Brazen and the Beast (The Bareknuckle Bastards #2)(24)

It was the hottest kiss Whit had ever experienced, but that was not for his brother to know. “When I exited the carriage—”

“We heard you were thrown out,” Felicity said.

He gave a little growl. “It was mutual.”

“Mutual,” Felicity repeated. “Carriage tossing.”

Lord deliver him from prying sisters. “When I exited the carriage,” he said, “she was headed deeper into the Garden. I followed.”

Devil nodded. “Who is she?”

He stayed quiet.

“Christ, Whit, you got the lady toff’s name, didn’t you?”

He turned to Felicity. “Hattie.”

Having a sister-in-law who was once an aristocrat paid handsomely at times, particularly when one required the name of a noblewoman. “Spinster?”

It wasn’t the first descriptor he’d assign to her.

“Very tall? Blond?” Felicity pressed.

He nodded.

“Plump?”

The word brought back the memory of the dips and valleys of her curves. He growled his assent.

Felicity turned to Devil. “Well then.”

“Mmm,” Devil said. “We shall come back to that. Do you know who the woman is?”

“Hattie’s quite a common name.”

“But?”

She looked to Whit, then back to her husband. “Henrietta Sedley is daughter to the Earl of Cheadle.”

The truth slammed through Whit, along with triumphant pleasure at the revelation of Hattie’s identity. Cheadle had earned the earldom—received it from the king himself for nobility at sea. I grew up on the docks, she’d told him when he’d tried to scare her with foul language. “That’s her.”

“So Ewan is working with Cheadle?” Devil said, shaking his head. “Why would the earl go in against us? It doesn’t make sense.”

And it didn’t. Andrew Sedley, Earl of Cheadle, was beloved on the docks. His business was a source of honest work and good pay, and men who worked the Thames knew him as a fair man willing to hire anyone with an able body and a strong hook, regardless of name or country or fortune.

The Bastards had never had cause to interact with Sedley, as he exclusively ran aboveboard shipments, paid his lading taxes, and kept his business clean, with nary a whiff of impropriety. No weapons. No drugs. No people. The same rules the Bastards played by, though they played in the muck, their contraband running to booze and paper, crystal and wigs, and anything else taxed beyond reason by the Crown. And they weren’t afraid to defend themselves with force.

The idea that Cheadle might have shot the first cannon at them was beyond understanding. But Cheadle and his daring daughter weren’t alone.

“The son,” Whit said. August Sedley was by all accounts an indolent lackwit, bereft of his father’s work ethic and respect.

“It could be,” Felicity said. “No one thinks much of him. He’s charming but not very intelligent.”

Which meant the young Sedley lacked the sense required to understand that going up against Covent Garden’s best known and most beloved criminals was not to be done lightly. If Hattie’s brother was behind the hijackings, it could mean only one thing.

Devil saw it, too. “Ewan has the brother doing his work, and the sister protects her family.”

Whit knew the price of that. He grunted his agreement.

“She fails,” Devil said, tapping against the floor again and looking down at Jamie. “This ends. We take the son, the father, the whole fucking family if need be. And they lead us to Ewan. And that ends, as well.” They’d been fighting Ewan for two decades. Hiding from him. Protecting Grace from him.

“Grace won’t like it,” Felicity said, softly. A lifetime ago, Devil and Whit had made a singular promise to their sister—that they wouldn’t hurt Ewan. It did not matter that he’d been the fourth in their band or that he had betrayed them beyond reason. Grace had loved him. And she’d made them promise never to touch him.

But Grace wasn’t a part of this. Whit shook his head. “Grace will have to suffer it. He comes for more than us now. For more than his past. Now, he comes for our men.”

For the world the Bastards would protect at all costs.

It was time to end it.

Whit met his brother’s eyes. “I’ll do it.”

The words were punctuated by a knock on the door to the building, the sound muffled in the distance. Another body, no doubt. There was always someone in need of care in the Garden—and he’d be damned if he’d let an entitled aristocrat add to the body count.

The brothers locked eyes. “All of it?”

“The business, the name, everything he values. I’ll bring it down.” Young Sedley had crossed the Bastards, and with it, brought destruction upon himself.

“And Lady Henrietta?” Felicity said, setting Whit on edge with the honorific. He didn’t like her as an aristocrat. He’d preferred her as Hattie. “Do you think she is part of it? Do you think she works with Ewan?”

No. The denial rioted through him.

Devil watched him carefully, then said, “How do you know?”

I know.

It wasn’t enough.

“She’ll give up the brother.”

Devil regarded him in silence. “Would you give up yours?”