For the moment.
The two men continued to circle each other like they were connected by an invisible tether. She’d already known that this wasn’t going to be a gentleman’s sport of boxing. There would be no Marquess of Queensbury Rules of conduct. This would be a bare-knuckled fight to the death. And while Alec had surprised her, both by his speed and skill, she had very little doubt that in the end, Bear would be the victor, and Alec would be a bloody stump on the ground.
“I’m shocked Lord Dover would marry a woman so far beneath his touch,” Alec continued. He wasn’t exactly panting, but his breathing was becoming more labored as he ducked and wove. “Beauty doesn’t equal class.”
“Mind yer bleeding tongue. Or I’ll cut it out of ye and wrap it around your throat like a fucking cravat,” growled Bear. He grunted again when Alec zipped in and nailed him in the nose, hard enough to spill blood.
“Ooh, ’e drew yer cork, Bear!” someone yelled.
“C’mon, Bear! Thrash the dandy!”
“Aye—kill the fucker!”
The goliath rushed forward and embraced Alec in a parody of a hug. Alec brought his hands up to box his opponent’s ears. Bear responded by slamming him to the ground, and then kicking Alec solidly in the ribs.
Alec groaned as he rolled away. Bear swung his foot forward for another kick, but Alec’s hands whipped out, grabbing the man’s boot. In a deft maneuver, he jerked upward, sending Bear toppling like a giant oak into the dust. Awkwardly, Alec scrambled to his feet, holding his side.
“Crack ’is napper, Bear!”
Bear leaped to his feet and rushed Alec again. As he did so, he threw out a hurried punch. The blow glanced off Alec’s cheekbone with enough force to snap his head back. Another punch grazed Alec’s jaw. The crowd roared their approval over Bear’s attack. Alec staggered backward.
Kendra forced herself to look away from the fight. Think. Goddamn it, she needed to think!
Everyone’s attention was focused on the fighters. Alec had wanted her to use the distraction to slip away, but Kendra had no intention of doing that. Beside her, Tom was still holding his pistol, but it was almost an afterthought. He no longer pointed it at her. Like everyone else, he appeared to have forgotten she was there.
An idea began to take shape. Kendra shot a quick look at her other captor. Ned had even gone so far as to tuck his pistol into his belt, in order to use his hands to cup his mouth and yell, “Clout the devil!” His attention was completely focused on Bear as the man delivered another stunning blow to Alec.
It’s now or never. She sucked in a deep breath and pretended to stumble into Ned.
“Eh, ’ere now. Watch it!” he snarled, and shoved her back, not bothering to look at her. Not feeling the weight of the pistol sliding off him . . .
Deliberately, Kendra went with the momentum of the shove, which took her toward Tom. He glanced at her, irritated, but it was already too late. She dropped Alec’s coat and cravat, whipping up the pistol that she’d taken off Ned. She slammed it into Tom’s temple with as much force as she could muster. As his knees gave out from under him, she snatched the gun out of his slack hand, and jumped back.
“Freeze!” she yelled, but her voice was drowned out by the whoops and hollers of the men surrounding the fighters.
Ned was the only one who’d noticed her action. He stared at her in open-mouthed shock. “What the devil—?”
“Stop!” She tried to pitch her voice over the noise of the crowd. “Goddamn it! I said—”
She lifted one of the weapons. They were two-barreled flintlocks, which meant they held exactly four balls of lead between them. She’d have three balls left if she fired one. But if she didn’t, Alec was as good as dead.
Kendra squeezed the trigger. The explosion that followed made her ears ring and the recoil made the weapon buck like a live animal in her hands.
“—stop!” Her voice sounded abnormally loud as silence descended abruptly on the clearing. Heart pounding, she steadied her grip on both weapons and leveled them at the mob, which turned like a single organism to gape at her.
“I want to see your goddamn hands up,” she ordered. “Walk backward to the wall.”
“Ye only got three balls in them barking irons,” one man snarled. “Ye can’t kill us all.”
“Congratulations, you’re a fucking mathematician. I can still take out three of you assholes, beginning with you. So unless you want to die today . . . get back.”
She cocked both hammers, earning nervous glances from the men. She prayed no one was going to challenge her. She had no compunction about following through on her threat. She could take out three men—but then she and Alec would be toast.
Son of a bitch.
“Yer only a woman,” someone muttered.
Kendra leveled a stare at the man. “Correction, asshole. I’m an excellent shot. Of course, at this distance, it would be damn near impossible to miss. So unless one of you wants to serve as an example of what happens when you don’t obey instructions . . .”
Slowly, mumbling beneath their breath, the men shifted until they were lined up against the far wall.
“You, too, Snake,” she told the child, who was still sitting on top of the wall of crates.
The boy gawked at her. Then he scrabbled down like a monkey from his perch and headed for the wall.
Kendra’s gaze cut to Bear and Alec. Neither had moved. Unfortunately, Bear was the one standing. Alec had fallen to his knees. She could see blood spatter on the ground beneath him.
“Step away from the Marquis,” she ordered Bear. When he didn’t move, she pointed the flintlock at his head, careful that she was far enough away from the massive reach of his arms. “Are you deaf? Get the hell away from him.”
Bear’s eyes remained flat and unafraid. “I’m not lettin’ this murdering bastard get away.”
“He didn’t kill your girlfriend. And I’m going to prove it. Step back, unless you want a bullet destroying what little brain cells you have inside that place you call a head.”
Bear didn’t move. Crap. If she didn’t do something fast, the other men would assume she didn’t have the nerve to shoot and they’d be on her like a pack of ravenous wolves.
Very slowly she lowered the weapon. Her line of sight went to his heart. Lower still until the gun pointed at his abdomen. Lower still . . .
And watched the giant go pale.
“If I shoot, there’s a good chance you’ll live . . . assuming you’d want to live, that is.” She summoned a smile. She could almost hear the clicks of two dozen Adam’s apples, as the men lined up against the wall swallowed simultaneously. Amazing—none of them blinked at a gun pointed at a man’s head, but they looked ready to faint when she pointed the weapon at his groin.