72 Chapter 72

It was true, wasn't it? Every single word about the earl. Although she'd told herself no one was that black-hearted, as Splendor tried to ignore the damp soaking through the paper-thin soles of Gabe's boots, she knew the extent of that truth.

Dueling was illegal. The thought that Kendall Winterborne could end the day in court on a murder charge was no consolation. Not when the tang of frost sent no shivers up her spine, the caw of crows left her bone marrow untouched. She was beyond these things.

She had practiced shooting last night, trying to hit the door handle. The fact she had blasted a hole in the fender instead was not auspicious. Mrs. Hanney, to whom she had paid four months' rent in advance, had gone berserk. That was never a good thing.

Neither was Gabe's terse whisper on the dawn mist.

"The whole of London says he's a crack shot and you just have to be here now. Ain't you seen that pair of pistols he's got?"

"He may yet back off."