My Cruel Fiance Tried To Blackmail My Ruined Family — Until The Man I Truly Love Returned To Destroy Him
Part 2
The fragile hope ignited at that ball was brutally snuffed out mere days later.
Craig was no fool, and sensing his prize slipping away, he moved with ruthless speed.
Utilizing his dark connections, he froze my father’s assets completely and launched a devastating smear campaign against Dan in the papers, whispering of treasonous activities abroad.
Worse still, Craig demanded that I accompany him to a week-long hunting party at a sprawling country estate to display our unbreakable engagement to the world.
My father, terrified of debtors’ prison, had tearfully begged me to comply.
For three agonizing days, I endured Craig’s suffocating presence as he paraded me like a hunting trophy.
But Dan had come to the estate too, acting as a silent sentinel on the edge of the shooting party.
Every time Craig touched me, I saw Dan’s jaw clench and his hands form white-knuckled fists.
On the fourth night, a torrential rain lashed against the massive glass panes of the estate’s great conservatory.
Feeling suffocated by the heavy velvet gown I wore, I slipped away from the drawing room to seek sanctuary among the exotic ferns.
Craig had cornered me earlier that afternoon, hissing that the wedding was being moved forward to the following week.
He had threatened to have my father charged with embezzlement using forged documents if Dan tried to interfere again.
I wandered deep into the dark foliage, wrapping my arms around myself and finally allowing a single trembling sob to escape.
Dan stepped out of the shadows, discarding his formal tailcoat, his white linen shirt unbuttoned at the collar.
He looked less like a duke and more like a dangerous, desperate soldier.
“I am taking you away from here tonight,” he declared, closing the distance between us.
I shook my head wildly, explaining the forged proof of embezzlement Craig held over my family.
“I have proof of my own,” Dan countered intensely.
“My men just sent word from Paris that Craig is secretly married to a French courtesan, with two children hidden away.
He is a walking corpse seeking your bloodline solely to legitimize his claim to an earldom.”
The revelation paralyzed me, but the sheer scandal of a broken engagement still terrified me.
I lied, stepping backward until my spine hit the damp brickwork, telling him I cared for Craig and wanted nothing to do with him.
Dan’s legendary iron control snapped completely.
He slammed his calloused hands into the brick wall on either side of my head, trapping me instantly.
His chest heaved against mine, radiating a furious heat as he demanded I look into his stormy eyes and say I didn’t love him.
Tears spilled over my lashes as the truth shattered my defenses, and I choked out that I couldn’t say it.
With a shuddering breath, his mouth crashed down onto mine in a raw, starved kiss that consumed five years of agonizing separation.
“A touching sentiment,” a cruel, mocking drawl suddenly sliced through the humid air.
Dan pushed me behind his broad shoulders as Craig emerged from the stone pathway, his face twisted into an ugly mask of pure hatred.
Craig pulled a silver-barreled dueling pistol and aimed it directly at Dan’s chest, but what happened next would shatter the high society of London forever?
