A series of blows in rapid succession all over Ainsworthy’s lily-white midsection conveyed Darius’s initial sentiments.

“Damn, he’s quick.”

“Accurate too.”

“Blighter’s mad,” another man said. “Look at them eyes. Barkin’ bloody mad.”

Nick and Trent exchanged a look at that comment. Darius’s response was to land a single blow to the jaw that left Ainsworthy staggering. Darius backed away, despite all instinct screaming to the contrary, until the man was righted by the spectators and turned back into the circle.

When Ainsworthy was pawing the air with his fists again, Darius started in once more. For Vivvie, for the baron, for Angela, for the wives, their children, for William… Blow after blow fell, the sound and feel of each reverberating through Darius’s soul like a tocsin.

“Relentless as a mill wheel, that one.”

“A damned maniac.”

“Look at his eyes, lad. He’ll kill the idiot, see if he don’t.”

“Poor bastard shouldn’t have crossed that mad bugger.”

Another single hard right, only this time Ainsworthy went down. Darius didn’t back away immediately but hovered, until Nick and Trent marched him backward, while the rest of the crowd tried to jeer Ainsworthy to his feet.

“Have some damned pride, man!”

“On your feet, boyo. You’ve yet to land a decent shot.”

“Stay down, unless ye want him to finish ye for certain.”

The seconds conferred while Ainsworthy hung on all fours, lungs heaving. When he managed to get to his feet, he spat in Darius’s direction.

“Bad form!”

“Make him pay for that. This is me own mews he spat on!”

“Fetch the parson. The skinny bastard’s done for now.”

Darius waited, letting Ainsworthy weave closer, then closer still. With exaggerated care, Ainsworthy pulled back an arm, and while he was choosing his moment—a scientific fighter, clearly—Darius hit him with a right jab that sent him into the dirt again, unable to rise.

“Show’s over,” Nick said meaningfully. “Back to work, lads, before the King’s man reads us the Riot Act.”

Somebody tossed a cold bucket of water on Ainsworthy, while Trent threw his greatcoat over Darius’s naked shoulders.

“Trent?”

Trent put an arm around his brother and bent close. “I’m here.”

“Get me away from this place,” Darius said, chest working like a bellows. “I want to kill him. I want to put my hands around his miserable throat and choke the life from him. I want to kill them all.”

Trent started walking Darius toward the townhouse. “Kill who-all?”

“The damned skulking, bastard predators,” Darius panted. “Ainsworthy, Wilton, even the women.”

“I know.” Trent hugged his brother closer. “But you didn’t, Dare. You wouldn’t let yourself.”

“Trent?”

“Love?”

“It felt good to beat the shit out of him. It felt wonderful. I want to do it all over again. I’m going to be sick.”

Trent hovered, despite having obligations out at Crossbridge, and Darius let him hover for two days.

On the third day, they rose and went to the docks to watch as Ainsworthy scurried onto a ship bound for Boston.

“How many warrants did you say were drawn up against him?” Trent posed the question as the gangplank was raised and the ship drifted out toward the current in midchannel.

“Five felonies at last count, and at least three angry women are out for his blood. Ariadne seemed mostly relieved, but her fortune was still largely intact.”

Darius stood beside his brother, the bracing wind off the river slapping ropes against hulls and making unfurled sails luff madly. For a few minutes, they watched the ship slip farther from the dock.

“Does it help, to know you’ve hounded him out of the country?”

“It helps.”

To see the ship depart helped a great deal, like weight taken from Darius’s chest, like somebody had turned up the lamps and opened a window. Beating the stuffing out of Ainsworthy had helped too, as had having Trent and Nick’s unquestioning support. It all helped—but not enough.

“You’re for Longchamps?” Trent asked.

Darius nodded as Ainsworthy’s vessel caught the current and began to turn downriver.

“You have a special license?”

Another nod.

“Then what the bloody hell are you waiting for?”

“It’s like this.” Darius addressed the small bundle in his arms—though perhaps not quite as small as even a few weeks ago. “I can’t very well ask permission of anybody else, but I feel the need to ask permission of somebody, and you’re the only fellow on hand.”

The baby gurgled happily and grabbed Darius’s nose.

“None of that strong-arm business now.” Darius retrieved the paternal beak from the child’s grasp. “This is serious stuff, your lordship. Baby Baron, your mama calls you, and you probably like it, don’t you?”

The infant made another swipe at Darius’s nose, but Darius was getting wise to his son’s tricks.

“So you won’t mind too much if I marry your mama?” He settled into a rocking chair with the baby. “You won’t get colicky and difficult because I love you both until I’m mad with it? You have scared years off my life, boy, just by being precious and dear. Say something, why don’t you?”

Except Darius knew damned good and well the baby was far too young to offer any words of comfort or encouragement. A child this young didn’t even understand—

“By God, you’re smiling at me,” he whispered. “You’re grinning like a sailor hitting his first tavern on shore leave. You, sir, are a rascal.”

The child beamed at him some more, and the toothless grin was the greatest blessing a man bent on courtship might have wished for.

Vivian deserved better than the not-always-so-very-Honorable Darius Lindsey, there was no arguing that, but she was at least fond of her lover. She understood him, and the comfort of that was immeasurable.

“You have to know something,” Darius said to the child now drowsing in his arms. “I’m going to be a papa to you in every way that counts, provided your mama will have me. When you are a grown fellow, we may have to explain a few oddments to you, about why you resemble me but inherited all manner of wealth and consequence from dear William. He loved you too, and he loved your mama. I’d stake my life on that.”

Darius fell silent, sending up a prayer that William was reunited with Muriel and their sons, and beaming down from some happy cloud.

“Your mother and I will muddle through those details as best we can at the time—if she’ll have me.”

The child fell asleep, and Darius lingered a long while, admiring his son—and gathering his courage.

A new mother got used to the prodding of instinct, even in the middle of the night—maybe especially in the middle of the night. Vivian rose from her nice warm bed, slipped into her mules and night robe, and headed for the nursery down the hall. A glance at the eight-day clock told her Will had nursed not two hours earlier, but some awareness tickling at the back of her mind had awakened her.

She opened the door to the nursery and was greeted by a current of cozy air. The fire was kept going here, lest Baby Baron take a chill.

Baby Baron had taken something worse than a chill, for the child was not in his bassinet. Panic sent Vivian’s heart hammering against her ribs in an instant—until she noticed a long, dark form sprawled on the daybed against a shadowed wall.

Darius Lindsey lay fully clothed but for his boots, fast asleep without so much as a blanket to cover him. His hand cradled a small bundle on his chest, one wrapped in a pale receiving blanket with an embroidered hem of peacock feathers.

Her menfolk, no doubt worn out from exchanging confidences. The sight of them in slumber, both with hair of the exact same dark shade, did something queer to her heart.