Thief of Shadows (Maiden Lane #4)(81)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

She held the pistol level and aimed at Mr. Seymour, waiting for her moment.

Seymour parried a lightning thrust from Winter. “You were supposed to be unarmed. This isn’t fair.”

“Oh, you aristocrats,” Winter hissed, stomping forward in attack, “you make your own rules that must be followed by all but are only in your own favor.”

Mr. Seymour sneered, batting aside Winter’s long sword. “It’s the natural order of things that the mighty will rule over the meek. If you don’t like it, then plead your case before God.”

And he struck, as quick and vicious as an adder, ripping a long tear in Winter’s waistcoat. Isabel moaned, low and terrified. Winter’s waistcoat immediately began to darken, and as he moved, blood spattered to the floor from both his left arm and his side. Dear God, he was losing so much blood! He would weaken if this didn’t end soon. But the men were still too close together for her to shoot.

“You’re good,” Winter panted, skipping back from another thrust. “But then you aristocrats often are—what more do you have to do than to endlessly practice your sword craft?”

“You may learn the art of the sword,” Seymour sneered, “but it’s like a parrot talking: he only mimics what he doesn’t truly understand.”

He lunged and Winter caught the attack with his own sword, the blades shrieking as they slid against each other, each man bearing against the other with his full weight and strength. Winter’s blood smeared the floor and his rear boot slid in it, forcing him to stumble to the side to avoid the tip of Mr. Seymour’s blade.

Mr. Seymour grinned. “Thin stuff, your commoner’s blood. I shall paint the walls with it when I’m done with you.”

Winter raised his eyebrows at the theatrical threat. “You make your money off the backs of little girls. Don’t think that I’ll let you win here.”

“Perhaps you won’t have that choice,” Mr. Seymour grunted. He darted to Winter’s opposite side.

Finally! Isabel pulled the trigger. The gun exploded with a deafening BOOM! The recoil laid her flat. She struggled to rise and for a moment simply stared in horror.

Both men were locked together, so close they might be embracing. Dear God, had she shot them both?

Then Mr. Seymour slid bonelessly from the embrace and Winter looked up.

“Oh, Winter!” Isabel didn’t know how she got there, but suddenly she was in Winter’s arms, kissing him awkwardly, tears slipping down her cheeks. She’d almost lost him. If she hadn’t fired when she had, he would’ve—

She glanced down at Mr. Seymour and frowned. “But where is the gunshot wound?”

Harold cleared his throat. “You missed, my lady.” He pointed to a large hole blown into the plaster of the wall.

“I missed?” She looked up in time to see Winter scowling at her footman.

Instantly he smiled down at her. “But it was very close. I’m sure that had you had time to aim, you would’ve got him through the heart.”

“Humph.” He was humoring her outrageously, but under the present circumstances, she could hardly protest. “Then how did he die?”

Winter lifted his sword. It was smeared with blood. His own face was white. “I let the beast out.”

“Oh.” She reached to touch him; he was too calm, too reserved. She could almost see him retreating back into himself.

“Jesus!” Lord d’Arque’s voice came from the door. “What happened here?”

He was staring about the room in horror. Isabel froze. If he chose to bring Winter up on murder charges, she would have a very hard time defending Winter. He was a commoner who had just killed an aristocrat.

“Your friend Seymour attacked Lady Beckinhall,” Winter said before she could speak, his voice hard.

Viscount d’Arque blanched. “Attacked? Dear God, my lady, I hope you are all right?”

“Yes.” Isabel touched her throat delicately, wincing at the bruised skin there, relieved that he was properly appalled at Mr. Seymour’s actions. “Thanks to Mr. Makepeace and my footman. They both risked their lives to save me.”

Lord d’Arque stared down at Mr. Seymour’s body. “When you said Makepeace was in peril from Seymour, I thought your imagination had run away from you.”

“Yet you kept following me anyway?” Isabel asked softly.

“Seymour was acting very strange after the girls were found here,” Lord d’Arque said slowly. “Whenever I mentioned questioning the girls, he made sure to deflect my attention. And then he had become obsessed with Makepeace. Kept saying he was the Ghost of St. Giles and had killed Roger.”

“I was under the impression you thought that yourself,” Winter murmured.

Lord d’Arque glanced at him. “Maybe for a bit, but it’s simply too outlandish—that a schoolmaster should be a masked madman. And why would you have killed Roger anyway?”

“I wouldn’t have,” Winter said soberly. “I don’t know who killed your friend, my lord. I wish I did.”

Lord d’Arque nodded, looking away for a moment. “I suppose Seymour was behind this dreadful business with the enslaved girls? That was his moneymaking scheme?”

“Yes,” Isabel said. “He meant to kill us so his secret wouldn’t come out.”

“Awful.” The viscount passed a hand over his forehead. “To make money that way—by the labor of little girls and in such a wretched place.” He looked around the cramped little room, then back at them. “I cannot find any pity in my heart for Seymour. He more than deserved his fate, but his wife is a rather nice woman, you know. The scandal when this is revealed will kill her.”

“Then don’t let it,” Winter said. He smiled grimly. “We can say that the Ghost has claimed another victim.”

Lord d’Arque nodded. “Leave it to me.”

Chapter Twenty

For a moment, the Harlequin Ghost of St. Giles stood still, staring at his True Love, his palm upon her belly where their child grew. The True Love held her breath, for this was her only chance. If he did not recognize her, did not return to the day and to the living, she had no other means of waking him from the spell. So she waited, watching him, as the sun began to dawn on St. Giles…

—from The Legend of the Harlequin Ghost of St. Giles

ONE WEEK LATER…

“I have a letter for you, Peach.” Winter held out the paper with the carefully printed address toward the little girl.