The Heiress(26)

He was still smiling, and I realized, lying there on the floor, that this was fun to him. That he was thoroughly enjoying watching me tremble at his feet.

But the question you must be asking, the question I’ve asked myself: Did I think he would shoot me, right then and there?

Darling, I want so badly to say yes. I want to say that what happened next was true self-defense, because I feared for my life in that very moment.

But it’s the truth you asked for, and the truth you’ll get.

I was afraid for my life, yes. But no, I don’t think he would have shot me. There was no fun in that, after all. Just like there was no fun in beating me over and over, breaking skin, knocking out teeth. It was the fear he enjoyed, the threat. My terror made him feel in control, and all these years later, I wonder who taught him that. His father? His mother? A sadistic teacher at that all-boys school he went to in the mountains of north Georgia?

Or was he born like that? Was that desire for power, the satisfaction that came from having someone at his mercy, simply a quirk of his biology, just like his green eyes or his height?

I have no way of knowing.

What I do know is that he heaved a sigh and lowered the gun, setting it upright on its butt against the little bench at the foot of my bed.

“Head’s killing me,” he muttered, turning away.

Terrible last words.

I watched him walk out the door, heading for his own bedroom at the other end of the hall, and all the terror that had raced through me just seconds before ignited into something hot and wild, and I was moving almost before I knew it.

The metal of the gun was still warm from Duke’s hand, the weight familiar to me as I carried it out of the bedroom. I’d been hunting in the woods around Ashby House with Daddy since I was five, and I knew my way around firearms.

The flat was dim, moonlight spilling through windows high up on the wall above the landing, and the sconces on the stairs providing the only light. The carpet was soft underneath my bare feet, the silk of my nightgown cool, and Duke was just in front of me, almost to his bedroom door.

“Duke.”

I didn’t shout it, and my voice sounded surprisingly flat in my ears.

The butt of the gun nestled in the hollow of my shoulder like it had been meant to sit there.

He turned.

He was frowning, I remember that. He wasn’t scared, just irritated that I had decided to keep playing a scene he had already grown tired of.

I pulled the trigger.

I only wanted to scare him. I didn’t even think the gun was loaded.

Ah. And there I go. Giving you lies when I promised truth.

Let me try again.

I didn’t know whether the gun was loaded, that’s true. In retrospect, it’s insane that Darcy Butler’s father was displaying a loaded gun in his Parisian flat, and that Darcy and then Duke toted it all over the city.

But honestly, I wasn’t even thinking about that. Only later did it occur to me that the gun might have harmlessly clicked, and Duke would’ve flinched and then made me pay for my empty threat.

The shot was loud, so loud it seemed like it would blot out any other noise forever. I’d cried the first time I’d fired a gun, aiming for a rabbit I hadn’t wanted to hit, and my father had told me I was going to need to toughen up if I expected to run Ashby House one day.

I didn’t cry this time. I watched, feeling outside my own body, as the bullet tore through that clean white shirt of Duke’s, just along his ribs, as his face bloomed with surprise, eyes wide as they looked at me.

Remember, this was a gun meant for killing elephants and tigers.

You can imagine what it did to a person.

I fired again.

It’s that second shot that makes me a murderer to my mind. The first? I’d been terrorized for weeks at that point, scared past the point of endurance that night, and I can forgive myself for reacting. Maybe anyone could.

I think you can.

But the second bullet … that’s when I adjusted my aim. That’s when I knew exactly what I was doing.

That’s when I sent a bullet straight into the heart I thought would be mine forever.

It was so quiet after. My ears wouldn’t stop ringing, and Duke was slumped on the carpet, his eyes staring. His chest moved up and down in a jerky movement, once, maybe twice. There was a sound in his throat I never wanted to hear again, and I was glad when it was over, when he was still.

I knelt beside him for a while there in the darkness, like I told you. His blood soaking into my nightgown while I waited to feel something. Horror, remorse, fear. Anything at all.

Relief came first. It was over now. I’d never again wake up wondering if this was the day he went too far. And then, a flicker of sadness followed. Not for the Duke he’d actually been, but the Duke I’d thought he was.

But that was it. No shame. No grief. No worry or frantic thoughts of police and punishments, and good god, did they still have the guillotine in France?

It was more like I’d just solved a math problem that had been vexing me, and I wondered if this was what it was to be in shock. That was it, surely.

All those feelings—those natural, human feelings, like grief and regret—would come in time.

Or so I thought.

For now, however, there was one last thing to do.

I went to where I’d left the gun, and moved it to the top of the stairs, taking care to wipe it down with the unbloodied hem of my robe. Then I went back to Duke’s body, wrapping my arms around him, letting more of his blood cover me, pressing my cheek to his so that his blood soaked into my loose hair.