Page 54 of Madcap with a Marquess
He dipped his chin in a clipped nod. A slight shuffling drew Rupert’s gaze, and a fresh wave of rage flooded his veins as it landed on Franny’s attacker. Walking away was too meager a consequence for what the man had done, for what he had aimed to do. Rupert walked up to the man, and the cad scrambled backward. But he was too slow. Rupert crashed his boot down onto the man’s bent knee. It gave way with a sickening crack, and the man’s piercing scream cut through the night. That would do.
Rupert turned back to Franny, her eyes wide, mouth agape. He bent over, grabbed her waist, and threw her over his shoulder.
“Rupert! This is not what I meant!”
He strode off toward the carriage. Rage still pumped through his veins. He was beyond infuriated with his wife. But he could get used to throwing her over his shoulder.
28
Franny
Theadjoiningbedchamberdoorslammed behind Franny, and she jumped. She had no idea what this conversation was going to bring, but she was determined to finally have a full discussion with her husband. They were going to talk. She would make it so.
She spun around and faced Rupert. He stood in front of the door separating their rooms, chest rising and falling as if he’d run back to Rutledge Manor instead of subjecting her to a silent carriage ride. His brown curls were wild, standing on end in some places. A large purple bruise was already sprouting below his right eye, dark dried blood spread over his nose and cheek, and a few cuts still oozing bright red. He had lost his coat at some point from the carriage to the bedchamber. The muscles of his arms contracted, twitched. His body radiating with tension. With rage.
Her breathing picked up. He was so animal, so powerfully arousing. The way he had taken down her assailants. Her core pulsed. She fanned herself with her hand.He’s cross with you, Franny. Get a hold of yourself.But she didn’t want to. She was alive. They were alive. Her blood thrummed. Priggish Perty going all…Protective Perty was enough to send her body into heat. Her gaze locked on his. Dark muddy waters stared back at her. How she wanted to jump into those dirty depths with him.
“Whatthe fuckwere you thinking, Franny?”
Oh. She liked that language on his tongue.
“Do you have feathers for brains? Do you even have that? God, do you have any idea the danger you put yourself in? And for what—a little thrill? Are you incapable of thinking before acting?”
She blinked. She didn’t particularly likethat, though. “Nothing happened, Rupert. I am fine. Truly, it is not a big deal.”
Perhaps, that was laying it on a bit thick. But nothinghadhappened. Franny did not—could not—dwell on it. If she chose to dwell on the things she’d endured for the last two decades of her life, it’d swallow her whole. She’d long ago learned to shove those memories into a deep, dark corner, locking them away where they couldn’t reach her. It wasn’t the first time men had tried to take advantage of her, even if it had been the most dire.
Franny did what she always did—numbed herself and moved on without looking back. Pretended it didn’t exist. She was an expert at pretending, after all. So skilled at it at this point, she could no longer tell where the act ended and she began.
The flickering candlelight gleamed against the whites of his eyes, stretched unnaturally wide. Apprehension skittered over her at his unhinged stare. Or perhaps it was the way he appeared to be trying to wrench out his hair… She opened her mouth—
“Oh my God,” he said, laughing wildly, jerking his head back and forth. “It is not a big deal? It is not abigdeal?Do you know what those men were going to do to you? Fuck, Franny! All I keep seeing over and over in my mind are those men on you. All I can think about iswhat if I hadn’t gotten there in time?” His voice broke, and he dragged a hand down his face, inhaled sharply. “Are you—?” He struggled to swallow. “Did they hurt you?”
“I’m fine, truly,” she rushed to assure him.
“You’re fine,” he repeated, his voice oddly high-pitched. A laugh burst from him, hollow and frantic, and it danced around them like a deranged echo. “You’re bloody fine. Thank the fucking Lord, because it was very close to you beingfarfrom fine. God, you don’t think, Franny! You do as you please and piss on the consequences. Not giving a bloody damn about the destruction you leave in your wake. The people you hurt, the ones who care for you. Do you have any fucking clue the scare you just put me through? First, not knowing if I would even find you. And then, seeing those men…”
He yanked on his hair, his ribcage heaving, waistcoat straining at the seams. “I would havemurderedthem if I had the chance. All because you ran off acting like an unruly child. Because you cannot possibly sit home and act like a respectable woman!”
Her frustration boiled over, shooting from her like steam from a kettle. It always came back to blasted respectability with him.
“You are such an insufferable lobcock! You think I was running off to have some fun—for athrill? No. I was trying to win enough money so I could leave your bloody disparaging arse. All I get from you is condemnation. I willneverbe good enough for the Prestigious Perty.” She sucked in air.
And then her breath stuttered.
She blinked as his words registered.
“You care for me?” she asked dumbly.
He actually cared what happened to her? Two decades of the absence of it made the concept nearly impossible for her mind to make sense of. And she thought at this point, she probably wouldn’t even recognize it if it hit her square in the face.
That’s when she noticed the absence. The absence of his chest rising and falling, the absence of his fists clenching and unclenching, even the absence of his telltale anxious thigh tapping. Complete and utter absence of movement.
Her gaze darted around the room, then back at him, and she curled her toes in her boots. He remained still as death. The light in his eyes completely gone. Snuffed out.
“Rupert?” she asked hesitantly.
And then a fire roared to life behind those dark brown eyes.
