The Other Miss Bridgerton (Rokesbys #3)(71)

Andrew . This time she only thought his name. She couldn’t have got his attention, anyway. He was staring at the doorway, his face locked in an expression that was almost devoid of emotion.

Devoid . Another word she thought sounded like its meaning.

Devoid . She despised it.

It was a word that should never be used to describe Captain Andrew James. He was full. He was replete. He was alive .

She thought he might be more alive than anyone she’d ever met.

And . . .

And . . .

She blinked, bringing her vision into focus. Andrew was still looking away from her, but it didn’t seem to matter any longer. She did not need to see his eyes; she knew they held more blue than the ocean. She did not need to hear his voice; she knew it would wash across her with the warmth of the sun.

What he’d said earlier in the day—he was right. She knew him.

Andrew James did not merely exist. He lived .

And he made her want to be the same way.

The realization took her breath away. She’d thought she was quick and adventurous and full of wit, and maybe she was, but when she was with Andrew, she was more . More of all that, and more of everything else, and more of things she’d not even known she might want.

It was not that he’d changed her; all of the seeds were already there.

But with him, she grew.

“Poppy.” Andrew’s voice. Low, and tight with warning. The noises emanating from the tavern had changed. Footsteps. Someone was coming toward them.

“Senhor Farias,” Poppy whispered. The tavernkeeper emerged first, propelled stiffly forward by a man who held his upper body immobile with one beefy arm wrapped tightly around his chest.

And a knife at his throat.

A third man hopped down the steps behind them—the leader of the bunch, Poppy thought. He said a few words in a chilling tone of voice, and then Senhor Farias said, “Do not fight them, Captain! They are many, and they have many weapons.”

“What do they want?” Andrew asked.

“Money. They say they want money. They see you are English, that you are rich.”

Poppy’s eyes darted from man to man, even as her hand kept stroking Billy’s cheek. Why would these men think they were rich? Well-to-do, certainly; it was obvious they were not laborers. But there was no way they could know that she was related to a wealthy viscount, that she had a family who would pay a king’s ransom for her safe return.

Not that her parents could afford such a ransom. But her uncle . . . he would pay.

If he knew she’d been kidnapped.

But he did not know she was in Lisbon. No one did. Not a soul who had ever mattered to her knew where she was. Funny how she’d never quite thought of it that way before.

Funny.

Maybe tragic.

Probably not both.

She looked back down at Billy. He mattered to her now, she realized, and so did Andrew. But if she disappeared into the dark side of Lisbon, so would they, and her family would never know her fate.

“I have some coin in my coat,” Andrew said, his voice slow and deliberately even. He nodded toward his chest. “If they reach into my breast pocket, they will find it.”

Senhor Farias translated, but Poppy did not need to understand Portuguese to know what the gang’s leader thought of Andrew’s suggestion. His reply was sharp, his expression malevolent.

And Senhor Farias blanched with fear.

“He says it is not enough,” the tavernkeeper said. “I ask how he knows it is not enough, and he says he knows who you are. He knows you captain Infinity . You have goods and cargo that don’t fit in a pocket.”

A muscle worked in Andrew’s face, and Poppy could see how hard he was working to remain in control of his temper when he said, “Tell them that if they let us go, they will be amply compensated.”

Senhor Farias’s mouth trembled as the man holding him pressed the knife more firmly to his throat. “I do not know that word, amplycomp —”

“I will pay them,” Andrew said sharply, grunting as he took an elbow to the gut. “If they let us go, I will pay them.”

Senhor Farias translated, and Poppy’s blood ran cold when the leader threw back his head and laughed. Once he’d wiped his eyes, he said a few words, and Senhor Farias turned back to Andrew.

“He says he will take you. He will get more that way.”

“Only if he releases—”

The leader cut him off with a few barked words.

Senhor Farias swallowed convulsively.

“What did he say?” Andrew demanded.

The tavernkeeper’s voice shook down to a whisper. “He says . . . he also takes the lady.”

A look came over Andrew that was positively feral. “Over my dead—”

“No!” Poppy cried.

Andrew’s eyes did not stray from the leader of the gang as he said, “Stay out of this, Poppy.”

“I’m already in it,” she shot back. “And a fat lot of good you’ll do me if anything has to be done over your dead body.”

Andrew looked down at her with a glare.

She returned the expression.

“Captain?” Senhor Farias’s voice choked with terror, and when Poppy looked at him she saw a tiny trail of blood slipping down his neck.

Andrew’s response was absolute. “She. Goes. Free.”