The Wallflower Wager - Tessa Dare Page 0,79

I’ve never seen her like this before.”

“Delope,” Chase said. “Do it for her.”

Gabe spoke through a clenched jaw. “Everything I will ever do for the remainder of my life—whether that life lasts ten minutes or fifty years—is for her. I don’t require your approval, and I don’t need you as my goddamned second and third.” When neither of the two men moved, Gabe bellowed at them, “Begone.”

Before walking away, Chase leaned close. “Just as a point of clarification, in case you do die . . . Which of us would you say was the second, and which the third?”

“For Christ’s sake.” Gabe was going to finish this. Now. He stalked across the green, took one of the prepared dueling pistols from the case, and approached Lambert until they stood toe-to-toe. “We don’t have to do this.”

“Are you offering to apologize for this grievous misunderstanding?”

“No.” He jammed the barrel of the pistol into Lambert’s gut. “I’m thinking I’ll skip over the ten paces nonsense and shoot you right now in cold blood.”

Lambert made a croaking noise. “You’d hang for that.”

“Perhaps.”

The fact might have dissuaded Gabe—if he wasn’t a dead man already.

Ash and Chase were right. He would be at a disadvantage shooting from any distance, and he’d be committing a crime punishable by death. Maybe he’d survive the duel, but he’d be captured soon afterward—and if he didn’t succeed in killing Lambert, it would have been for nothing. If he was going to swing from the end of a noose, he might as well go out knowing he’d meet this monster in Hell.

“You won’t get away with it,” Lambert said. “Everyone knows what you are. Word about the ton is that you’re nothing but a lowborn guttersnipe.”

“The word about the ton is right.” Gabe cocked the pistol. “And this lowborn guttersnipe is sending you to Hell.”

“Wait!”

The cry pierced the fog. It was a high-pitched, desperate cry. Female. Familiar.

Gabe closed his eyes and cursed.

Penny.

“Wait!” Penny cried, dashing over the damp grass with her hem hiked to her ankles. By the time she arrived at Gabriel’s side, she was panting. “Wait. Don’t shoot him.”

“Penny, what are you doing here?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” she hissed. “I’m preventing you from doing something that will get you killed.”

“You need to leave. You don’t belong here.”

“You’re wrong. I do belong here. If anyone’s going to defend my honor this morning, it’s going to be me.” She put her hand over the barrel of the pistol. “I’m the only one who can do this.”

Gabriel reluctantly fell back a step.

Penny took his place, standing directly in front of Lambert. She looked him in the eye. “I have things to say to you. You’re going to listen. Silently. Not one word. Otherwise, Mr. Duke will have my permission to do with you what he will. Understood?”

“Now, poppet. We—”

“Not. One. Word,” she growled.

Gabriel aimed the pistol.

Lambert displayed his open hands. Silently.

“I was a child. I trusted you. My family trusted you. What you did to me was an unconscionable betrayal of that trust.”

Bradford turned to his father-in-law. “What does she mean?”

“I can’t imagine,” Lambert said.

“He touched me,” Penny told her brother. Her voice was flat, drained of emotion. “In ways a grown man should never touch a girl. He did it for years.”

“I would never hurt you, poppet. You must have misunderstood.”

“I understood perfectly. You gained my trust with gifts and attention, and then you manipulated that trust to hurt me. You drove a wedge between me and my parents. You made me feel dirty and ashamed.”

“Penny,” her brother said. “If what you’re saying is true, why did you never say anything before now?”

“Oh, Bradford. Because of this. Precisely this. I knew you would doubt me.”

“I don’t doubt you believe you’re telling the truth. But I do wonder if you might be confused.”

“Calling me ‘confused’ is doubting me.” She kept her gaze on Lambert. “I’m not confused. I recall everything. Every hug that lasted too long. Every kiss in exchange for a sweetmeat. Every ‘dancing lesson’ in the ballroom that one rainy autumn. And I remember every caution to keep those things secret. I knew it was wrong, even as a child. You knew it was wrong, too.”

“Wrong isn’t the word,” Gabriel interjected. “Sick. Monstrous. Evil. Death is too good for you, you—”

“Thank you,” Penny cut in. “I appreciate your support, but I’ll choose my own words today. And I’ll take my own retribution.”

Lambert chuckled. “Retribution?”

“I will never forgive you for ruining those years that should have been happy, or for ruining