Chapter 12

12

N ovember 12, 1826

Number Five Grosvenor Street

Will raised his voice, which he rarely did, but the stubborn woman he was supposed to be protecting was refusing to see reason. “If we take you to El’s protection at Goodrum’s in our carriage, your brother will never know you’re in there with us. That’s the only idea that makes sense.”

Gabrielle’s brother had returned three more times that day demanding they turn over his sister. Each time he appeared, he had more dubious and dangerous-looking men with him. Frankly, it looked as though he’d emptied out a riverfront tavern.

Toplofty had wanted to take a pistol to the man, but they’d all shouted “no” to that cork-brained idea. Will had taken turns with John ejecting Captain Tamaryn and his entourage, but each time he’d returned with additional ruffians.

When Will had suggested sending for the earl, both Gabrielle and Margot had become hysterical. They didn’t want to add to the man’s already overwhelming burden of trying to pacify a blackmailer.

“I can’t let anyone else be hurt by my brother’s rage.” Gabrielle clenched her fists and argued her point. “Look at how he tried to push Toplofty around.”

“I’m pretty sure your brother and his minions are no match for the Rutherfords. We should let them handle this.” John put forth that suggestion.

Margot refused that idea out of hand. “We don’t want to have to explain bodies floating in the river, especially bodies connected to the East India Company.

“Why won’t you let Captain El hide you at Goodrum’s?” Margot’s voice took on a desperate, pleading tone.

“Then I’ll never be able to leave. I might as well be a prisoner in my brother’s home as being shut away at Goodrum’s. And what if my brother finds out I’m there? He’d try to ruin Captain El.”

Will exchanged a look with John. They knew it would take a lot more than an East India Company captain to pull down the duchess’s empire, but they were not in a mood to argue the point with Gabrielle and Margot.

There was a scratch at the door to the parlour where they were debating what to do. When Margot said, “Enter,” Mrs. Collins appeared in the doorway.

“What’s wrong? I just got back from my day off, and I could hear shouting all the way back in my room.” She was tying on her apron and narrowed her eyes at the complete silence that greeted her question.

Gabrielle’s brother picked that moment to return for a fourth battering at the door to the townhouse.

November 12, 1826

Covent Garden

Col’s suspicion that ex-runner Elias Shell would run out of money had paid off. He watched him leave the Brown Bear counting his money from his payment from Col’s fellow runners who used him for information on London gangs.

He sucked in a sigh of relief when the man headed off at a fast clip toward the river. There was still a bit of lingering daylight. The bastard wouldn’t slip through his fingers this time.

Col nearly trotted past him when Shell veered into The Globe tavern. What in the name of St. Joseph’s ankle bone was he going to do in there? Col ducked into the shadows close to the end of the building and watched as he came back out with four other men to whom he handed over some of the money he’d gotten at the Brown Bear.

Col’s stomach plummeted. Something big was about to go down, and here he was, far away from any help. Instead of heading on down to the river, the four men hailed a hack carriage. On a whim, Col whistled, a long, shrill whistle. Like magic, Dickie appeared. He swore that boy was like a wraith, and he’d followed Col undercover more times than was safe.

“Where we goin’, Guv?”

“ You’re going to go find CB and tell him all hell is about to break loose. He needs to gather the troops and get to the townhouses on Grosvenor Street.”

“Wot about you?”

“I’m going hunting.” With that, Col turned, gave another loud whistle and hailed a hack.

November 12, 1826

Number Five Grosvenor Street

The hardest thing Gabrielle had ever done in her albeit short, twenty-year life was to walk away from the woman she loved and climb into her brother’s carriage. She knew her brother would be relentless and never give up until he’d ruined all of her friends who’d protected her. And so she’d given up her chance for happiness in Margot’s arms.

The final blow had been when he’d shoved Mrs. Collins to the ground when she’d tried to order him away from Number Five. Gabrielle had stoically reached out to her brother for a brief embrace before walking away, taking nothing with her, and refusing to look back at Margot whose muffled sobs had gutted her.

The four ruffians he’d brought along with him to Margot’s townhouse left the inside of the carriage and joined her brother’s coachman outside. Two of them climbed into the boot whilst the other two sat next to John Coachman.

Once she faced her brother alone, she felt overcome by an odd strength she hadn’t known she possessed. In the four years he’d been gone, she’d remembered him as a large, menacing figure from her childhood. Now that she’d grown to be nearly as tall as her sibling, he seemed normal-sized and pathetic, even though he’d retained his youthful looks. His ice blue eyes in his tanned face and his shock of nearly white-blond hair made him look like an avenging Viking.

“Gabrielle, what were you thinking? Where have you been all these years?”

“How did you find me?” she asked suddenly, ignoring his questions.

He clucked his tongue and shook his head. “The East India Company has eyes and ears everywhere. I’ve been getting reports of your being seen in so many places where no innocent young woman should ever be seen. You were even arrested at a vulgar party before you disappeared with that…that woman. And then, of course, you haven’t answered any of my letters.

“You’ve ruined yourself for any decent marriage to a man of substance in London, so I’ve come to a decision.”

“A decision about what?”

“I have a colleague who manages a tea plantation in the Jiangnan region in China. He needs a wife, and I think the two of you would suit.”

“Don’t I have any say in my future?”

“No. You’ve shown a decided lack of intelligence in the choices you’ve made over the last four years, so it’s my turn to make choices for you.”

He leaned back into the squabs of his luxurious carriage and crossed his arms, signaling the conversation was over. That physical show of the end of discussion she remembered about her brother all too well.

“I’ll take you out with me on my next trip back to China.”

“How soon would that be?”

“In April, if the weather in the Channel stays fit.”

Even though she hadn’t laid eyes on the man in four years, she did remember one salient detail. No amount of argument would change her brother’s mind once he’d come to a decision.

Col could not for the life of him figure out where Shell and his men were headed. He’d followed them in his hack along Piccadilly as far as the west edge of London where the road turned into Knightsbridge after the Hyde Park Turnpike. When they kept on going, he was stumped. What in the hell was in Surrey? Was he leading him on a wild goose chase?

Just when he was considering having the driver turn the hack around back toward London, the carriage ahead of him speeded up, pulled next to another carriage, and forced the conveyance off the road.

The events that followed were incomprehensible until Col had his driver pull off to the side of the road so that he could get out and edge closer to the accident. Pistol shots ensued, and when the smoke cleared, most of the men on the outside of the private carriage were either dead or wounded.

And then he saw the reason for the dramatic attack. Shell reached inside the private coach and dragged out a woman, Gabrielle Tamaryn. When the man inside leapt to the ground behind her to try to protect her, he too was shot.

What Col had been fearing all along became clear. Shell had become so desperate, he’d decided to grab one of the women and pass her off as the murderess to whoever had hired him. He may have started out as an investigator for hire, but then the temptation must have become too great to blackmail the earl as well.

Col had his service pistol but that was it. There was only him against the dangerous lot Shell had paid to help him overtake Gabrielle’s carriage. What Col couldn’t figure out was who in the hell the man was who’d come to Gabrielle’s aid. And where in the name of St. Bridget were the drapers who were supposed to protect the earl’s women?

He had only seconds to come to a decision. He was definitely out-manned, none of his comrades in arms would ever guess he’d headed to Surrey.

Shell and his paid choir birds pushed Gabrielle into their hack and piled in behind her. That left only one man serving as coachman after he’d tossed the hired hack driver to the ground.

The man wasted precious minutes settling in and taking control of the pair of roans. In that small space of time, Col calculated the odds, whispered a hoarse “Oh, hell” to himself, and raced to grab onto the curved luggage bar at the boot end of the hack just as they rolled back onto the dirt road, but now headed back toward London.