Pippa and the Prince of Secrets by Grace Callaway

11

Cull stood at the prow of the barge as it glided over the fog-shrouded Thames, his gut churning like the dark water. Earlier on that day, he’d assigned Fair Molly, Plain Jane, and Keen-Eyed Ollie to surveil Lady Julianna Hastings. He’d given the trio strict orders to observe only and rendezvous at the Nest by nightfall.

The girls had returned without Ollie. Apparently, the three had separated to cover the entrances of the Hungerford Market where they’d seen Lady Hastings enter, agreeing to reconvene at the stairs below the market at eight o’clock. The girls had waited a half-hour; when Ollie hadn’t shown, they’d assumed he had forgotten and made his way back on his own.

But Ollie hadn’t returned to the Nest. Cull had assembled a search team, and they were on the way back to Hungerford Stairs, Jane and Molly peering anxiously into the fog.

“Ollie’s all right, ain’t ’e?” Plain Jane asked, a quiver in her voice.

“Course ’e is.” Fair Molly put an arm around the smaller girl’s shoulders. “’E probably lost track o’ the time. ’E’ll be waiting for us at ’Ungerford, you wait and see.”

Despite the brave words, Cull saw the way Molly chewed on her lip. It was a tell-tale sign of anxiety. Jane’s thumb crept toward her mouth…a habit she’d learned in the orphanage where she’d spent her first five years and one she’d worked hard to break. But stress brought back old habits; for mudlarks, danger to one of their own was the worst kind of stress.

For Cull, their leader, to be the cause of that strain made him the worst kind of failure.

Damn my own eyes,he thought savagely. I shouldn’t have sent them on this sodding mission. I shouldn’t have compromised their safety…just to impress a woman.

When Pippa had broken down weeping last night, his first alarming thought had been that he’d hurt her. That he’d been too rough in his lovemaking. But then he had looked at her beautiful, tear-stained face and recognized what she was feeling: heartbreaking loss.

He’d held her until she calmed. Then he’d dressed her and drove her home. They hadn’t spoken during the ride: her outpouring had left her as wrung out as a dishrag. He remembered his mam’s weeping bouts, how she’d stayed in bed for days. No matter how hard he’d tried, he couldn’t ease her pain. His helplessness felt crushingly familiar.

Christ, it killed him to know that Pippa was still suffering over the loss of Longmere. Cull had thought she was done with grieving, yet she’d wept as if her heart was breaking, as if her husband had died only yesterday. Apparently, she still loved Longmere…so much that she couldn’t let him go.

Did I push her into something she wasn’t ready for?

The thought had brought about pounding remorse…and panic. Cull’s fantasy and reality had finally merged, and he wasn’t ready for them to part ways again. There had to be something he could do to make things right. To dry Pippa’s tears, make her forget her undeserving husband. Make her look at Cull again with ardor shining in her eyes.

The solution had struck him. While he couldn’t compete with Longmere when it came to proper courtship, he possessed one skill that the toff hadn’t: the ability to find facts. Recalling Pippa’s interest in Lady Hastings’s activities, Cull had sent his larks off to gather information on the woman. He’d planned to call upon Pippa with an apology…and a dossier on the viscountess. He’d thought his offering would be more unique and practical than a bouquet or poem. And it would show Pippa that, while he was no elegant lord, he had other things to recommend him as a lover.

Which led to the present chaos.

Ollie is paying the price for my selfishness. Cull clenched his jaw. How many people must I fail?

The tally burned upon his back, and he remembered the sting of each one being etched on his skin. A reminder of the lives he’d failed to protect. He would be damned if he added one more to the count.

The Hungerford Stairs came into sight, and Long Mikey navigated the barge to a small wharf. The sprawling colonnaded market above the stairs stood dark and abandoned against the clouded night sky; in a few hours, the lighters would arrive with goods to fill the stalls of the bazaar. Molly passed around lanterns, and Cull led the way down the pier.

“Comb the shore before making your way up to the market,” he said. “Molly and Jane are with me; Mikey, you take the others. The instant you find anything”—he pulled on the whistle that was identical to the ones all the larks wore around their necks—“raise the alarm.”

Mikey barked out orders to his troop, their line of lanterns moving east while Cull led his team in the opposite direction, toward the footbridge that connected the market to the South Bank of the Thames. Along the muddy shore, the stink of the river was amplified by the market’s unsold offal oozing its way into the water. As a child, Cull had scavenged here, competing with the big grey rats for scraps.

They reached a section of the shore littered with boats, which resembled beached seals in the darkness.

“Pair o’ coves,” Fair Molly said in a low voice. “Fifteen feet ahead.”

Cull was already heading toward the flickering light. “Perhaps they’ve seen something.”

He approached the two men slumped in the shelter of a propped-up boat. Their fire illuminated their drink-slackened expressions as they passed a bottle between them.

“Good evening,” Cull said to get their attention.

One of the men raised a bleary gaze. “Gor, look at ’is fancy mask. What’re you…a highwayman?”

His comrade snickered.

“I’m looking for a boy. Blond, wearing spectacles, this tall.” Cull placed his hand at Ollie’s approximate height. “Have you seen him?”

“No one’s come by,” the man replied.

Fair Molly planted her fists on her trousered hips. “So you ’aven’t seen a boy?”

“’E didn’t say that, did ’e, missy?” The second man’s burp reeked of onions.

Cull bridled his impatience. “Did you see the boy or not?”

“Might ’ave,” the first drunk said. “When I went to piss in me water closet, saw someone sleeping there, didn’t I.”

His pulse quickening, Cull asked, “Where is your water closet?”

“’E likes to do ’is business ’neath the bridge,” the second man said.

Cull took off, Molly and Jane behind him. They reached the footbridge moments later. Holding up his lamp, Cull scanned the rocky shore beneath the bridge’s span…and his heart slammed into his ribs when the light fell on the small body: a boy lying on his side, the tide tugging at his boots.

Please, God, let him be alive.

Cull sprinted over. Kneeling, he carefully turned the boy over.

Ollie’s right temple was crusted with blood, his face bone-white in the darkness.

“Is Ollie…is ’e…” Jane said in a muffled voice.

Cull felt for a pulse on the boy’s neck.

“He’s alive.” Relief pushed the air from Cull’s lungs. “We’ll get him back to—”

“Wot are those coves looking at?”

Molly’s question diverted Cull’s attention. She was staring at a dock on the other side of the bridge. Nothing was anchored there, but a few people had gathered around a dark form lying upon the wooden planks. The river breathed, stirring the shape, rustling what appeared to be layers of fashionably full skirts.

A cold premonition seized Cull’s gut.