You give Cad a piece of your body—by slapping him across the face! He pauses for a moment, then turns to you bearing a viper’s smile.
“You like it rough, do you?” he snarls, grabbing your wrists and literally ripping your bodice.
“Get your filthy hands off me!” you snap back. You try to position your knee within manhood-striking distance.
Unfortunately, he notices what you’re doing and expertly pins you against a statue of Cupid, with your knees on either side of him, offering you no opportunity to inflict damage.
“Not so fast, sweeting. You won’t play that trick on me again.”
Desperately, you cast about for an escape route. The hard stone of the statue digs into you, but it is nothing compared to the hard stone of the man in front of you. Cad grabs your face with his free hand and forces you to look at him. He sneers, his cruel eyes flashing triumphant.
“I must say,” he crows, “my brother may be a fool, but he is a fool with good taste.” His eyes run over you in a way that makes you shiver. You say nothing, staring at him mutinously and then spitting at his hell-born face.
Angered, he pushes your face roughly against the statue.
“Don’t make this hard for yourself, sweeting,” he hisses in your ear. “I think you’ll find that if even my sap of a brother can satisfy you, then I will be more than enough to—”
“Unhand her! NOW,” growls a dangerously low voice. You look up in relief.
“Benedict!” you cry.
“Benedict!” moans Cad, rolling his eyes. “If you don’t mind, this young lady and I are rather occupied. I suggest you take this opportunity to leave us and get off my property for good. Before I call the authorities.”
Benedict stalks forward silently, his eyes silvery with rage. Cad gulps despite himself.
“How dare you,” Benedict says a little too quietly, his voice the eerie calm before the storm.
“Now see here, Benny,” says Cad, releasing his grip enough for you to slip away from him. Cad barely notices as he turns to face his dangerously silent half brother. He reminds you of a cornered snake facing a particularly deadly mongoose. “You are—”
Again he is cut off as Benedict lands a deft punch to his jaw and another to his nose.
“Not the face!” howls Cad, and he launches himself at Benedict. Throwing his sibling against a statue of Cupid with such ferocity it makes you wince, he lands several heavy slugs to Benedict’s stomach.
You watch, dazed, as the two brothers—one light, one dark, yet perfectly matched—battle for mastery of the other. You search desperately for some tool with which to help Benedict.
“Always such a stick-in-the-mud, Benny,” Cad jeers. “Always so easy to provoke with your foolish notions of honor. And what did it get you? I have your home, I have your title, and now once I have beaten you, I shall have your whore, too! Perhaps you would like to watch?”
If Cad meant to throw Benedict off balance with his taunts, he could not have chosen a worse way to do it. You see a strange light cross Benedict’s dark silver eyes that makes you shiver in both fear and desire.
Even Cad seems to sense his mistake. He tries a swinging right hook that Benedict expertly dodges. A fire has been lit under him now, and he comes at Cad with a series of brutal punches that send the rogue collapsing to the ground.
Benedict launches himself on the slumped golden form of his half brother with another volley of blows. As Cad whimpers, you realize with horror that the strange light in Benedict’s eyes is in fact a death gleam. It is up to you to intervene—lest this brave, wonderful fool, who has managed to break through the once-impenetrable walls of your heart, does something that he regrets.
“No, Benedict!” you cry. “He’s not worth it!” Your voice seems to snap Benedict out of his murder daze, and he stares at you in wonder. You stare back at him, your eyes loving but your expression unflinching.
“Please, my love. Do you wish to hang for fratricide?” Benedict pauses for a moment, then shakes his head and raises himself off the ground. Turning to Cad, he spits on his cringing form.
“You are nothing to me. Nothing at all,” he says, his voice cold and impassive. He then turns to you, his eyes ablaze with passion and concern.
“Did he hurt you?” he asks, so tenderly that you feel your throat catch.
“I shall be quite all right, thank you,” you say, as you watch relief course over his handsome face. He raises a strong hand to stroke the hair out of your face with a gentleness that takes your breath away.
“Oh, my darling,” he says as he leans in to kiss you. You close your eyes, but feel him yanked from you by a certain would-be ravager.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” snarls Cad as he throws Benedict to the ground and draws out a pistol. “I mean to have my way, and I’m not letting anyone, least of all my pathetic waste of a half brother, stop m—”
For the third time Cad is cut short—this time by you smashing an urn-shaped garden ornament onto his head.
He slumps to the ground, out cold. Benedict stands shakily, his eyes blazing with admiration and desire. You gasp with pleasure as he pulls you into a fiery kiss. Whatever happens between you in the future, you will never forget this moment.
Still, reason must prevail, if only for now, for you have an unconscious fake heir to deal with. Benedict, as if reading your thoughts, pulls away and looks coldly at his brother lying on the ground.
“We should go.”
Benedict is right. Get out of there and go to .