The Devil in Her Bed (Devil You Know #3) - Kerrigan Byrne Page 0,3

make it there, they might be able to attempt the short dash to the forest undetected.

She could lose them in the forest. The children of Mont Claire spent their entire childhood slithering through warrens, exploring primordial root systems, or climbing trees on imaginary adventures.

Pippa breached the main floor to the sound of violence and chaos. Even though their hands were slippery with sweat, she and Francesca kept a tight, painful grip on each other as they ran.

Her mother’s words became a mantra, a throb in her head, an agony in her heart, and the strength in her legs.

Live. Live. Get out of this house. Live. Live. Get out of this house.

The force with which Francesca was ripped from Pippa’s grasp nearly pulled her off her own feet. She whirled around to see the American with the white cowboy hat put a knife to her best friend’s neck.

Francesca Cavendish, her grey eyes wide with terror, was the last person alive to say Pippa’s name …

And her last word before the blade moved was an admonishment to run.

An irritating siren pierced the air at a terrible pitch, ceaseless and grating. It drowned out the sounds of fear and death filtering to Pippa through the tremendous halls of Mont Claire.

Could no one stop these men? Would they simply swarm the manor like an army of ants, and dismantle every living thing inside?

Pippa had to escape it. It would deafen her, surely. Turning on her heel, she fled down the hall, but was intersected by another masked man before she could reach the furnace room.

“Grab the little bitch!” the American ordered.

Pippa leapt to the side, scrambling down a narrow service corridor that dumped her into a main marbled hallway.

The siren scream haunted her as she sped down halls, blindly crashed through doors, and leapt around and over the bodies of those she’d known her entire life. She was grateful for her tears. For the way they softened and blurred the sights of gore, blood, and the dead-eyed features of her beloved. She left a trail of her tears as she ran.

A man seized her braid and yanked with such force, she lost her balance.

It wasn’t the American, but a smaller foe with a blade no less fearsome. He lifted it over his head, his intention unmistakable as it arced toward her chest.

A battle cry cracked on a high note as Declan Chandler leapt from the study and drove a fire poker into the man’s head. He didn’t stop swinging, even after the man crashed to the ground like a felled tree. Declan’s movements remained tight and frenzied, his eyes black with a rage Pippa didn’t understand. After the fifth blow, Declan tossed the instrument at the man’s misshapen skull and seized Pippa.

The wail that had been aggravating her miraculously ceased when he clamped a hand over her mouth. Yanking her forward, Declan half dragged, half carried her through the study and into the Mont Claire library, a two-story phenomenon with more books than could be counted.

Before she could struggle or stop crying long enough to ask what he was doing, Declan took them to the fireplace, which was large enough to have housed a small tenant family.

Declan held a rough finger to his smooth lips. “If you’re not quiet, they’ll kill us both, do you understand?”

Upon her nod, he took his hand off her mouth. Turning to her, he seized both her wrists, then stared down in horror at the drops and smears of blood marring her flesh and white sleeves.

“Pip, are you hurt?”

She shook her head, unable to form words for the horror of it.

“What is this?” he demanded. “Whose blood?”

Francesca’s blood.

“Not mine,” was all she could say.

Loud boots and bloodthirsty calls filtered down the grand marble halls as a cadre of men threatened to discover them.

“Here,” he whispered, and shoved her up the chimney before following her.

Soot and grime coated them both as they shimmied up the wide, cylindrical flue, their bodies wedged so tightly, Pippa worried that they wouldn’t be able to get out again. Rough walls abraded her arms and back, and tore at the coarse wool of her dress and stockings.

Declan braced his legs beneath her so she’d have something of a perch and used his long arm to stabilize them, wrapping the other around her.

Pippa’s chest burned from exertion, and ached with a well of grief so intense, she worried it would crush her lungs. She could see nothing in the dark of the chimney. She could only