Daring and the Duke (The Bareknuckle Bastards #3)(106)

Instead, it was welcoming, as though the whole room, the whole house, the dukedom itself had waited for Ewan to return. For this.

He stopped beneath his father’s portrait, a large oil painting that seemed, somehow, to have avoided the neglect and age that the rest of the manor had suffered, as though his father had sold his soul to ensure that he would forever be remembered like this—impeccably handsome and with the amber eyes he had passed onto all three of his sons.

Ewan had never liked looking at the painting; he’d never liked the similarities he saw in it. The eyes, the sweep of blond hair, the angled jaw, the long straight nose that would have been a similarity if Devil hadn’t broken Ewan’s and given him a gift in the balance.

For decades, Ewan thought that broken nose was all that set him apart from his father. The only thing that made him different—for hadn’t he made the same choices as his sire?

“You bastard.” The words were gunshot in that room that hadn’t witnessed sound in ten years. “You used to love throwing that word at us. Like a weapon. Because we didn’t belong to you. And you thought that was the pain of it. You never knew the truth, you feckless coward . . .”

Three boys, his brothers.

“You never knew that the word would knit us together. That it made us stronger than you. That it made us better than you.” He stared his father down, through the darkness and the years. “You never knew that it would be your downfall.

“But you always knew she would be, didn’t you?” he whispered, finally letting himself remember. Who he had come for. And why. “You feared her because of what she was to me, and that was before I understood what it was to love her. Before I understood what it was to stand with her, and see the future, and know that it did not have to be bleak. That it could be strong and smart and full of hope. And full of love.”

He paused, breathing in the silence. Knowing this was the last time he would stand in this room. Knowing it was the last time he would give even a moment to this man. To this place. To the name that was never his.

Knowing that he would walk away from this estate tonight, and return to London, and make good on that long-ago promise he’d made to the place he’d always loved. To the woman he loved, who had already begun making good on it.

We’re going to change all that.

Together.

Ewan lifted the candle, looked his father in the eye, and said, “You were right to fear her; but you should have feared me, as well.”

And he set the portrait on fire.

The flames took hold instantly, the frame and canvas like perfect tinder, and Ewan turned to leave as the fire crawled up the wall, consuming this room, as though it were sentient, and knew the work he required of it.

Ewan left the room and found the next, knowing he had one chance to leave everything behind and return to London. To return to her and start a new life. Together. Away from this place and the specter of it. Quickly, methodically, he set more portraits aflame, the fire chasing over plaster and the woodwork, down the stairs—moving more quickly than he could have imagined.

It was a fire that would be talked about in Essex for years.

And with every moment, every new flame, Ewan felt more free.

Free to return home.

To her.

When the fire blazed to his satisfaction, hot enough to ensure the end of this place that deserved to be reduced to rubble, Ewan made for the door, the flames making quick work around him.

Good. It was time for it to end.

He didn’t want to waste another minute dwelling on the past.

He wanted the future.

He wanted Grace.

He crossed the massive entryway toward the door, even as the flames licked over the first floor banister. Through an open door, he saw how they’d already chased through into the conservatory. Fast like fury. Hot like freedom.

Ewan set his hand to the door handle and pulled the door open, the cool air a welcome respite to the blazing heat inside. Before he could step through to the outside, an ominous creak sounded from above. He looked up to the first floor, where an overhang jutted out over the entryway, now swallowed by flames.

The hesitation was a mistake.

With a horrendous roar, the balcony peeled from the wall, and somehow, in the sound, he heard her voice.





Chapter Twenty-Six


Grace and her brothers rode the hours to Burghsey House in silence, the air inside the carriage thickening with memory as they returned to the place that had shaped them—Devil’s vengeance and Whit’s fury and Grace’s power. And as the wheels clattered and the miles stretched into hours, they all lost themselves to the past.

Three hours into the ride, Devil cursed harshly in the waning light. “Christ. I don’t remember it being so far.”

“It took us two days to get to London,” Whit said, rubbing a hand absently over his torso, an echo of the broken ribs he’d had on that interminable walk.

Thirty minutes later, Devil’s fidgeting was nearly unbearable, his cane in constant motion against the toe of his boot. “I don’t remember it being so fucking empty.”

“I remember that,” Grace said, softly, looking out the window, the sun setting in the distance in a blaze of yellows and oranges. “I remember how lonely it was, before you came.” And then once they’d arrived, it was as though someone had lit the lanterns at the estate. “Though I suppose I should not say such a thing, considering what came of you being there.”