Chapter 26

Siena had nearly fallen asleep, so exhausted was she after her ordeal, but every time her eyes closed, the ropes would cut into her wrists and she would be startled back awake. McGregor had, at this point, nodded off himself, but when she heard the shouts coming from outside the door, she hoped he would stay sleeping.

"Siena!"

Levi. He was here.

She strained to catch a glimpse of him through the windows, but she couldn't see anything through the filth.

McGregor rose, sputtering, to attention – apparently, he had picked up a few skills during wartime – and snapped up the gun sitting beside him.

"Time to say farewell to your darling husband," he said with an evil grin, opening the door to peek out around it. Siena's heart jumped in hope when he cursed.

"Stay here!" he ordered as if she had any choice in the matter.

Her heart pounded as she wished with all of her might that the only person she would see walk through that door was Levi. As for McGregor or her father, she would be perfectly happy if she never saw either of them again.

"Levi!" she called out, trying to stand, but it was no use – she was tied to the chair too tightly. She looked around her for anything that she might be able to use to free herself, but the room was empty.

Although some of the splinters of wood might be worth a shot.

She used all of her might to inch her chair forward, her eyes focused and determined as she tried to imagine that she was a heroine in one of the books she read, only she refused to be one that walked stupidly into danger and then sat and waited for her prince to rescue her. She had every belief that Levi could and would save her, but she was equally intent on doing all she could to make it as easy for him as possible.

Angling the chair over, she lifted her wrists and scraped them against the splintered wood, although just as she did, she heard shouting from outside. Knowing that she might have precious little time, she lifted her hands up and down, harder, faster, hoping the rope would rip sooner rather than later.

Her heart was in her throat when she heard the commotion from beyond the door, and she urged herself on faster. That, however, did nothing to help her as the chair tipped over with her momentum and she went flying forward, unable to catch herself as she landed on her side with a painful "oof."

Ignoring the throbbing in her hip, she tried to inch herself backward to continue her work, hopeful when it seemed that her hands were a little looser.

Perhaps she could do this after all.

That's when she smelled the first hint of smoke.

And panic burned within her.

Levi could hardly believehis eyes at the building that stretched up in front of him.

He had known that many of the buildings along the Thames were rather derelict, but this one looked as though it was ready to fall over at any moment.

Anger spurred him forward as he rode up to the door, giving Lucky a pat and a promise to reward him for all of his hard work before tying him on the rail away from the building.

"Siena!" he called, his heart pounding as he knew there was no way that she was here alone, that someone had to have forced her here. He could only pray that she had been left unharmed.

His boots had just hit the bottom stair when the door swung open, the barrel of a gun the first thing he saw.

Relief flooded through him when he saw the identity of its holder.

"McGregor!" he said, wondering how his valet could possibly have arrived before him but grateful, nonetheless. "Thank goodness. You found Siena. How is she? Is she all right? Is she injured?"

"She is fine," McGregor said, a strange expression twisting his face. "For now."

"What do you mean?" Levi asked as a surprising sense of unease crept over him. "What is happening, McGregor? Where is Siena?"

He began to push past his annoyingly confusing valet to find his wife, but McGregor shocked the hell out of him when he dug the pistol into his ribs.

"Stop."

"Stop? You are aware that you answer to me," Levi said, hating to pull such rank, but he did pay the man's salary after all. The least McGregor could do was provide him the explanation for why he couldn't enter the building.

"Not anymore," McGregor said, his expression twisting his face to the point that Levi hardly recognized him.

"Move. Aside." Levi would determine what had so changed McGregor later, but for right now, he had to find Siena.

"I don't think you understand," McGregor said, lifting the shotgun now and pointing it at Levi's head. "You are not going inside. You are here for an altogether different reason."

"McGregor, have you gone mad?" Levi growled, his impatience and disbelief mounting. "Did someone pay you to turn against me? Lord Sterling?"

"Yes, as it happens, but it didn't take much convincing," McGregor said, butting him with the shotgun and forcing him backwards, walking him all the way to the bank of the river. The waves lapped behind him, and Levi disjointedly wondered if he was going to shoot him here. It would make for an easy clean up.

"Nor am I going to follow through on my end of the deal. You see, I've been waiting a long time for this opportunity. I never thought the day would come. You were miserable – the way it should have been. But then I see you walking around with a smile on your face, a spring in your step." He let out an inhuman bellow. "I couldn't take it anymore!"

Levi was stunned into silence, wondering where this man had come from, how McGregor had lived with him, helped to take care of him, been one of his closer friends, and yet harbored so much hatred against him.

"McGregor, what did I ever do to you?" he asked disconnectedly. "We served together. When you had no one to return to, I gave you a job, a home."

"It was all fine until you killed him," he answered, his voice filled with vehemence.

"Killed who?"

"Your brother."

Pain washed over Levi in a wave, as well as all of those feelings of guilt that had consumed him over the past year. It seemed Siena's words had somehow gotten through, however, for it was not quite as dark as it had been in the past – more grief than guilt this time.

"I didn't kill him," Levi said quietly, having an inkling of what had caused such pain in McGregor. He had guessed his brother preferred his own sex, not that it was something they had ever spoken about. It did explain a lot. "I did everything I could to save him. I am sorry that you have felt such loss. I understand it more than you know."

"You understand nothing," McGregor growled out. "But you will."

Ice seized Levi's heart when he realized just what he meant.

"McGregor," he said, holding his hands up. "Taking love away from someone else does not bring back your own."

"No. But it will make you feel the same pain that I do."

Levi looked down at McGregor's hands, deciding he couldn't waste any more time. He lunged forward to take the shotgun from him, but as he did, McGregor released it, and the momentum sent Levi flying forward. He fell on his left side with a grunt, his burned shoulder and hip taking most of the pain. Pushing it aside, he rose to his knees, needing to get to his feet.

But before he could do so, pain burst into his skull, sending stars in front of his eyes, and then everything went black.

The smoke rolledinto the room before the fire did.

Siena stayed as low as she could – easy to do when she was already on the floor. But then the heat followed, and she began to sweat, both from its effects as well as the fear that she was never going to escape this.

"Good thoughts, Siena, good thoughts," she murmured to herself as she closed her eyes and envisioned the rope tying her hands together ripping in half – which, shockingly and thankfully, it did, sending her hands flying to the sides as she cried out in relief. She pushed herself up and untied her feet, although it took much longer than she would have liked, her hands numb from being tied so tightly.

That time proved far too valuable, as when she ran, nearly tripping, to the door of the room she was being held in, she placed her hand over it and found it was hot to the touch. She knew that was not a good sign, but there was no other way out of this room. It was to chance it or to die.

She pushed through the door, nearly sobbing to find that the fire was much stronger here in the front room. The exit was blocked, and the windows too small for her to fit through.

She was never going to escape.

As the flames consumed the old wooden building, panic rose in Siena's chest, along with the smoke that was filling her lungs. She coughed and sputtered, her eyes stinging from the acrid fumes. The heat was unbearable, scorching her skin even through the layers of her dress.

Amidst the terror, through the window she caught a glimpse of Levi – but instead of relief she only felt additional terror. He was lying prostrate on the ground, blood seeping out of a wound on the back of his head. As she watched him, it was almost as though he felt her gaze, for he groaned and turned over before his eye flew open, his expression changing from one of pain to horror as he pushed himself off the ground as quickly as he likely could, using his hands on his thighs to do so.

He had obviously been injured in some way himself, and Siena's heart throbbed anew that he had been hurt.

"Siena!" he shouted, his voice barely audible over the crackling fire. She tried to call out to him, but her throat was raw, her voice lost in the din of the inferno.

With tears streaming down her face, Siena stumbled through the burning building, avoiding the growing flames, each step feeling like a mile. The walls groaned and creaked around her, threatening to collapse at any moment. She knew she had to find an escape, but the smoke made it impossible to see.

Even through her cloying panic, all she could think about was how this must be Levi's worst nightmare coming true again. She had to come out from this alive, if only so that his own inner demons wouldn't destroy him.

For if she was lost to the fire, she knew that he would never recover.