The Viscount’s Vendetta by Kathy L. Wheeler

Thirty-Eight

M

aeve held Penny tightly to her side, doing her best not to succumb to the suffocation threatening to overwhelm her by taking slow, shallow breaths. The room they were in didn’t have a single window, and black was edging her vision. Penny’s life was worth nothing if she fainted.

Mr. Jervis paced the sparse room. There was no grate for a fire, and the air was chilled. A faded settee and a wood table with three chairs and a couple of aged trunks stacked in a corner were all that graced the tiny chamber. No artwork on the drab bricked walls. All in all, the situation did not bode well for her or Penny.

It was kill or be killed. They would have to pry Penny from her dead hands. Sadly, that possibility was shifting to real probability.

The door crashed back, and a large man entered, wearing a mask that covered the top half of his face. “What goes on here?” he growled. His lips were flattened but Maeve was vaguely aware of her recognition of him. His feral gaze scanned the room. It landed on her, and he froze, clearly shocked.

Another man strolled in behind him, also bemasked, and bumped into the first man. “Dammit, Shuff—” He peered around the man, and his eyes widened behind his thinly veiled disguise.

Maeve drew on her inner Lady Ingleby. “Good afternoon. Lord Shufflebottom and Lord Welton, I presume?”

Shufflebottom tore off his mask and stalked over to Mr. Jervis, grabbed him by his dirty cravat, pulling the man to the tips of his toes. “What is she doing here?”

“She took off after the gel. I-I couldn’t shake her off, m’lord. Wot are we t’ do with her?”

“We can’t very well shoot her,” Shufflebottom said. “Too loud.”

“Aw, Shuff, we can’t off Lady Harlowe,” Welton said.

Shufflebottom ignored Welton. “Where’s the ring, Lady Harlowe?”

“Ring, my lord?” Maeve’s nerve endings tingled; it was a wonder she didn’t collapse from the effort of remaining cool.

“The ruby. Lady Harlowe—apologies—your predecessor pretended she had no notion of its location.”

Dear heavens.She looked him in the eye as the horror of her situation took a turn for the worst. “You killed Corinne.”

Shufflebottom inclined his head. “I fear I lost my temper with her. She was a pathetic little creature.”

Welton winced. “Ah, Shuff. That wasn’t very sporting of you. Maudsley had promised her to me, ya know?”

“Shut up, Welton,” he said. “As you can see, we have more pressing issues.”

“But, Shuff—”

Shufflebottom’s arm shot out, knocking Welton back against the unforgiving bricks, and he collapsed in a heap.

“Ye can’t very well move ’em during the day. There ain’t a speck o’ fog,” Jervis said.

“Not easily,” Shufflebottom agreed.

Maeve hugged Penny closer, dearly hoping the girl didn’t grasp what they were saying.

Another figure had entered the room Maeve hadn’t noticed.

A woman dressed in all black. Her dainty hat with its black lace veil hid her face. But Maeve could tell from the cut and fit of her elaborate and expensive gown she was looking at the widow Chancé.

“We don’t wish to hurt you or the”—her pause indicated her eyes had settled on Penny from behind her veil—“child. We just want the ring.”

“It were stolen. I checked the safe meself when Hollerfield left town,” Jervis said. “Whore pro’bly sold it.”

The widow’s attention moved to Jervis.

Jervis stared at Maeve as if she were a bug under a scope. “I’ll toss her in the Thames. Won’t no one likely t’ see ’er fer weeks.”

Penny’s tiny fists tightened on Maeve’s behalf. “No!” Her cry was frantic.

Jervis started in Penny’s direction, and Maeve yanked her into her body.

The widow stripped off her hat, revealing eyes an odd shade of blue. “I abhor children,” she said. “If we drop one, we may as well drop both.”

“The child’s too valuable, my dear,” Shufflebottom said without an ounce of inflection.

“Ye can’t drown Lady Maeve. She be scared of water. She almost drowned when she were little. She lost-ed her sister.” Her little voice was a screech against the walls.

Jervis jerked Penny’s arm and shook her hard. Maeve heard her arm crack from the pressure.

Penny’s shrill, pained cry reverberated through the room. Maeve shoved him away, grabbed Penny to her chest. “You bastard.”

Shufflebottom was there in an instant. “Didn’t you just hear me say she was too valuable, you idiot?” He jerked the gun from Jervis’s hand and hit him on the head with it.

The widow was gripping the back of the closest wooden chair, her breaths coming in sharp rapid takes. “Is that true, Lady Harlowe? Did you… lose your… sister in the river?”

Confused at the widow’s sudden pallor, Maeve swallowed and answered slowly. “It’s true. Her name was Caroline.”

“Dear God. Maevie,” she said and slid to the floor in a dead faint.

“Caro!” Shufflebottom barked.

“Caro. Caroline?” Maeve whispered.

A shadow filled the door. Harlowe. “Give it up, Shufflebottom.”

Relief slammed into Maeve.

Shufflebottom still held Jervis’s gun. He raised his arm.

Maeve screamed. “Brandon! The gun.”

The deafening blast rang in Maeve’s ears along with Penny’s screams. Smoke clouded the air.

“Lady Harlowe?” Dorset’s voice penetrated the ringing.

The smoke cleared and Maeve saw his concern. “Sebastian? It’s Penny, I think that blackguard broke her arm.” She handed Penny’s whimpering form off to him. Brandon. Maeve glanced around and saw Brandon next to Welton, checking him for a pulse, and the widow lying on her back. Maeve rushed to her side. “Caroline. You’re not dead.”

All blood had drained from her face and seemed to be coming from her chest. “Not yet,” she choked out. “Oh, Maevie. I have so many regrets.”

“No, darling. We shall save you. Mother will be beside herself…”

She gripped Maeve’s hand. It was a death’s grip. “No. You-you mustn’t tell her. She would never survive the scandal.”

“What happened? Why did you never come home?”

“I was fished out of the river by Jervis’s father. From that moment on, my life was never my own again. You mustn’t fret. This is for the best. I never meant for you to learn what I’d become.”

“Please, Caroline. You can’t die. Not like this.” Maeve’s tears flowed freely now.

“This is for the best, Maevie. I’m the one they’re looking for. I’m the one who created the Athenaeum Order. It was all mine for a very hefty fee.” But her sister’s hand slackened, and her eyes closed. “I’m sorry, Maevie. It’s time. I love you.”

“No. No. No, Caroline, it’s not too late.”

But it was. She was dead.