To Distraction (Bastion Club 5)

They each reported, but other than the news of the ship, there was little real advance beyond what they’d known days before.

“So,” Deverell concluded, “tracing the money is still our surest route to the procurer.”

“Is there anything more we can do on that front?” Christian asked.

“I doubt it.” It was Dalziel who answered. “I can vouch that Montague is thorough and uncommonly tenacious over such matters. He has contacts I’d give my right arm to learn of.” His long lips twisted. “But he’s the soul of discretion—which is presumably why he has such astonishing connections.”

Which, Deverell surmised, was a subtle hint that although Montague might know of Dalziel, there was no point pursing his identity through that most upright man of business. Deverell had to admit the idea had crossed his mind; Montague managed the affairs of some of the most wealthy and influential families in the land.

He recalled he hadn’t mentioned Montague’s last message. “Montague might have turned up something by now. He was spending today checking. I told him about this meeting—I was hoping he’d have learned something definite by the end of the day.”

They all looked at the clock; it was nearly six-thirty.

Christian rose and fetched the decanter; Dalziel asked after Christian’s underworld contacts, whether they might be inclined to assist in bringing down the slavers.

They were discussing that possibility when the knocker on the club’s front door was plied with uncommon force. Repeatedly.

From downstairs came the clatter of Gasthorpe’s and the footman’s footsteps as they ran to open it.

In the library, eyes met. They all sat up, sat forward, set glasses down.

Voices reached them, all male, agitated. Then numerous feet came pounding up the stairs.

As one, the five rose and turned to the door as it burst open.

Fergus stumbled in, Grainger on his heels, Gasthorpe a step behind.

Fergus fixed his gaze on Deverell, literally wringing the cap he held between his huge hands. “They’ve got her, m’lord—the blackguards have kidnapped Miss Phoebe.”

Deverell’s world tilted. A cold wave washed through him, leaching out all warmth; ice crept behind it, desolate and bleak. His heart stopped, his body felt like stone—locking him in place despite the overwhelming impulse to race to Park Street, to look for clues, tear London apart if need be….

He managed a step forward.

Beside him, Dalziel put out a hand and halted him. “No.” There was a quality in that steely voice that even now commanded.

That dragged Deverell, all but quivering under the restraint, back to the real world. He hauled in a breath, held it.

“Find out all you can first,” Dalziel quietly continued, “then we’ll all be able to help.”

The sense in that was undeniable. Deverell expelled the breath locked in his lungs and nodded. Motioning Fergus to a chair, he sank slowly back into his, breathing deeply, desperately searching for a calm that had been destroyed.

He fought to curb the black panic roiling through him. He’d never felt its like before—it was so difficult to breathe—but Dalziel was right; Deverell forced his mind to focus. Fergus slumped onto the straight-backed chair Gervase set for him. Deverell met the Scotsman’s anguished gaze and realized Fergus was flaying himself; she’d been in his care.

He kept his tone even. “What happened? Start from when you last saw her, but quickly.”

Fergus nodded and dragged in a breath. “She was walking in the rear garden like she always does late afternoon. They—Miss Audrey, Mrs. Edith, and Miss Phoebe—had come back from their afternoon rounds. The two ladies laid down in the drawing room and Miss Phoebe went for her constitutional.”

Christian le

aned forward. “She walks every day at that time?”

“Aye.”

“It’s a walled garden,” Deverell put in. He nodded to Fergus. “Go on.”

“Milligan—the housekeeper—called to Miss Phoebe that Miss Edith had rung for the tea tray. Miss Phoebe was down the back corner of the garden. She said she was coming and started back, and then Milligan called me in. I went.” Fergus looked shattered. “But she was halfway back to the morning room—no more than twenty yards—and the back gate was locked, I’d checked it, and there’s shards along the top of that wall. How did they get in and grab her?”

“Was the gate still locked?”