Ruthless Vows (Letters of Enchantment, #2)(92)

They hurried through the back half of the property, where even now it felt like a different world. One far removed from Oath and the war. But before the estate came into view, Bruce stopped in the shadow of a hawthorn.

“This is as far as I can go without the soldiers seeing me,” he said. “Go directly to your father.”

“Are you part of the Graveyard?”

Bruce didn’t reply to the blunt question. Roman took it as affirmation.

“Will you go back for her?” he asked next, unable to hide the way his voice shook. “Will you go back for my wife?”

“Don’t worry about Miss Winnow. She’s a smart girl.”

“Does that mean you’ll do as I ask? I—” Roman cut himself off, narrowing his eyes. “I never told you her last name was Winnow. How did you know that?”

Again, Bruce was silent, but he held Roman’s stare with a clenched jaw.

Pieces began to fall into place. Roman stepped closer, using his height to loom over Bruce.

“You’ve seen her before. When?”

“There’s no time for this.”

“When?”

“Before she left for the front, a few weeks ago. Your father asked me to deliver a message to her. Now don’t lose your head. It’s not the time for—”

“What was the message?” Roman’s voice was cold and smooth.

“It was money.”

“Money?”

“Enough for her to live comfortably if she annulled your marriage. Which by the looks of it she didn’t, so get out of my face and do what I told you to do, before all hell breaks loose.”

Roman’s hand curled into a fist.

But he had gained the answers he wanted.

He turned and strode away.



* * *



His blood was still boiling when he approached the back doors of the mansion.

He noticed two things through his haze of anger: there was a massive stack of crates beneath the pavilion, brightly labeled with CAUTION, and Dacre’s soldiers were patrolling the backyard as if they were no longer afraid of being spotted by the neighbors. Roman walked directly through their line and realized he held more power than he had once believed. They yelled at him to halt, to lift his hands, and yet they did nothing when he refused to comply. He acted like they didn’t exist as he stepped through the back doors of his house.

His shoes clicked on the polished floors. He headed to his father’s study, drowning in his thoughts.

He hadn’t been able to reach Iris. He hadn’t been able to protect her when she needed him most—from his father or from Dacre. Roman had no idea if she was alive, if she was wounded, if she was dead.

She’s not, he told himself, even as he ground his teeth. I would know if she was dead.

The door to his father’s study was cracked. Roman kicked it wide open, startling Mr. Kitt, who had been pacing with a cigar in hand.

“Shut the door,” his father said in an urgent tone. His blue eyes widened when he saw how disheveled Roman was. The vomit, the trickle of blood. The scrape of brambles. “What happened?”

Roman was silent as he stared at Mr. Kitt. He felt like he was indeed hewn from stone, worn down from years of guilt and fear and longings he could never pursue. And yet he was finished being ruled by such things. The past weeks had chipped and cracked him; he had crawled from that husk of a shell, cut away old strings, and now he held the stare until his father submitted, extinguishing the cigar on the desk.

“Why are there crates stacked beneath the pavilion?” Roman asked in a sharp tone. “Don’t tell me it’s more of that damn gas you had the chemist professor make.”

Mr. Kitt blinked, taken aback by Roman’s abruptness. But he recovered quickly, drawing closer to whisper, “No, in fact. But has it been taken care of?”

“What do you speak of, Father?”

Mr. Kitt glanced beyond Roman, to the door that still sat open. It was the first time that Roman had ever seen his father appear frightened.

Mr. Kitt lowered his voice even further, murmuring, “Is he dead?”

Roman had suspected his father was playing both sides of the field—with Dacre, and with the Graveyard. Of course he would, because he wanted to emerge on the winning side, no matter the outcome. But now Roman knew for certain.

Mr. Kitt was in too deep. He knew nothing of gods from below, nothing of life at the front or the claws of war and the wounds they inflicted. And the Graveyard, while passionate, appeared highly unorganized and disorderly. They had bungled an assassination attempt, and now the entire city would pay for it.

“I don’t know,” Roman replied.

“What do you mean you don’t know? Did the bomb go off or not?”

“It did, but your man dragged me away before I could see any further.”

Mr. Kitt began to pace again. But he looked confident, as if knowing the blast had happened meant he could move on to the next step.

“We should—”

He was interrupted by a cold draft. The walls shuddered. The chandelier above clinked. The hardwood groaned beneath a pair of heavy feet.

Roman knew that sound, that feeling. He watched his father freeze as he recognized it too. They listened, horror-struck, as the parlor door slammed.

“Get behind the desk,” Mr. Kitt whispered, grasping hold of his arm in a painful grip. “Hide there. Don’t come out until I tell you to.”