He swallowed a groan. Good hell. This was not the time for this. “Of course not.”
Those three words, however, didn’t suffice. “Because I am not like a girl girl.” No, she wasn’t. “I ride astride, and we hunt, even though I don’t like hunting.” Her eyes widened. “Is that what it is?”
“Gillian?” he said impatiently.
By the crestfallen look that stamped her features, she’d been expecting more. “Hmph.” With that little grunt, she adjusted the small basket of stones. “Very well, I’ll leave you to them.” With a toss of her blond curls, she left.
Finally. Now he could—
“There he is.”
Colin cursed. His heart pounded hard and loud in his ears, and he took a step to flee.
Too late.
“Got you, you miserable bastard.”
The two boys behind the leader of the trio dissolved into laughter, as if the cleverest insult had been dealt, rather than a mere statement of fact about Colin’s birthright.
His feet twitched. Colin longed to run, and yet… He was many things. Illegitimate. Sometimes surly. But he wasn’t one who’d back down when confronted by his bullies. Still, when Colin stepped out from his hiding spot, his stomach sank.
Lord Langley and two of the sons of some landed gentry stood shoulder to shoulder. All in equal states of flawless dress. From their wool tailcoats on down to their gleaming, buckled boots, they were the model of privilege and power and… everything Colin was not.
“I don’t have any problems with you,” Colin called, proud of how even his voice was when inside he was shaking. It wasn’t that each boy was particularly strong, but when they combined forces? He suppressed a shudder.
Bulky Lord Langley looped his thumbs into his strained waistband and ambled over. He stopped three feet away from Colin. “Yes, that might be true, but you see, we have problems with you.”
Three feet. The distance was close enough to pounce and close enough that Colin couldn’t escape without the other boy landing at least one blow. But it was always more than one. Particularly as he had his lackeys with him.
Colin brought his arms up, folding them close at his chest, so he was in position to counter any strike. “Oh? Am I supposed to guess what offense I’ve supposedly committed this time?”
“We saw you talking to Lady Gillian Farendale again,” Benny MacArthur interjected as he leaned around Langley.
Langley glared at the small, slender boy.
MacArthur instantly fell back.
When Langley faced Colin, his dark look was reserved once more for Colin. “We saw you and the youngest Farendale girl,” Langley confirmed, as if he required the pleasure of that reveal. “You’ve no place speaking to a lady.”
No, Colin didn’t. But he’d be damned if he let these village bullies to the decision. “There’s no crime in speaking to a lady.” And he was familiar with crime and law. Studying those books Gillian sneaked from her father’s library was how he spent his nights.
“It should be.” Langley flashed a slightly yellowed, gap-toothed smile. “After all, your mother is a whore.”
Hatred snapped through Colin, and it was all he could do to maintain his restraint to keep from pouncing on and pounding the other boy. There was one certainty, however: There’d be no getting out of it this day, then. “My father is a duke,” Colin pointed out. “And you’re only just a baron’s son, so?” He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “And not even by blood.”
“It is by blood,” Langley shouted. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The fact that he and his family had come to their title by a chance twist of fate was Langley’s weakness. Rumors said the boy’s family had never even met the ancient baron from whom they’d received the title.
If Colin were a better person, he’d stop baiting Langley. But Colin wasn’t a better person. A fight was certain, and if he was going to have it, Colin would also have the other boy unsettled. Colin tapped his chin in feigned contemplation. “Was there blood between you and the last baron, though? A third cousin twice removed died?” He looked to the other boys, who scratched at deeply puzzled brows.
Langley caught the confusion from his pair and thumped his fist against MacArthur’s arm. “Stop it. There’s a blood connection.”
“Of course,” MacArthur and Meadows said in obedient unison, compliant, loyal friends once more.
Langley approached; his hulking frame bent and poised for battle. “I’m going to end you, Lockhart.”
Letting out a roar, Colin charged. His own frame, however, was slighter compared to the other boy’s bulk, and Langley cuffed him in the face, knocking Colin to the ground.
Colin landed hard and all the air in his lungs left him on a whoosh. Giving his head a clearing shake, he braced as Langley came for him once more. He waited, timing his kick so that it was just right. Until Langley stood over him, and smiled coldly back.
Colin braced; preparing to kick the bigger boy between the legs.
“Owww,” Langley cried out, and spun around.
What in hell? Colin scrambled to stand.
A small rock hit Langley squarely between the eyes.
The village bully squealed like a stuck pig. Tears immediately sprang to the boy’s eyes as he rubbed at the red and rapidly swelling mark.
Colin’s eyebrows went flying up as he looked from the first, sizable stone that had hit the boy, to the one responsible for that blow.
Gillian stood there, her hands on her little hips and anger blazing from her eyes. Even as diminutive as she was at just a handful of inches past four feet, Colin found himself as unnerved by her ferocious presence as the trio cowering off to the side. “Who do you think you are, Layton Langley?” she shouted.
“I’m a—”
“Don’t go, ‘I’m-a-baron’s-son-and-one-day-a-baron’ing,’ me, Layton Langley,” she cut in. “You’re nothing but a bully and a coward.”
The boy’s cheeks went all the redder, and he swiped the back of his sleeve over his nose, which was dripping with snot.
Gillian, however, wasn’t done with them. She whipped about to face his partners in crime. “And what do you think your mother would say to you, Benny MacArthur?” She spun to the smallest of the trio, cowering at MacArthur’s side. “Or you, Terry Meadows? Do you think she’ll be proud to find out that you’re being nothing but a big bully?”
Both boys, properly chastised, dropped their gazes to the ground.
“Now”—she stomped over—“get going.” When they didn’t immediately leave, Gillian clapped her hands once.
That sprang two of the boys into movement. In their haste to flee, both tripped and stumbled into each other before taking off in opposite directions. Then only Langley remained.
“As for you, Langley, I’ve little doubt that your own bully of a father won’t care much what trouble you find yourself up to. You’re just like him.” She peered down the length of her pert little nose at him in a spectacular display of disdain better suited to Gillian’s powerful mother, Lady Ellsworth.
Langley’s bulging Adam’s apple moved wildly, and then he found his footing. “I am just like my father, but you, Gillian Farendale? You are nothing like your proper, respectable mother and father. You’re trash.” Langley’s voice climbed. “Trash, just like he is. And someday, you are going to find yourself in trouble because of the company you—”