When She Said I Do Read Free Page B

bullet tore into the grass at Dade’s feet, sending soil and roots up in a spray to spatter his boots. Dade started, looked down, then looked back up at Mr. Porter, his jaw hardening.
    “Do not think that will save you.”
    Mr. Porter lowered his smoking pistol and tossed it into the grass. “Fire, then.”
    Dade firmed his grip on his pistol and aimed.
    Callie felt sick. Oh, why didn’t someone do something?
    Mr. Porter began to walk forward, grim determination evident in every lurching step. “Go on. Fire. Don’t you think I deserve to die? Isn’t that why you gave challenge in the first place?”
    He came closer and closer. Each step brought him farther into range. Dade could not miss now, not unless he intended to. One look at her brother’s face told Callie that he did not intend to.
    Mr. Porter did not intend to stop, either, apparently. He continued his slow lurching walk directly toward the ball about to hurtle from Dade’s pistol.
    What was he doing? Was he mad? Did he not see that Dade would fire?
    Mr. Porter stopped at last when his chest was no more than eighteen inches from the barrel of Dade’s pistol.
    “I’m waiting.” Mr. Porter’s rasping voice was clearly audible in Callie’s ears. “Fire. Do it. Wrap your finger around the trigger and pull it.”
    Dade’s jaw worked. “You think to daunt me with this game?”
    “I play no game. You have a grievance against me. I have none against you. Take your vengeance and be done with it. Let us all bloody well be done with it.”
    Bloody well be done with it. Callie’s thoughts skittered back to the night before. Mr. Porter’s strange manner of speaking—as if he thought himself to be soon lying cold in death. Did he want to die?
    Yet his hands, his touch, his words, while dark and lonely, had thrilled her with their hunger and need. He wanted to live, she just knew it.
    Perhaps he simply doesn’t know how.
    Bastard . Sudden fury enveloped Callie. To put them all through this, simply because he wanted to give up the fight, to slip beneath the waves of his misery?
    And what of Dade? What was he to do now? If he put down his pistol, could he ever forgive himself for the dishonor? If he fired, could he ever forgive himself for taking a life?
    But … he wouldn’t take a life. Would he? On her behalf, on behalf of the family honor, would her honorable misguided brother actually kill Mr. Porter?
    With horror she saw Dade exhale, swallow, and blink.
    Oh, dear heaven, he would.
    Mr. Porter saw it, as well, for he straightened somewhat and lifted his head. And waited.
    As if watching a play, Callie could see the future unfolding before her. Mr. Porter’s still, bleeding body on the ground. Dade, pale and undone, standing over him, pistol smoking. Mr. Porter, buried here on these grounds, no one in attendance but the vicar. Dade, standing trial, denounced as guilty of murder. Dade, swinging lifelessly from the hangman’s rope, his swollen tongue protruding from his mouth.
    Callie wasn’t precisely sure how she got there. She must have already begun to run across the dewy grass before the moment arrived, because just as Dade’s finger began to tighten on the trigger, she slithered to a stop in front of Mr. Porter.
    “You can’t shoot him!”
    Dade jerked the pistol high with a curse. “Bloody hell, Callie!”
    Callie planted herself squarely in front of Mr. Porter. In fact, her back pressed right against him—that was how close the pistol had been. “Dade, you mustn’t kill him!”
    Dade snarled. “I rather think I must.”
    Mr. Porter exhaled. “Please do.”
    “Shut it!” Callie ordered Mr. Porter over her shoulder.
    “Get out of the way, Callie. This no longer concerns you.”
    “No longer concerns me?” Callie plunked her hands on her hips. “Well, I like that! Was it not I that Mr. Porter … er—”
    “Interfered with?” Mr. Porter said helpfully.
    “Batten it down!” Callie hissed over her shoulder. To Dade, she held out