Captain of the Heart by Anna Vincent EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
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- Author:Anna Vincent
- Language: English
- Genre: Popular
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Paris, March 1784
As the sun rose above the forest to flood the clearing with morning
light, two shots rang out. It was, Léonie thought in that brief instant, almost
impossible to hear them apart.
Her eyes flew from her brother’s outstretched arm to that of his
adversary. The Marquis de Vercours stood proudly staring at them, his lips
curved in a malicious smile. His gold breeches and coat gleamed in the
fresh sun, unmarked by the telltale signs Léonie had fully expected to see.
She turned to her twin brother and a gasp broke from her lips.
Jean-Michel was crumpling slowly into the long dewy grass, a wide, red
stain soaking into his shirt.
‘Nom de Dieu!’ Léonie sobbed as she ran to him. ‘What has he done to
you?’ She fell to her knees and cradled her brother’s head in her lap. ‘JeanMich, Jean-Mich,’ she sobbed, ‘speak to me! Tell me you are not killed by
that . . . that . . . espèce de cochon. Look at me, speak to me!’
Her brother’s eyes were closed and he was breathing in short rasping
gasps. With every tortured breath, more blood soaked into his shirt. It tore
at her heart to see the pain etched in his dear face. If only she had been born
a man, she would take his sword and run it through the arrogant marquis’s
fine, gilded chest. Oh, how good that would feel!
She looked up as she felt a tug on the sleeve of her cloak. Her brother’s
second, Christian Lavelle, frowned down at her, his face as drained as hers
felt.
‘Come, Léonie. We must be away from this place. Someone will have
heard the shots.’
‘Bah!’ said Léonie inelegantly. ‘So this is how men think to serve their
honour — by shooting one another like dogs and then running away.
Perhaps I am glad to be a woman after all.’
‘I’m sure you are, Mademoiselle de Chambois,’ came the oily voice of
her brother’s challenger. ‘Such beauty would never do adorning the face of
one such as your worthless brother.’
Léonie glared up at Vercours, making an effort to curb her tongue. ‘I do
not believe, monsieur,’ she responded stiffly, ‘that you would recognise
worth in another human being if it were presented to you on a gilded platter.
You had good fortune on your side, c’est tout.’
His laugh was like slime on a stagnant pond. A quiver of loathing ran up
her spine.
‘I am always lucky, mamselle, as your brother surely knew when he
maligned me at piquet last evening.’ She froze as he bent over her, but he
merely retrieved the silver pistol that had fallen from Jean-Michel’s fingers
and handed it to his second. ‘Such hot-headedness is not uncommon in one
as young as your twin, of course, though one always regrets the taking of
such a spirited life.’ He raised a kerchief to his nose as if to ward off the
whiff of gunpowder that hung in the still air. ‘But such young men will be
ruled by passion. Such a wasted emotion, don’t you think?’
‘What I think, monsieur, is that one who cheats at the card table is not fit
for the honour of a duel. He should be shot like a dog.’
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