Duke of Midnight (Maiden Lane #6)(97)

Maximus gently pulled it over her shoulders, wrapping his arms around her. He was never going to let her go after this. “What in bloody hell were you thinking?”

Makepeace cocked an eyebrow, but Maximus ignored it. He never, ever wanted to go through such agony again. He glared sternly down at the woman in his arms.

“I was thinking,” she rasped, “that you couldn’t get a clear shot with me in the way.”

He tucked her head under his chin, running his palm over her wet hair. “And so you decided to sacrifice yourself? Madam, I had not taken you for a halfwit.”

“I can swim.”

“Not in water-logged skirts.”

She frowned impatiently. “Did you shoot him?”

“I had much more important matters to consider,” Maximus snapped.

At that she tilted back her head and glared at him. “You’ve been hunting him for nearly two decades. What could possibly be more important than killing your parents’ murderer?”

He scowled at her. “You, you maddening woman. Whatever possessed you to…” Just the memory of watching her dive into the Thames made his throat close up. When he spoke again, his voice was rough. “Do not think to ever do that to me again, Diana. Had you not lived I would’ve joined you at the bottom of the Thames. I cannot survive without you.”

She blinked and her militant expression softened. “Oh, Maximus.” She laid her palm against his cheek.

And there in that wretched boat, dripping and shivering, with black smoke darkening the sky and ashes floating on the wind, Maximus thought that he’d never been so happy.

“I’ll find him again someday,” he murmured into her hair. “But once lost to me, I cannot find life without you, my Diana. Please, my love. Don’t ever leave me. I promise, on my mother’s grave, that I’ll never cleave to another but you.”

“I won’t leave,” she whispered back, her sweet gray eyes glowing, “though it is a pity you missed your chance with Lord Noakes.”

Makepeace cleared his throat. “As to that…”

“I shot him,” St. John muttered almost apologetically.

Maximus looked at him in astonishment.

St. John shrugged. “It seemed the thing to do, what with that gun to Miss Greaves’s head business and his subsequently shouting after she’d gone in that he’d started the fire and wasn’t sorry. Oh, and also, he shot at you, Wakefield, when you were in the water. Didn’t seem very gentlemanly, and although he wasn’t a very good shot, there was always the possibility that he wouldn’t miss with a second one. He was aiming another pistol when I shot him.”

“It was a good action.” Makepeace nodded. “And a good shot. Must’ve been near seventy feet.”

“Closer to fifty, I think,” St. John corrected modestly.

“Even so.”

“But…” Both men looked over inquiringly when Maximus spoke. “But I never asked you to help me with Noakes.”

Makepeace nodded, his expression grave. “You didn’t have to.”

“You never had to,” St. John concurred.

THAT NIGHT ARTEMIS lay nude in Maximus’s huge bed and watched as he shaved. She’d already had a lovely, hot bath and washed her hair twice. They’d dined in his rooms, a simple supper of chicken and gravy with carrots and peas and a cherry tart for dessert.

Nothing had ever tasted better.

“It’s rather a miracle that no one was killed,” she said. She’d been very glad of that news, even after spotting a very familiar set of broad shoulders among the crowd at the dock. “Do you think anything remains of Harte’s Folly?”

“Last I heard it was still smoldering,” Maximus replied without turning. He frowned at his reflection in his dresser mirror. “But I understand that the theater is completely gone as well as the musician’s colonnade. They might be able to save some of the plantings, but whether Harte will rebuild…” He shrugged. “The gardens are probably a lost cause.”

“It’s too bad,” she murmured. “Phoebe loved Harte’s Folly, and I rather liked it, too. It was such a magical place. Why do you think Lord Noakes set it alight in the first place?”

“Presumably to cover the fact that he’d just murdered his nephew,” Maximus replied.

“What?” She thought about the blood on Lord Noakes’s hands. “Poor man!”

“Well, he was trying to blackmail his uncle,” Maximus said drily. “If he’d just told me that he’d gotten the pendant from his uncle’s house in the first place, he’d be alive right now.”

“Mmm.” She picked at the coverlet. “Well, I suppose I wouldn’t have been going to Harte’s Folly again in any case.”

“Why not?” he asked absently. “Was the play not to your liking?”

“We didn’t get that far.” She sighed. “Penelope had rather a fit when we first arrived and caused a scene. I’m surprised no one told you.”

He turned slowly. “What?”

She looked at him. “She called me a whore.”

“Damn it.” He scowled at his hands. “That rather destroys my plans.”

“Plans for what?”