Page 24 of Between a Duke and a Hard Place
“Dammit, Violet! Have you completely lost your senses?”
Violet whipped around, her breath catching as Max stalked toward her, his coat billowing behind him, his expression a storm of fury and something darker still.
Her stomach dropped.
Oh, hell.
Chapter Twelve
Max had not known fear in many years.
Not since the war. Not since the battlefield. But when he’d returned home from his morning journey to Eddington’s, followed by his monthly visit to the tenant farmers at the farthest reaches of his ends, and been informed that his wife—his reckless, infuriating wife—had gone riding alone, cold terror had seized his spine. Following it, came absolute fury.
Her own family was plotting against her and still she behaved as though the world was not a dangerous place. When he’d returned home to find that she had gone out alone—he had not even thought. Instead he’d had only mounted his still saddled horse and ridden after her at a punishing pace, his jaw clenched so tightly he thought his teeth might crack.
And now, here she stood, blinking at him as if he were some troublesome gnat, utterly unrepentant. “I see my husband has developed a habit of following me about,” she said, her voice cool and dry as winter air.
Max reined in his horse so hard it reared slightly, then dismounted in one swift movement, closing the distance between them in three long strides.
“What the hell were you thinking?” he ground out.
She lifted a brow. “That I wanted to go for a ride. I’ve been riding on these lands for nearly two decades now!”
“Alone?”
She held her arms out akimbo. “Do you see anyone else, Max? I am quite obviously alone.”
He exhaled sharply, rubbing a hand down his face, physically restraining himself from throttling her. “You do realize that you are a target, do you not?” His voice was low, tight with fury. “For Eddington. For Nigel. For Ethella. None of them can be trusted and any of them could happen upon you here!"
Violet folded her arms. “On your land? They would not dare.”
Max let out a short, humorless laugh. “You really are a menace, aren’t you?”
“I have been called worse.”
“Would you like to hear worse?”
Her lips twitched, but she suppressed it. “I do not see the need for such dramatics.”
“Dramatics?” His voice rose. “You think this is dramatics?”
Violet did not step back.
Max did not step forward.
And yet, somehow, they were suddenly too close, the space between them thick with heat and tension, their breath coming short and fast.
“I will tell you something, your grace,” Max said, his voice now low and lethal. “Eddington does not care that you are wed to me. He does not care for titles or honor or consequence. He will take what he wants. And if he catches you alone…”
He did not finish the sentence.
He did not need to.
Violet’s breath shuddered out.
For the first time, true fear flickered in her eyes.
Max’s hands flexed at his sides, desperate to do something, to shake some sense into her, to pull her against him?—
