Page 11 of A Problem Princess

“Stay back!” her attacker warned.

Cordelia let out a soft cry as the man pulled the knife away from her throat and jabbed it toward the blond. His arm around her chest slid up beneath her chin and pressed chokingly against her throat as he held her in front of him like a shield.

The blond stranger stopped, but his right hand slid beneath his jacket. “You haven’t hurt her yet,” he commented as if discussing nothing more threatening than the weather. “If you let her go unharmed, I’ll let you leave. You can get away, and no one will ever know that you were here. I’ll let you live.”

Her attacker laughed, a maniacal sound that curled icy fingers of terror down Cordelia’s spine. “You think I wasn’t prepared to lose my life the moment I arrived here tonight?”

Oh God…She was as good as dead! “Please,” she begged as hot tears gathered at her lashes. “Please don’t hurt me. I won’t—”

“Shut up!” Her attacker yanked her against him and tightened his arm against her throat.

The blond man took another quick stride forward and slid his hand further beneath his jacket.

“Stop where you are!” The attacker sliced his knife through the air. “I’ll kill her—I promise you!”

“If you do, then I’ll kill you. But you’d rather live,” the blond gentleman replied, just as impossibly calm as before. He behaved as if he’d faced situations like this so many times in the past that talking to a man with a knife was as easy as negotiating the price for a new pair of boots. “There’s no shame in that. I’d want to live, too, if I were you.”

He moved forward another step. Not once had his green eyes glanced at Cordelia.

“Events didn’t go as planned tonight,” the blond gentleman continued. As he inched across the drawing room, Cordelia realized that he was just as large as he’d seemed when he’d filled up the doorway with his broad shoulders and tall frame. “But you can still escape with your life. Just let her go and step away, and I’ll let you leave. You won’t even have to put down your knife.”

The attacker paused at the offer as if considering his options.

“Please,” Cordelia begged, her voice hoarse from the pressure against her throat. “Please do as he says…”

Her attacker shook his head and growled out, “I’m dead either way!”

Cordelia flashed numb, and a soft cry passed her lips. This man couldn’t be persuaded not to kill her. No one could save her! She had to save herself.

“Scepter,” the blond stranger muttered as if the word were a shibboleth.

The attacker froze.

“You’re part of it, aren’t you?” the gentleman guessed. When her attacker didn’t answer, he continued, “Who sent you here tonight? Someone had to have let you into Carlton House and given you a footman’s uniform.”

The man snarled, “I’ll never tell.”

“Which peer? Which member of Parliament or Whitehall official? I know it’s one of them. It has to be someone connected to the palace, someone high-ranking enough for his orders not to be questioned.”

“You know nothing!”

“So much more than you realize.” The blond man’s voice lowered to an icy drawl. “And if you cooperate and tell me who sent you, I’ll make certain they can never harm you.”

The attacker paused to consider the offer.

Cordelia needed to act…now!She clenched her necklace in her hand, and with a fierce cry, she stabbed it viciously at her attacker’s face. The sharp edges of the pendant cut into his cheek and lips.

He let out a shrieking curse as blood seeped from the long, jagged rip across his cheek and shoved her away as she attempted to stab him again.

Freed from his gasp, Cordelia darted away. He lunged and thrust his knife at her. She flung up her arm to block the blow. The sharp blade sliced through her satin glove and into her flesh. She screamed, but the attacker lunged again—

A gunshot rang out.

Her attacker froze, then staggered back a step. A red stain bloomed across the crisp white waistcoat of his palace livery. Slowly, he looked down at it, his face suddenly pale and bewildered. He swayed on his feet, then dropped to the floor, dead.

Behind him, the blond man stood with his arm straight out. Smoke curled up from the end of his spent pistol.

Cordelia sank toward the floor as the blond gentleman dropped his gun and rushed forward to catch her in his arms.