Hold Your Breath 01 - Stone Devil Duke (8 page)

“So your chosen option was to
try to kill four men?”

“
I do not take the deaths lightly, your grace. I am sorry you were involved. It is my soul that takes the marks of those deaths, not yours. And I do not intend for you to have another death on your conscience. Please, just let us part ways, and let me do what needs to be done.”

“
I think you already know I cannot let you do that, Aggie.”

Her eyes took in
Devin’s face, and she was suddenly frightened by the man across from her.

She had thought
of him as a nuisance and a threat to the exposing of her hack driving, but in that moment, he became much more. He became someone to not just ignore and hope would go away. He became a true threat.

A threat to her entire plan to put right the wrongs and to keep her family safe.

He would no longer allow her to continue on her mission as she had been. For some reason, he had decided she was his to protect.

Why? What possible reason would a man of his status have for getting involved with a
girl in a ridiculous amount of trouble? It wasn’t worth it. Aggie’s eyes narrowed at him as she wondered what he really wanted of her.

E
ven worse, she wondered at her own reaction. She liked the man. She liked that he didn’t cower from danger. Liked that he actually listened to her, even if he disagreed with every step she took. Liked his steel eyes. The concern in them. No one had looked at her with such raw concern in a very long time. It was that concern that held the most danger.

Like
him or not, she had to get rid of him.

Aggie shook her head, eyes at the ceiling.
What else could she say to remove this man from her shoulder?

She levelled her eyes at him.
“Maybe I went about this all wrong earlier at the ball. I apologize. I should have thanked you, your grace, and then we could have parted ways.” Aggie gave him a quick smile, folding her hands in her lap. “So thank you. I appreciate your help. Is that what you are really after? Acknowledgment of good deeds done?”

He smiled at her then, slow, drawn out. Aggie swallowed hard against what was coming.

“You can keep trying, Aggie, but I am going nowhere. Charm, blackmail, appreciation—all of them hold no sway with me. Have you not already learned I do what I please?”

Aggie bit back a scream.
Of course he did what he wanted. Obvious.

“
Your grace, once more, I do not need your protection. As for your stalking of me, well, you are no gentleman—truly odious behavior.”

“And you consider yourself a lady?”

Aggie let her irritation show in the dagger look she shot him as she stood, trying to step over his leg and leave the carriage. Unfazed, the duke grabbed her arm and yanked her down directly into his lap.

“
Your manhandling is out of control, your grace.” Aggie lost no time in trying to break free, which merely caused him to clamp his arms around her again.

Aggie took a deep breath, attempting
calm. It didn’t work.

“Your grace
, you have just grievously insulted me.” She looked down her nose at him, the best she could from her close and awkward angle.

“I meant no insult
, my lady, just merely noting the clothing.” His hands moved along her cloak, patting the lumps. “Good God, how many pistols do you have in there?”

“Enough.”
Aggie bristled, then froze as a new realization struck her. “Blasted that.”

The duke’s eyebrows rose
at her in question.

She sighed,
her eyes darting off, distracted. “I presume the man who helped your ‘drunk’ self into the cab tonight was your friend, Lord Southfork…which means my secret is no longer a secret.”

“Not to fear. Yes,
Killian knows of your fetish for dressing up in men’s clothing and your hackney skills. But he would never repeat the story to anyone, not even under torture, unless you, specifically, gave him permission.”

“You trust him that much
?” Aggie asked, disbelief clear in her eyes.

“Without doubt. I
trust him with my life, and I trust him with your secret.”

He looked hard into her eyes, and h
er breath caught. She was much too close to him, on his lap for heaven’s sake. She forced out wooden words. “Yes, but the question remains. Do I trust you?”

Aggie
searched his face, his eyes. Could she trust this man? Could she trust her very life to anyone other than herself? Did she even have a choice?

Calm
resolve, clear as the day in his steely eyes, was all she saw in answer to her question.

How could she trust someone she knew nothing of? Someone she instinctively knew was dangerous.
But dangerous to her? That was the real question.

Her heart stopped beating in the next
moment. But not because of the duke.

Beca
use a knife flew in at them through the open carriage window.

The next second, she was smothered.

~~~

In an instant,
Devin had her flattened on the carriage floor.

Not taking a breath,
not caring that his weight crushed her, he reacted before the knife had fully embedded into the worn cushion.

Devin
stilled, listening.

Aggie’s breath be
came hot and quick, and she started wiggling to escape from the shell he had enclosed her in.

“Aggie,
it would do nicely if you could stop squirming for a minute,” Devin said in a dead calm whisper. “I am going to get up, and I demand complete silence and no movement out of you. Do you understand?”

Harshness edged his voice
, he knew, but he couldn’t afford the slightest question from her. It was a damn knife that missed her by inches, after all.

A whisper went into his chest. “Yes.”

He slithered his right hand between them, ignoring Aggie’s gasp as he brushed past her breast. He fished, extracting one of Aggie’s pistols from deep in her cloak.

Lethal grace
lining his movements, Devin shifted off of Aggie, his foot gaining a small spot by her head, and positioned himself low against the inside of the coach. He pulled out his own pistol, leaned up, head back as far as he could, but with sight line to the street.

All was silent.

He waited.

Devin
noted that Aggie had actually listened to him and remained frozen, lying on the floor, eyes wide as he got up from her. But now she slowly started to move her arms.

He cleared his throat. She stopped.

He turned his attention back to the street. Still silent.

Devin
looked down at Aggie and pointed to the opposite carriage door. They had to remove themselves from the interior of the carriage, for this was the worst place to be cornered.

Aggie nodded.
Scrupulously searching the street, Devin knelt, poised to react. Aggie crawled to the corner opposite him, pistol drawn.

After a minute
, Devin glanced back at her.

“They
are gone?” she whispered.

He moved over to her, hand going over her shoulder onto the door latch. It would be quickest to escape the immediate area by foot. “We need to get out of here. Are you ready to run?”

Aggie shook her head. “I am not leaving my horse.”

Of course not. Of course her damn horse was more important than bodily harm to her—or him. She sure worked on saving herself in the worst possible ways.

A swear started, but Devin swallowed it before it escaped.

Even through the black soot covering her face
, he could see the set of her jaw. She wasn’t going to budge on leaving her horse.

“
Fine. But you are staying in here.”

“No. You need other eyes up there. And you know I can shoot.”

Devin bit back another blasphemy. He knew he couldn’t stop her, and he also knew they needed to get the hell out of there. Not giving her permission, he opened the door slowly, eyes scanning the street and adjoining alleys. Stepping out, he slid along the edge of the black coach, and crawled up to the driver’s perch.

Aggie followed
, drawing another pistol on her way. She joined him on the small seat, wedging herself in next to him. Devin grabbed the reins and sent the carriage down the street, moving west past Charring Cross without further incident. They reached a respectable area, and he pulled off the main thoroughfare to a quiet residential street.

“
Why are we stopping?” Aggie slid her pistols back into the pockets in her cloak.

Devin
pulled the brake on the carriage. “Our conversation is not done, Aggie. Down you go. Back into the coach.”

“
What? Why? What is wrong with staying up here and conversing? We can chat on the way back to the place I dropped you last night?” She looked a little too hopeful.

“I am not going to have a conversation like this out in the middle of the street
, Aggie.”

“
But the two of us together in there. Alone. It is not at all proper.”

“Proper?
” Devin cocked an eyebrow. “Truly? You are going to try that ploy? Maybe pulling up together at your uncle’s residence would be more proper?”

Aggie growled,
turning from him, then started to climb down. “Fine. But whatever you may think of me at this moment—outside of this, outside of my current outfit—I am nothing but a respectable lady, and I would like it to remain that way.”

“
Duly noted.” Devin followed her down.

She went in
to the carriage first, pushing her hood off her head as she sat, arms crossed over her chest. Even in the dim light coming from the outside carriage lantern, her glare was obvious.

“What is that?” Aggie pointed at
Devin’s upper arm as he moved in front of her.

He
sat and Aggie scampered across the coach to sit next to him.

“Your coat
—the tear?” Aggie reached out to touch a hole in the dark cloth.

Devin
looked down at his arm, surprised. He hadn’t really noticed it in the commotion.

Without waiting for him, Aggie
pulled his overcoat down past his shoulder to inspect his black jacket. It, too, was torn. Her fingers went over the tear.

“It i
s wet. Take off your coat and jacket.” She didn’t wait for him to comply, just started to peel off his layers.

Devin
allowed her, in silence, to pull off his overcoat. His only motion was to lean forward as Aggie’s hands moved up his body to remove the jacket. She took care in how she laid both items next to her, then pushed her own sleeves up past her elbows.

Jacket
gone, she returned her attention back to his arm. “Damn, it sliced you.” She pulled a leg up under herself, turning fully to him, her nose nearly touching the wound. Devin could see blood staining his white linen shirt around the tear in the cloth.

“Does it hurt?”
She tugged at the hole in the fabric, trying to see under it.

Devin
shrugged.

She looked up at him, worry mixe
d with hesitation in her eyes. “Shrugging means it hurts, you realize. Would you mind if I ripped your shirt a bit more so I could see the wound?”

Devin
gave her a perplexed look. And she was the one worried about properness? “I would rather you not tatter my clothes.”

“But it i
s already ruined. I cannot tell how deep the slice is until the shirt is off the wound.”

“True
. But the whole shirt can just come off, you realize.”

Her
bottom lip slipped under her front teeth in obvious moral struggle. Devin kept an innocent look on his face as he watched, amusement growing, as she worked up the nerve to allow his shirt to come off. She moved from him and made a long, silent production of lighting the interior lantern.

“Maybe I should just remove it?”
Devin’s eyebrow cocked helpfully.

It took Aggie
another minute to decide.

“Yes, please do so
. I am not looking to become a harlot, mind you, but you are injured because of me.” The dim carriage light did little to mask the color that was quickly flushing her face on the few sootless areas. She shifted her eyes from Devin to the far upper corner of the coach.

Devin
took that as his cue to get on with the shirt removal. He did so slowly, prolonging Aggie’s obvious embarrassment, intentionally bumping her several times as he struggled out of his waistcoat, braces, and linen shirt.

He cleared his throat.

Aggie didn’t turn back.