“Lowe,” he said, low and dark, and she spun toward the word. He was revealing her now? She supposed it was a good move. The checkmate of their game.
But disappointment came, nonetheless.
Until she realized he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking past her, over her right shoulder, into the eyes of her brother, who stood several feet away, on the edge of the ring, frustration and something worse in his gaze. Something unsettling. Something incalculable.
“You think you have won? You think you can take everything of mine . . .” He paused. “And my sister?”
The room went silent, every man present leaning forward to hear the conversation.
She stepped toward her brother, knowing that he was furious. Eager to calm him. To keep him from Temple. From ruining her plans. From ruining what she was building.
The good and the bad.
Temple stopped her with a hand on her arm, immediately placing himself between her and her brother. Kit was already shaking his head, coming forward, driven by stupidity, his voice loud and angry. “All of London thinks you a winner. A hero. But the Killer Duke is nothing more than a coward.” He looked to Mara, and she saw the loathing there, her father’s as much as Kit’s. “A coward and a whoremonger.”
The gasp that rippled through the room was Mara’s as much as any others’. The words were a blow, dealt from the one man who should have been concerned for her reputation. Temple would have to fight him now. He wouldn’t have a choice, and Kit knew it. One did not call a man a coward and not receive a fight. She stepped toward him, wanting to stop it. Wishing she could hurt him herself.
Temple’s arm came across her chest. He turned to her. Spoke softly, for her ears only. “No. This is my fight.”
There was anger in his gaze, too. But it was different, somehow.
It was for her.
Who was this man?
Kit did not see the anger, too blinded by his own bluster. “You won’t fight the one man who has an honest reason for it.” He lifted his fists. “But now I am here, and you can’t ignore me. You’ll fight me.”
The words unlocked the men assembled. They moved in a wave of humanity, bombarding the bookmakers around the room, each eager to place their bets.
“It’s the Fight of the Century!” someone called out.
“Two hundred on Temple for an immediate win!” Another cried, “A single round—repeated!”
“Fifty says Temple breaks three of Lowe’s ribs!” A deep voice called.
“I’ve seventy-five on the Killer Duke earning his moniker again!”
London had been waiting for this fight for a decade. For longer. The Killer Duke versus the brother of his kill. The ultimate David and Goliath.
Kit’s words from their meeting days earlier echoed through her. I am not free of this. And now, neither are you. He would ruin everything. Lose it all, again. And destroy everything she’d worked for in the process. Temple would get his vengeance; she would get nothing.
The thought should have brought resignation. Should have brought devastation. Should have come on the urge to flee. But instead, it brought sadness, for hadn’t there been a time, a moment, when she’d had a taste of what it would be to win it all? The money, the orphanage . . . the man?
She pushed the thought away.
He was not for winning. Certainly not by her.
She didn’t deserve him.
Now, after this, he would be rid of her.
Temple turned to her, pushing her back to the ropes. “Temple,” she said quietly, not knowing how she would finish.
This wasn’t my plan.
I didn’t know he was here.
Win.
He didn’t look at her. It was as though she didn’t exist. And in that moment, nothing else mattered. All she wanted was for him to see her. All she wanted was to go back. To the dressmaker. To the night on the street outside his home. To twelve years earlier.
All she wanted was to change it.
“Temple,” she said, again, wishing his name said all of it.
He ignored her, lifting her over the ropes and passing her down to the Marquess of Bourne standing on the other side. Bourne caught her and held her, keeping her safe from the throngs around them. “He should kill you for setting him up.”
Dear God. They couldn’t possibly think she’d planned this.
He couldn’t possibly.
Except, it was precisely what she would have thought, if the situation was reversed.
And she and Temple were two sides to the same coin.
She would tell him everything once he’d won. All of it. From the beginning. She would tell him that the money belonged to the orphanage. That she fought for the boys, and nothing else. That she did not wish him ill.
That she wished him to win.
But for now, she had no choice but to watch the bout. Temple faced Kit—faced her—and she saw that this was nothing like the fight with Drake. There was emotion in his eyes this time. Anger. Fury.
More.
He dragged his foot through the sawdust in a powerful, undeniable beginning.
Or perhaps it was an end.
The fight began, and even now, Temple followed his own rules. Allowing Kit the first move. Her brother grabbed at Temple with vicious intensity, landing a blow to the eye.
She hadn’t expected the sound of flesh on bone, the way fists fell with hollow thuds. The way knuckles slapped against bone. The sound turned her stomach as she watched Temple take first one hit, then another, then a third. And then, as though he’d been counting the blows, offering them for free before forcing her brother to pay for them, he came at Kit the way she’d always heard he fought.
His fists landed like thunder, pummeling Kit’s abdomen and sides, until her brother turned from the assault, taking a moment to find his breath. To find his strength. And went at Temple again.
Perhaps he was named because he was built like stone, impenetrable. Unbeatable. As though the world could come to an end, and Temple alone would survive. His fists rained down upon her brother. Jabbing and crossing and cutting until Kit fell away, coming to rest on the ropes mere inches from her, one eye nearly shut from the blows.
She might hate him at times. He might no longer be the boy she’d known—the one she’d left—but he was still her brother. And she did not wish him dead. She pled with him. “Kit! Stop this! He’ll kill you!”
He met her gaze, and she expected to see pain or regret or surprise there . . . but instead, she saw something unexpected. Hatred. “You chose him.”
She shook her head, instinctively. “No.” It wasn’t true. Was it? She’d chosen the boys. She’d chosen their safety.
And then . . . somehow, she’d chosen Temple.
The thought shocked her. Dear God. Had she chosen him?
Would he allow it? Her gaze flickered to him, coming at them. Coming to fetch Kit. Temple’s eyes found hers instead. Cold. Hard.
Betrayed.
She hated that look. Couldn’t face it. Turned back to her brother, who smiled, the way he always had when they were children and he was about to do something that they would enjoy, but that would no doubt earn him a beating from their father.
And then he reached for the floor of the ring.
For her knife.
She saw the gleam of silver before anyone else.
Mara gasped and screamed out, “No!”
But it was too late. He went at Temple without finesse—with sheer, unmitigated force.
Her gaze flew to Temple, who was not watching Kit.
He was watching her.
Dear God.
“He’ll kill you!” The same words, now with a different meaning. “No!” She was a madwoman, breaking free of Bourne’s grasp and pushing toward the ring, grasping at the ropes, trying to get to Temple.