All the Rules of Heaven (All That Heaven Will Allow #1) - Amy Lane Page 0,95

yer brains run out yer nose. But leave ’er out of it.”

Behind her, Sophie struggled to her feet. “You need to leave now,” she said. “My brother is coming. He wants us. He’s a railroad man, and he won’t let you take us back. We won’t go back, you hear? You’ll have to kill me before I go back to your hateful house and let you use me at your will.”

Bridget wanted to weep for pride. Oh, her Sophie girl, so sure of her own weakness. She sounded like a warrior right then. No hands would touch her that she didn’t invite, and Bridget was the most blessed of women because Sophie only wanted her.

Conklin moved wicked fast, though, and when Bridget saw he was heading for Sophie like Bridget didn’t exist, she charged.

She didn’t feel the cruel backhand that sent her crashing across the room, but the wall—that she did feel.

She lay there, dazed, trying to push herself up through the ringing in her ears. Sophie started to scream, but Conklin punched her, and the next sound she made was a mewl of rage and pain.

And that was when Conklin lost himself, blind to all but his drugs and his madness.

The door was open; anyone could have seen. Bridget stared into the hall, praying for salvation, praying for help as Conklin ripped Sophie’s skirts from her body and drove himself into her, frothing and gibbering as he fucked.

Sophie sobbed, and Bridget put her hands under her one more time, and that’s when he arrived.

Bridget would spend the rest of her life thinking the only man she’d ever admire was James Beaufort.

He strode into the room and froze, but for just a moment. Just long enough to take in the scene.

Just long enough to see the paperweight.

The bronze base of the thing went rocketing across the room when it crashed down on Thomas Conklin’s head. He fell to the side and his baseless gibbering stopped.

The only sound left in the room was Sophie’s furious sobbing.

Bridget managed to find her feet as James sank to his knees. “Sophie?” And well might he have been confused. As she wriggled out from under the body of her attacker, his sister was a mess, half-clothed, blood dripping from her face, bruises on her chest, her breasts, her thighs.

“James?”

“Oh, baby sister. I’m so sorry—”

And then she fell upon him, weeping.

It was a fine tableau, and one Bridget would revisit many times in her long life—but they could not stay there any more than they could breathe life back into the monster leaking his brains out on the floor.

“We need to get rid of the body,” Bridget said, her voice echoing into the room. “We need to hide him and clean up and take him down the stairs tonight and bury him. There’s a small graveyard out back—they keep the earth there soft.”

“I’m sorry?” James asked, dazed and purposeless in the aftermath of murder.

Sophie struggled to her feet. “She’s right, James. We need to get rid of the body.”

James studied the blood on his hands. “But… but he was he was forcing himself on you, Sophie. Look at you. You’re—”

Sophie nodded and wiped her ruined dress over her bleeding mouth and nose. “Do you think he didn’t pay off the management?” she asked bitterly. “Do you see a soul here, James? We were making a ruckus fit to bring down God himself—but Conklin Senior, he’s got more money than God, you understand?” She flew to the door and slammed it shut and then returned to her brother’s side.

“James.” She hugged him tight, and he wrapped arms around her shoulders, clinging to her like she was a glimpse of sanity in a madhouse. She pulled back, though. “James, you must listen to me. We’ll leave tonight and bury Conklin in the cemetery. Who knows you’re here?”

“Henrietta,” he said, sounding puzzled.

“Anyone you work with? Did you talk to anybody when you came to town?”

James shook his head slowly. “Cover yourself, darling.”

Sophie grimaced at Bridget and went to grab a bath sheet from the pile crumpled in the corner. She wrapped it around herself.

“Now, James, think. Conklin was coming to find me—we don’t know how many people he told or who knows where he is now. But he’s not well liked. If he disappears, I’m not sure who will search for him. And nobody knows about you or Henri. I never told Tommy about you.”

“Why not?” James asked, frowning.

Sophie shrugged and looked at Bridget sorrowfully. “He wouldn’t have been