Page 166 of Pride: The Rogue
Latimer cleared his throat. “We’ve not had the pleasure—”
“Of course, we haven’t, you bloody bastard,” the earl icily chided. “I wouldn’t be caught tossing aside coins at your ridiculously depraved,club.” He sneered. “Furthermore, you’ve got a pair of ballocks on you to refer to our meeting as a pleasure.”
Aye, he deserved Maxwell’s loathing and far worse.
“I’m here to speak with Miss Lovelace, Maxwell,” he said, keeping his calm.
“No.”
Latimer’s jaw rippled. So, this was how it was going to be. Her brother-in-law was going to make him work for it. That was fine. Latimer deserved that.
“I understand—”
“If you understood anything at all, you’d have known not to waste your time coming to my goddamned household and asking to see Miss Lovelace.”
“Has Livian indicated she doesn’t want to see me?”
Latimer’s use of her given name served its intended purpose.
It knocked the earl off balance—briefly.
Maxwell retorted with a question of his own. “Do you truly believe she wants to?”
“I don’t know,” Latimer acknowledged. Emotion made his voice rougher than usual. “She would have every reason not to.”
A dark rage contorted the earl’s features. “That’s enough reason for me to have your worthless arse thrown off my property.”
Hearing their master’s cue, Bran and Fowler stepped forward.
He was going to be turned away without even having a chance to see her. Desperation, despair, and fury sent a growl rumbling in his chest.
“I’m not leaving until she herself tells me to go to the devil,” Latimer warned, bracing for battle.
“Permission to kill himnow?” Bram issued that plaintive plea.
“She won’t have the pleasure of doing so, becauseI’llkill you before I let you see her,” Maxwell bellowed, bumping his chest against Latimer’s.
Keeping calm in the face of the other man’s uncontrollable fury, Latimer smiled coldly. “If you believe Livian wants you making choices for her or needs you to protect her from me, herself, or anyone, you don’t know her as well as you think you do.”
The earl hauled back to strike Latimer.
“Malcom!” That shout froze the other man.
Silence descended over the foyer.
“Lachlan.” Livian’s whisper was the first to penetrate the unnatural quiet.
His heart hammering, Latimer glanced up.
Livian stood at the top of the stairs beside a dark-haired, willowy woman, whose body positioning marked her as a sister—even if her coloring did not.
All of his focus, every muscle, every nerve-ending stretched and strained toward Livian.
Oh, God.
Her skin was pale where it’d always been filled with lively color. Her gaze, stunned, when last it had been hurting and pained.
Everything seized up inside him.
