I swore I saw the shadow of a smile on his starched face. But in the next breath, I was certain I hadn’t. The gunmetal jaw that was level with the top of my head went rigid, and his entire body hardened as if preparing for battle.

“Since your father was a known savage,” he said, “it can be reasoned by deduction that your mother is a peer of the realm. Or was? Where is she now? No longer among the beau monde. They would’ve banished her the moment she became round with her bastard daughter.”

Red-hot anger spiked as I tilted my chin up to meet him squarely in the eye. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Edric Sharp destroyed your mother, didn’t he? The selfish, uneducated brute deserved to hang. I wish I would’ve been there to witness it.”

My arm moved on its own, swinging swiftly, furiously, careening knuckles across his nose with a wet, blood-spewing crack.

He blinked, and I found myself looking up into a face that was too relaxed to be bleeding. But his hot blue eyes told a different story, one I didn’t register until his fist crashed into my jaw.

The strike hit hard enough to send me flying backward. My arms and legs whirled to remain vertical as hair tumbled into my face. Gasping, choking for air, I crumpled over my knees. By the time I righted again, the throb in my cheek had spread into my entire skull.

Outrage, exhilaration, and pure, unadulterated joy rushed through me. Nothing made my blood sing like a man who wasn’t afraid to fight a woman.

With a high-pitched shrill, I charged. He met me mid-air, our fists crashing into flesh. We hit and kicked with the force of lightning, losing our footing, and wrestling each other to the floor.

The pain wouldn’t surface until later. For now, all that existed was the ferocity to hurt him until he understood that no man used my father as an insult.

His muscled forearm connected with my throat. I threw a leg, an elbow, spluttering for air, and cursing him through each strike.

There was a lot more movement and effort on my end. Meanwhile, he seemed to be deflecting, redirecting, and flowing punches like a trained fighter with the veins in the backs of his hands and arms standing out like blue rivers.

He wasn’t going easy on me. He just didn’t have to try as hard, for he had the advantage of weight and brawn. But he couldn’t match my determination.

If he needed proof of that, it came in the form of my foot in his groin. I kicked him with all the strength I could gather and waited for his roar.

But I was only met with silence. I wasn’t sure he was breathing. Then he did.