Page 115 of The Wolf of Mayfair
He smirked. “I assure you, this union is very much consummated,Duke.”
The duke slammed a fist into a porcelain urn that rested on a nearby side table. The tall, cobalt-blue vase exploded into a sea of tiny shards upon the marble flooring.
Blood dripped from the old bastard’s wrist.
Helia stared on with horror in her revealing eyes.
“And I’ll have you know,” Wingrave continued, the calm to his father’s storm, “your threats of sending your wife away end this day. Should you attempt to have her placed in an institution, I will freely speak about how your own insanity led you to place a woman most respected, revered, and appreciated by thetoninto a cell.”
Spittle formed at the corners of the duke’s limp mouth.
Done with the duke, now and forever, Wingrave looked to the shadows, where his mother remained.
He motioned for her to join them.
The duchess inched out.
“How dare you threaten me?” the duke shouted, and the echo of his vitriol sent her into hiding once more. “How dare you seek to control that which is mine?”
“I do so very easily,Father,” he said mockingly. “Because your days on earth are numbered and power is mine. You know it, and you hate it.”
With that, Wingrave looked to Helia. “Come,” he murmured, guiding her toward the door. He’d not have her see any more of this.
There’d been a time when Wingrave would have relished nothing more than a good row with the nasty bastard. Now, however, with Helia in his life, he’d no interest in battling his father and instead had a desire to spend every goddamned moment of his life loving her and simply existing in her presence.
“Where are you going, Wingrave?” his father bellowed. “We are not done. This is not done. Return this instant.”
Behind them, the duke cursed and shouted.
There came a great, resounding crash.
Helia paused and glanced back.
Like some wild, rabid beast, Wingrave’s father grabbed everything in his sight and upended it.
He grabbed a gilded clock in one hand and a vase in the other and hurled them at the wide double doors.
The crash of shattering glass came over and over as he chucked every fragile piece that adorned the room until he stood amidst the shards of his crumbling empire.
Panting and crazed as any madman bound for Bedlam, the duke flitted wild eyes about.
Wingrave’s sire, with every delicate piece now broken before him, squatted and, with a savage roar, hefted a gilded and marble console table over his head—
“Oh, my God,” Helia whispered.
“There’s no god in this,” Wingrave said, guiding her face away from the melee. “This is the Devil’s work.”
He tried to tug her free, but in the face of mayhem, Helia lingered still.
“Helia,” Wingrave said loudly over the duke’s din.
“We are not leaving her with him, Anthony.”
Wingrave looked toward his mother’s hiding spot and stretched a hand toward her.
Amidst the duke’s destruction, the duchess rushed to join them. Without hesitation she placed her fingers in Helia’s welcoming ones.
Wingrave gave his wife and mother cover.
