The Governess (Wicked Wallflowers, #3)(7)

This day, however, was different.

I got to His Lordship. He knows you ordered a nob’s babe for Diggory.

That smug deliverance from Walsh played over and over in his mind.

All that remained was his word against Walsh’s.

He’d been bested, and by the scum of the streets who dealt in the sale of children.

He growled, fisting his hands.

“Mr. Killoran.” Nerrie, the second guard behind MacLeod, rushed over, falling into step beside him.

Broderick’s mind raced. That meeting had been his only hope, and it had been a slim one at that. “Not now.”

Undeterred, Nerrie matched his stride.

What course did he have? What options were available to him?

None that were—

“If I may, sir?” Nerrie tried again.

“You may not.”

They reached the base of the stairwell to the private apartments, and the guards on duty there parted, allowing them to pass. “I understand you have other matters to attend to, Mr. Killoran.”

God, had the blighter always been this damned thick?

“It sounds like there is a ‘but’ there. Do not let there be one,” Broderick warned tightly, taking the steps quickly. The young guard, near to his twentieth year, had been one of the more recent hires and had proven himself very nearly obsequious in his efforts to please.

Trailing behind him, Nerrie hurried to keep up. “But . . .” They reached the main landing, and another set of guards on duty allowed them entry.

“I said, not now.” Broderick stepped around a maid carrying a pitcher of water, that small slip of a girl waylaying the deuced persistent guard dogging his footsteps.

The usually quiet-for-this-hour corridor saw a flurry of servants rushing about, while other uniformed maids knelt on the Axminster carpet, scrubbing the wool. “What in blazes?” he muttered, stepping around the sea of his staff.

“Yes, sir. It is just . . . that . . .”

Whatever the young guard had to say could wait. Broderick was clinging to the world he’d built with his bare hands.

The other man swallowed loudly. “There was a problem while you were out,” Nerrie blurted just as Broderick turned down the hall to his apartments.

He abruptly stopped. “Why didn’t you say that?”

Nerrie cringed.

Maddock. A frantic energy thrumming through him, Broderick gripped the other man by his arm and dragged him over. “What. Problem?”

The guard’s massive Adam’s apple jumped. “M-m . . .” Maddock. “Miss Spark,” the young man squeezed out on a ragged exhalation.

Through the panic sawing at his mind, he registered that most unexpected of names. “Miss Spark?” Broderick echoed dumbly, his grip going slack.

“Your assistant,” Nerrie ventured.

“I know who my damned assistant is,” he snapped, releasing the other man. Broderick thinned his eyebrows warningly on Nerrie’s whitewashed face. “Careful about what you have to say concerning Miss Spark.”

In his employ for more than ten years, she’d been both friend and confidante and had also dedicated her life to caring for the Killoran siblings. None had proven themselves more loyal to the Killoran family and the Devil’s Den.

“No, of course she’s not a problem, sir,” the man stammered, looking one more misstep away from sobbing. “That is . . . she’s encountered a . . . problem . . . sir.”

Nerrie’s statement penetrated the earlier fog left by his street meeting.

Now he took in those details that had previously escaped him: the sea of servants busy at work in the hall, the carpet marked with fresh stains of blood. “Where is she?” he barked.

“H-her rooms, s-sir,” Nerrie called after him.

Readjusting his path, Broderick forced his feet into a measured calm he didn’t feel. To reveal a hint of weakness or emotion only offered others a weapon to use against oneself. He reached the stairwell leading to the next floor and took the steps quickly.

Not bothering with a knock, Broderick tossed the door open. He shot a hand out to keep it from slamming back in his face.

Four sets of eyes met his: three human and one feline. From where he sat beside Reggie’s feet, Gertrude’s latest rescue, Gus, hissed. Broderick looked past the eclectic gathering and found Reggie. She held a cloth stained red with blood pressed to the right side of her face. Blood had matted the already crimson tresses to her cheek.

“Broderick.” Gertrude was the first to greet him. She finished winding a bandage about Reggie’s ear. “There.”

He growled.

With another hiss, Gus bolted out from under Reggie’s chair and darted under the corner bed.

“Get out,” he ordered.

“I am fine,” Reggie protested in those placating tones she used on disgruntled serving girls arguing over a patron.

Gertrude was already abandoning the linens in her hand. She stalked over to Stephen and said something quietly to the boy seated with his legs dangling over the edge of Reggie’s bed.

When he refused to budge from his spot, Gertrude grabbed him by the hand and tugged him from his perch.

“Don’t see why we can’t stay,” Stephen groused.

“Because it isn’t our business,” Gertrude explained.

“Ya can’t say that for sure unless we ’ear ’im out.”