Brazen and the Beast (The Bareknuckle Bastards #2)(73)

The man who held her stiffened, and it didn’t take twenty years of fighting to know his intent. His hand fisted.

Rage clouded Whit’s vision.

He started to run, to get to Hattie before the dead man could land the punch. And he would be a dead man if he landed the punch. Whit would kill him before he could take another breath.

Nearly there.

Letting out a wild roar, he launched himself toward her, pushing her down, away from the man’s blow, turning mid-tumble to take the full force of the landing, protecting her from the hard ground.

They landed, her eyes squeezed tightly closed, and time stopped until she opened them, a fraction away from his own. Relief slammed through him, with more force than the boot he’d taken earlier. He resisted the urge to kiss her—the assembly had had enough of a spectacle. Instead, he lowered his voice and said the only thing that came to mind.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

She didn’t miss a beat. “I came for my business.”

Excitement thrummed through him. She was fucking glorious.

She also wasn’t hurt. He gave her a once-over to be certain, then rolled her to the ground and came to his feet, immediately heading for the man who’d been about to hit her.

The man whose anger had turned to fear.

“If you’re looking for a bout, you’ll have it with me,” he growled, turning the man pale in the light from one of the nearby fires.

“I—” The man shook his head. “He pushed me first!”

Whit set his hands to the man’s shoulders and pushed, the crowd parting to let him fall onto his backside. “Now I’ve pushed you. Do you intend to fight me?”

“N-no.” He scrambled away like an insect.

It wasn’t enough. Whit was gone, turned full Beast. He took a step toward his enemy, wanting nothing more than to end him.

A hand fell on his shoulder, the weight of it heavy and familiar. His brother.

Whit stilled.

“Let it go,” Devil said, soft at his ear. “Get your girl. And get her out of here, before people sort out what just happened and start asking questions.”

It was too late to prevent that—he turned to her—the woman Devil called his girl. She wasn’t, of course. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t stop himself from protecting her. It was habit. It had nothing to do with her.

But he couldn’t protect her from him.

Whit turned to find Hattie several yards away, on her feet again, with her friend Nora, who was, apparently, as much trouble as Hattie was. Felicity was fussing over her, brushing dirt from her sleeve and chattering, as though this were all perfectly normal. Nora was transfixed by Annika, who stood nearby, hip cocked, the long blade she kept there gleaming in the firelight.

As his gaze tracked Hattie, Whit went stiff with renewed anger. Her hat was askew and dirt smudged her face, her coat was torn at the shoulder—a fact that made him want to do immense damage. A wild thought came—had the man who’d touched her been sent by Ewan?

A growl sounded from low in his throat, and he started to turn back, but Devil stayed the movement, seeming to understand. “Just a drunk.” And then a single, strong word. “Her.”

She was what was important. Christ. He wanted to pick her up and carry her from there like a damn Neanderthal. “She can’t be seen with me.”

Devil looked straight at him. “He isn’t here.”

“He could be.”

He nodded. “He could be. But he’s not.”

Whit spun away, approaching the cluster of women, keenly aware of Hattie’s eyes on him, widening as he closed the distance between them. “You—” she said, and the tremor in her voice nearly did him in. “You’re bleeding.”

He did not slow his approach even as he looked down to find a three-inch gash low on his right side. A knife wound. He looked back at her, hand still, clutching a pocketknife. “You stabbed me.”

Her jaw dropped. “I did not!” She narrowed her eyes on his. “Though you certainly would have deserved it, you bastard.”

Devil laughed, low enough that only Whit could hear him. “Now I know why you like her so much. She’ll run you ragged.”

Before Whit could argue that he did not like her, and she absolutely would not run him ragged because she wasn’t getting anywhere near him after he saw her home tonight, Devil was looking to Sarita, the young bookmaker trying to calm the crowd, now arguing that Hattie’s interruption had impacted the outcome of the fight.

“We told ya there’d be free O’Malleys in the dirt, gents, and free there are,” the girl crowed, backed by two larger men from the Bastards’ crew. “I’ve no wagers on Beast gettin’ knifed by a spectator, so sod off wi’ that—not that I’d pay out on it, as there ’e stands, right as rain.”

Devil waved the girl over, and she came like a flash to receive her orders, cheeks glowing copper with excitement. While they spoke, Whit did what he could to hold himself together, to keep from taking Hattie in hand, from railing at her for turning up here, where anything could have happened. What if he hadn’t been here? What if he hadn’t been able to protect her?

The idea was unbearable.

He rubbed a hand over his chest to ease the aggravated tightness there as Devil returned to him, pressing a linen sack filled with ice into his hands. “Take the girl home. Get yourself sorted.”