The Governess (Wicked Wallflowers, #3)(92)

Lord Maddock again laughed; that taunting, rusty rumble of empty mirth sent heat up Broderick’s neck. “So you care about the lady. It’s all very splendid. You ruined your last hopes for a powerful connection.” He inclined his head, those golden strands an image of Stephen’s. “Take heart—nothing and no one could have saved you.”

Of course this man would believe that was the reason for Broderick’s actions—the desire for noble connections. He’d not see that it was always about putting his family’s future to rights. “I did not give the order for your home to be burnt,” he said quietly.

“My family,” Maddock rasped, surging forward in his chair, the first crack in the man’s otherwise steely facade. “My family was burnt. My wife. My unborn babe.” Little flecks of madness glimmered in the tortured marquess’s eyes. And Broderick’s insides twisted. The man he’d given his allegiance to was to blame, but Broderick had supported him. “My son was taken from me,” the marquess said flatly.

“I had no knowledge of your son’s kidnapping.” But he’d given the orders all the same. His ownership of that vile deed came from that command.

Maddock went on as though Broderick hadn’t spoken. “And then you’d attempt to foist one of Diggory’s bastards off on me.” He slammed his fist onto his desk. Several piles of ledgers tumbled over the edge and landed with a noisy thwack. Flecks of dust danced around the air. The marquess peeled his lips in a sneer that heightened the harshness of his features. And then he settled back in his throne chair, shifting back and forth on that seat, bent on reining in that show of emotion. “This past week, while you raced about London trying to find your sister a husband and yourself a way out of your eventual fate, I’ve sat here.” He spread his arms wide. “Waiting. Reveling in the moment. Because checkmate was declared long ago. But you?” He quirked one eyebrow, continually taunting. Baiting. “You still believed there was a way out. You thought you might find a lord in London who’d intervene on your behalf when I eventually came to collect.”

It was an unfamiliar place to be for Broderick. On the opposite end. With someone else pulling the strings of one’s life. There was a hopelessness here. A bleak desolation that came in discovering how powerless one truly was.

And this was how so many other men had felt . . . with Broderick at the other end of power. He should leave. There was nothing to say. No begging, pleading, or reasoning that would halt what this man, mad for the losses he’d suffered, intended. And yet he forced himself to stand there because he’d tired of running from him. “I thought perhaps peace might be possible.”

“Pfft.” The marquess scoffed. “Arrogant and hopeful until the end. But that is what you people do. You survive. You scurry about like cockroaches, escaping gaol, a hangman’s noose, a constable’s capture. But not this time.” His eyes bore the glimmer of a man possessed. “This time, I’m going to end you. I’m going to take down your empire and leave those street rats you call siblings mourning for their guttersnipe brother.”

“Stephen is your son,” he said quietly.

“Get out,” the marquess thundered, exploding to his feet with such force the chair toppled behind him. A crack in his kingdom. His chest heaved, and his face flushed. Maddock closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them, those dark irises had been transformed to their deadened state. “You asked what I want? Your ruin. And I’ll have it. You’ll not know when it’s coming. You’ll mayhap think yourself able to escape your fate. Now, get out,” he spat.

Broderick quit the marquess’s office. Where revenge was exacted swift and precise in the Dials, the marquess was so mad he either didn’t know or care about all that might go wrong in one’s waiting. And that was the only fledgling of hope to take from this.

The butler, hovering in the hall, jerked to attention. “This way,” he said tightly, motioning for Broderick to proceed. When they reached the hall, a servant stood in wait with his cloak. The butler took the garment from the footman and tossed it hard at Broderick.

He caught it against his chest.

“You are deserving of it, you know. Any revenge he exacts.” He jerked the door open. “Get the hell out.”

Even with that ire directed his way, there was a loyalty to the lanky young man Broderick appreciated. “I know,” he said quietly, shrugging into his cloak.

Gathering the reins of his mount from the street urchin he’d handed him off to earlier, Broderick tossed over another purse.

“Ya’re Killoran, ain’t ya?” the boy whispered, a reverent awe there.

He stiffened.

“They say ya’re hiring children. Lots of them.”

He had been. Not because of any honorable idea on his part, but because of his sister. It was a hard day when one looked at oneself and found how little good there was in him. “I am.” He tugged out a card and handed it over. “Ask for the guard MacLeod. Inform him that I sent you and urge him to find you work.”

The painfully thin lad’s eyes formed round circles. “Ya ’aving a laugh?”

He started. The high-pitched timbre revealed not a small boy but rather a girl. Similar in age and size to Cleo when Broderick had first entered the Killoran gang. “I’m not. MacLeod will help you.” But then, who would help her thereafter? Broderick’s stomach twisted.