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Apparently, Lady Ella agrees. She leaves Admiral Buchanan bumbling and snorting, trying to regain his footing after elegantly snapping her fan closed right in his face and turning away, performing a silent cut that slices damn near as deep as those in her verbal arsenal.
Ready to defend his pride, chin pulled back into the pillow of fat that hangs from his jaw, he begins, “Well, I say…she…”
“Before ye make any harsh judgments about Lady Ella that ye will regret, let me educate ye—her father is Admiral Edward Seymour.” His yellowing eyes bulge. “Yes.ThatAdmiral Seymour.”
“Oh, I see. Yes, she has certainly grown since the last I saw her. What a lovely young lady, quite lovely indeed. Tell me, Lord Stewart, I heard about a scuffle in the Mediterranean with the Spanish fleet. Nelson says he’s not sure victory was ours without your skill in battle. That is quite a compliment, you know.”
“Aye, Admiral Nelson is a good man. And he would never admit that his compliment is indirectly one to the man himself. After all, I’ve been a captain in his fleet for many years, and I’ve learned more about battle strategy from him than anyone. Although, skill or no skill, there are times when numbers outweigh all. ’Twas good we arrived when we did.”
“Come. Let us go find the gentlemen and the whisky.” I watch as his belly bounces in time with his laughter and wonder what he finds so funny.
We make our way through the crowd, stopping for a casual greeting here and there, I see Ella on the far side of the room talking to a mealy-looking young man. He certainly isn’t any sort of competition, but it doesn’t change the fact that his presence makes me uneasy. Just before she is out of my sight completely, I see them exit through the French doors to the terrace beyond.
Apparently, we found the gentlemen and the whisky because I now find myself in a room filled with both. And a bloody lot of pipe and cigar smoke. Lord Buchanan is in his element, joyfully introducing me to everyone who passes by, regardless if I am already acquainted with more than half of them.
The further into the room I get, the more stifling the air becomes. It gets worse as I become trapped by Oliver Adams, who insists on a conversation about the potential for another war with France so that he can bet accordingly on its outcome. Thomas Webb joins in with a complaint about all the money he lost last month and that the betting books are “nothing more than a fraudulent scheme.” His clear lack of understanding of the concept of betting explains his loss of money, and I have the urge to tell him so, but that would extend my time here in this rather obnoxious place.
Through a well-timed interruption, I managed to separate myself from Adams and Webb and gradually make my way closer to the door, so I could seek out Ella again. I have an uncomfortable impatience eating at me that is growing worse the longer I am trapped in this overcrowded room. Finally, Lord Canton gives me the opening I was looking for, and I slip out the door.
The cooler, fresher air is a welcome relief as I skirt along the wall, away from the crowd. Once I am on the terrace, I look for Ella but do not see her amongst the mass of oversized hats in every shape and size, and my gut tightens with apprehension. Something isn’t right, and my first instinct is to look for her in the garden that, from this point of view, looks like a damned labyrinth.
My pace is quick without running as I enter. Once I am no longer in view of the guests mingling on the terrace, I am in a full-out run as I try to navigate through the manicured shrubs, massive trees, random statues, fountains, and enormous planters overflowing with more flowers. Coming to a fork in the path, I stop, looking both ways hoping to see Ella safely walking in either direction. Yet instead, over the sound of my winded breath, I hear a cry, and I know it’s her.
What I find when I round the corner at the end of the path turns my vision red. The man has her pressed hard against a column inside the towering white gazebo. She is fighting against him, repeating the words that echo under the canopy, “Stop! Please stop!” But he doesn’t abide.
Without thought, I fly up the steps and, in one swift move, alter their positions, slamming him against the column, the point of my dirk pressed hard against the soft underside of his jaw.
“Ella, stand down on the path and wait fer me.” I don’t want her to witness what I am about to do.
“Alasdair! Please. Don’t kill him. Please, let us just leave.” The terror in her voice has me pressing the blade further into his pale skin, breaking the surface. He flinches, eyes squeezing tightly as the sting of the cut makes them water. I want this man to suffer. I want him dead.
“Ella. Do as I say.”
I can hear her scurry down the steps behind me, still calling to me, “Alasdair! Please!”
He’s trembling under my grip, useless fucking bastard. “Open yer eyes.” He doesn’t—he only squeezes them tighter as he whimpers in fear. My hold tightens on his throat as I press harder. “Open. Yer. Fucking. Eyes.” He does this time. “What is yer name?”
“I…I…” He makes some unintelligible sounds before answering, “L…Lord…Wes…Weston Percy.” He has a rancid stench about him that goes beyond his fear.
“LordWestonPercy, do ye feel the warmth slowly traveling down the skin o’ yer throat? Aye, ’tis yer blood, and there’s plenty more where that came from. A slight twist o’ my wrist and just a wee bit more pressure is all it will take. You’ll lay here as the light fades on your sorry existence, yer blood permanently staining the white marble beneath. A testament to where yer pathetic soul finally left this earth and made its journey straight to hell where it belongs. From what I’ve seen, ’tis an unpleasant experience to know yer death is inevitable an’ there isn’a a bloody thing ye can do about it.”
I can hear Ella down on the path crying, still begging me to leave him here. To not kill him the way my instincts are telling me to.
His blood is spilling over and seeping under my hand, making my grip slippery against his throat. “Today just might be yer lucky day, Weston. Can ye imagine that? All ye have to do is answer one question properly, and yer free to go. I will’na kill ye.” He responds with a strangled squeak but doesn’t move his head for fear of deepening the cut that is hiding the tip of my knife in his gullet. “Will ye ever come near Lady Ella again, intentionally or otherwise?”
Panicking, he gurgles out, “N-no.”
“Good. That was the correct answer. Now let me fill in a few holes fer ye. If I find that ye’ve gone back on yer word, yer a dead man.” My grip tightens. “If I find that ye’ve tried to communicate with Lady Ella, through yer own pitiful mouth or someone else’s or even through written fucking word, yer a dead man. Have I made myself clear?”
“Mmm…mmm…y-yes.” His face crumbles in pain from the movement of his jaw, pushing the blade deeper into raw flesh.
“Good. Now get yer worthless arse out’a here and pray we never cross paths again.” I remove my blade and shove him over the edge of the gazebo’s foundation with the hand gripping his throat. He lands on his back with a loud thud, choking and gasping for air as the wind is knocked from his lungs. I turn and calmly walk to the trickling fountain in the middle of the large pavilion to wash his blood from my hands, disappointed a spot of it stains the cuff of my white shirt.
Back on the path, I don’t see Ella, but I can hear her weeping. I rush toward the sound, finding her on a bench tucked into a carved-out section of the thick hedge. I kneel down in front of her, running my hands around her face, inspecting for injuries, and moving her disheveled hair away as it sticks to her tears.
“Are ye alright, lass? Tell me where yer hurt.” Seeing her like this is tearing me apart and taking every bit of strength I have to refrain from going back and finishing what my gut tells me I should have done.
“I’m fine, I…I’m just shaken up. I don’t…he just… Oh, Alasdair!” She grabs onto me, burying her face in my shoulder and cries harder. I hold her, letting her release the pent-up fear. Eventually, her sobs ebb, and she relaxes in my arms. “Alasdair, I’ve never been so afraid. I don’t know what came over him. I kept trying to go back to the party, and he insisted on showing me something. I…I…knew something wasn’t right, but I never imagined…” She lifts her head from my shoulder and looks at me in earnest. “I didn’t do anything to provoke him, Alasdair, I swear.”
