“I didn’t incinerate anything.”
“It’s much worse,” Ellie lamented, shaking her head. “A small explosion would be lovely compared to this.”
“What could possibly be worse than—”
Winnifred stopped short on a gasp as they entered the dingy parlor, her gaze alighting on a solitary figure. Tied to a chair!
“Tell me you found him that way and are in the process of a grand rescue.”
A trio of thick ropes bound his lean torso to the spindleback. With his arms behind him, his gray herringbone coat parted to reveal a tailored silver satin waistcoat that drew into tight horizontal furrows each time he took a breath. He sat with his trouser-clad legs sprawled scandalously wide, though it was likely to accommodate their length as they were long, tautly muscled, and bound at the ankle. And though he didn’t utter a sound, he emanated a keen alertness—and likely fury—in the rigid set of his broad shoulders.
“In my own defense, I only wanted to speak with him,” Jane said in a rush, nearly guttering the candle.
Ellie nodded in agreement and wrung her hands. “The rest was simply an accident.”
“Oh? He just happened to fall backward onto a chair and a pile of rope that tangled his hands behind his back? And, let me guess, the wind blew that sack over his head and neck?”
“Well, that took a bit of doing actually,” Jane offered, then proceeded to gesture from the chair to the door as if she intended to explain it all in detail. “You see . . .”
Winnifred stopped her before she could. “Who is he?”
“Haven’t a clue.” Ellie shrugged.
“It was dark,” Jane said. “Besides, we weren’t interested in his name, only his information. One minute we were speaking with this man and the next—”
“Flat on the pavement.” Ellie added a single clap of her gloved hands for effect.
“When he started to walk away, I only asked my cousin to intervene. I never imagined a carriage door, opened without even a modicum of malicious intent, could cause such calamity. Of course, I blame the lamppost that struck him the second time. But when I saw him lying there, and with our book still turning in my thoughts—”
“You know how single-minded Jane can be.”
“—a sudden brilliant notion overtook me. I mean, there we were with a scoundrel at our disposal. We couldn’t just waste an opportunity and leave him to the elements.”
Winnifred wondered if she was the only sane one among her friends. “You’re speaking as though you expected insects to carry him away, or for the rain to dissolve him. He’s a man, not marzipan!”
“Precisely why I summoned you. Now that we have him, I don’t know how to get rid of him.”
“Can we not simply . . . put him back where you found him?”
“I’d thought of that,” Jane said, then pointed an accusatory finger at Ellie. “But she refuses to permit me to give him laudanum so that he’ll be asleep when we remove the ligatures. It is, after all, the obvious solution.”
“You’ve already kidnapped him . . . and you were hoping to drug him as well?” Winnifred huffed. In fact, she was starting to hyperventilate. Light-headed, she imagined that it would be just her luck to die as a disappointment to her parents, suffocated by her own corset, dropping dead at the feet of the strange man tied to a chair in Southwark. “I cannot . . . afford to be . . . embroiled in a scandal. For heaven’s sake, I’m getting . . . married. Wednesday! The contracts have already been signed.”
“It isn’t too late,” Jane said, matter of fact. “You don’t have to tether yourself to a boorish man you will never love, simply because your father has arranged it.”
“I am obligated all the same.”
Ellie frowned. “Surely you wish for something more than to merely endure the rest of your life. What about joy and laughter and—”
“Stop,” Winnifred warned with a wag of her finger at both of them. She took in a steadying breath. “We are not venturing down this fruitless path again. I haven’t slept a wink ever since you mentioned your plan.”
Jane’s eyes caught the candle flame, glimmering with midnight blue triumph. “Because you’re tempted by it. I knew you would be! And I have faith that you’ll come to your senses and run away from disaster.”
Winnifred set her hands on her hips. “Well, if that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black. At least my disaster won’t land me in irons.”
“No. Yours will be worse,” Ellie said with a sniff. “You’ll be shackled in misery for the rest of your life.”
“Again. Thank you for your support.”
Jane laid her free hand over Winnifred’s shoulder. “Our support will be the carriage, waiting to abscond with you outside the church.”
“But you’ll be glad to know that she’s abandoned the pigeon aspect of the plan.”
“My brothers set them free,” Jane said with an exhausted sigh. “I cannot begin to tell you how many of my experiments they’ve ruined.”
Winnifred snapped her fingers. “Shall we focus on our current dilemma, ladies?”
“Oh, yes, right.”
The three of them stared at the accidental hostage. The way he cocked his head to the side, he seemed to stare back.
Winnifred felt a chill skitter down her spine. “Are you certain he cannot see us?”
“Yes,” Jane offered with authority. “I had two sacks in my reticule and tried it myself. Couldn’t see anything more than shadows.”
A harsh exhale puffed the sack out over his mouth. Almost as if he were laughing at them.
“And you’re certain he’s fully conscious? Not injured or impaired? After all, he isn’t speaking.”
“He’s merely being stubborn. You should have heard him curse at us when he awoke to find himself in this . . . situation.”
Winnifred could just imagine. Her father had quite the colorful vocabulary when merely inconvenienced by traffic. The only thing that might pacify him during those moments would be if all the other carriages disappeared and he was left alone on the road.
Hmm . . . she thought, an idea sparking to life. Then she drew her friends out of the room. “I think I’ve got a plan.”
* * *
Asher slipped free of the wrist bindings his captors had so helpfully loosened. Jerking the hood from his aching head, he made quick work of the other ropes. He could still hear the crunch of their carriage wheels on cobblestones. But it was fading quickly.
In the dark room it was difficult to get his bearings. Yet there was a sliver of light bleeding in through a rip in the dusty drapes and he found his way to the window, then peered out onto the lamp-lit street. Not a soul in sight. Turning back to the room, he glimpsed the shadow of the doorway.
Determined to catch them, he rushed through the foyer, the front door, and then burst outside with a growl in his throat.
But there was nothing to bark at when he reached the wet pavement. There was no carriage on the narrow, winding street. And no assistance to be had from the surrounding houses either. They were nothing more than ruins, crumbling into misshapen piles of rubble.
He cursed, wondering what time it was. The air felt damp and cool against his skin, the sky graying around the edges. He patted his waistcoat, forgetting for a moment that the engraved watch his grandfather had once given to him had been filched by Shettlemane and lost in a game of hazard years ago.