Three Nights with a Scoundrel (Stud Club #3)(92)

She snapped her fingers at the first. “You—bring quill and paper.” She swung her gaze on the second. “Run and ask Cook for a dish of minced fruit and nutmeats. And both of you, be quick.”

They dispersed as ordered, and Lily returned to the drawing room. It was a wild, likely futile idea, but it was the only idea she had.

“Amelia,” she said, retaking her seat and keeping her eyes trained on the feathered menace overhead, “I know you are a duchess, and this task is horribly beneath your station in life. But I must ask you to do it anyway.”

“Whatever can you mean?”

The footman arrived with paper and quill, and Lily waved him toward Amelia, saying, “I must ask you to take dictation from a bird.”

“What time are they set to be released?” Ashworth asked.

Extricating his boots from the squelching marsh, Julian climbed a small ridge and squinted toward the Thames. In the deep center of the river, the prison hulks floated at anchor—skeletal, rotting corpses of ships, stripped of masts and sails. Retired from their work as sailing vessels, now serving as overflow prisons for convicted felons.

“After the day’s work,” he answered. “This time of year, labor ends at four o’clock.”

“Odd, isn’t it?” Ashworth mused. “That they put convicts to work around all those weapons and guns?”

“I reckon the officers watch them close.”

Longboats ferried the prisoners back and forth from the shore, where they spent their days laboring in the Woolwich Warren, England’s largest armory. To the south of where they stood now, a large wall rose up from the marshland, enclosing the Warren—a maze of shipyards, weapon foundries, powder magazines, and more.

“Four o’clock?” Morland consulted his timepiece. “It’s not yet noon. We have plenty of time, then. Let’s take a meal at the inn beforehand.”

They’d ridden out from Town before dawn, tracing the Thames some distance on its journey toward the sea. Around daybreak, they’d come within sight of Woolwich and the fleet of hulks. They’d stabled the horses at a nearby inn and set out on foot to scout the area.

“Let’s go over the plan again,” Julian said.

“Again?” Ashworth groaned.

“It’s not as though it’s complicated,” the duke said. “We enter the Warren. Before the two brutes can be released, we’ll intervene. Explain matters to the officer, take them into our custody. We arrange for transport to Newgate, where I see them charged with murder. End of plan.”

“Wrong,” Julian said. “The plan has changed.”

“Oh, really?” Ashworth asked. “How so?”

“We have to enter the armory on false pretenses. Then let them be released. I’ll follow them for a bit before taking them into custody. My custody.” He opened a satchel at his side and removed a pistol, a horn of powder, and a pouch of lead shot.

“Your custody? At gunpoint? Why?”

“Because I need to know who hired them.”

In matter-of-fact terms, Julian told them about the shoving incident in the street yesterday, and the card pressed into his hand. He didn’t repeat the words of the message, only the gist.

“It was a warning,” he said. “‘Don’t interfere, or you’ll be silenced.’” He paused for a moment, concentrating as he measured black powder. “It’s just as I’ve always suspected. That attack on Leo and Faraday was meant for me. If these two brutes go to the gallows, I’ll never know who put them up to it. Lily will never be safe. My only chance is to capture them and force them to lead me to their employer.”

“And you propose to do that alone?” the duke asked.

“It’s kidnapping,” Julian said. “And torture, if they need some convincing to talk. I wouldn’t ask you to be a part of that.”

Ashworth said, “You’ve asked me to do worse.”

“That was in the past. You both have wives now, responsibilities. Morland here has a child on the way.”

Morland countered, “And what about you?”

A swift pang caught him in the chest. He ached for Lily. Would she be awake yet, he wondered? Was she already cursing his name, ruing the day they wed?

“Just leave,” Julian told the others, “I’ll go it alone.”

Ashworth and Morland exchanged glances. Neither man moved to depart.

“We’re not going to leave you alone, man.” The duke kicked at a loose stone. “We think too highly of your wife, for one.”

“And we both owe you our assistance,” Ashworth added.

Julian shook his head. “Forget the Stud Club. It was nothing more than a joke on Leo’s part. I only puffed up that honor and fraternity and ‘Code of Good Breeding’ nonsense to prod you into action when he died. Neither of you owes me anything.”

Ashworth snorted. “I owe you my life. Or don’t you remember?”

Julian tilted his head, considering. Well, he supposed there was that. He’d hauled Ashworth up from a cliff in Cornwall. At the time, however, the man hadn’t treated it like a favor.

The duke added, “And I seem to recall your assistance in a midnight search for my runaway ward.”

“That hardly counts. I didn’t want to help.”