Royally Ever After Read Online Free PDF

give the word to fire. Is that clear?”
    Lord Lovedon nodded.
    Chloe nodded, though nothing was at all clear.
    â€œReady?” Amy called out.
    No, I’m not even slightly ready.
    â€œOne.”
    Chloe sucked in air.
    â€œTwo.”
    She let it out.
    â€œFire.”
    Lord Lovedon raised his pistol and pointed it at her.
    Trust me.
    He fired.
    A little blue and green bird sprang up from between the two barrels.
    It twirled and fluttered its wings and sang, “Tweet tweet tweet tweet tweet.”
    H er face was a picture. Lovedon had all he could do to maintain his composure.
    Then laughter spilled out of her, great gulps and whoops and funny little snorts.
    â€œYour turn, Miss Sharp,” he said.
    She turned away, laughing, holding her pistol to her belly.
    He stood watching her, marveling at the exuberance and joy of her. She laughed in the same way she’d defended her sister: with all her heart.
    â€œMiss Sharp,” he said.
    She went off into whoops again. Then she wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her dress and returned to her dueling stance—body sideways, her glowing face straight on, pistol at her side. She brought up the pistol and fired.
    A little blue and green bird popped up between the barrels and fluttered its wings and turned its head this way and that, so wondrously like a real bird, and it tweeted in the cheerful, beckoning way of a bird seeking its mate.
    For a time, their birds tweeted and flirted with each other.
    She watched the birds. When they stilled, she looked at him.
    â€œI see,” she said in a trembling voice. “They’re French.”
    â€œI would say excessively so.”
    She held out the singing bird pistol. He took it from her, letting his hand graze hers. He put the birds back into their respective hiding places in the devices, then stepped away to return them to the pistol case, which Bates had left on the ground nearby. When Lovedon rose, he saw the two seconds walking back to the carriages, leaving the duelists to sort themselves out.
    He turned to her.
    She stood watching him. Her expression had grown serious, and he couldn’t read it.
    He grew anxious. If he muddled this part, he was finished.
    â€œI realize I made a very bad first impression,” he said. “But I can’t apologize. If I hadn’t behaved ill, you wouldn’t have behaved ill, and then where should we be?”
    â€œNot in Battersea Fields, certainly,” she said. “This . . . it . . .” Her lower lip trembled. Her eyes filled.
    She covered her face and wept then, great, racking sobs, as uninhibited as her laughter.
    Heart pounding, he closed the distance between them and wrapped his arms about her and held her.
    The storm abated as suddenly as it had begun. After a moment, she tried to draw away. He didn’t let go. “I only want to know I’m forgiven,” he said.
    â€œI forgive you,” she said. “That was not what I . . .” She paused and swallowed. “My sister was going away, and I was so sure I couldn’t be happy again, for a very long time.”
    â€œAnd now?”
    She didn’t answer, but she pushed, harder this time, and reluctantly he released her. She’d felt right in his arms. She’d felt right, he realized, from the moment she’d slapped him with her glove.
    She started to turn away.
    â€œYou did the right thing,” he said, “calling me to account.”
    She waved this away. “I was pot-valiant.”
    â€œYou’d have done it even if you’d been fully sober,” he said. “You might have done it differently, but you would have acted—out of love and loyalty and . . . all the right things.”
    She turned back to him, surprised.
    â€œI want to make reparations,” he said.
    â€œYou’ve done that,” she said. Her expression grew wry. “What a horrid waking up I had today.”
    â€œI’ve had my