The Duke with the Dragon Tattoo (Victorian Rebels, #6)(62)

The Rook’s eyes burned into Lorelai’s with an onyx fire. “As in…”

“The Black Water River,” she confirmed. “I’d recognize these waterways anywhere now that I can see the whole of them. They’re part of the river’s tributaries.”

“And this?” Moncrieff pointed to the small, hastily drawn dragon on the leather map.

“That is a very small island to the left of the mouth of the river. Tersea Island. You can see it from the shore, but the coast is naught but rocks and cliffs, it’s nigh impossible to land on.” She sat back, her entire frame quivering with equal parts excitement and alarm. “But if you can figure out how … I think … I think that’s where you’ll find your treasure.”

“All that time you spent on the Black Water, Captain, we could never make sense of it.” Moncrieff bent his knees to inspect the rudimentary drawings of the waterways. “Even though you couldn’t remember, you must have known it in your bones, that the treasure you’d sought your whole life was hidden there.”

“Yes. I knew it in my bones.”

Lorelai didn’t look up from the map, but a strange ache lodged at the base of her throat at his words. He’d come for her, to fulfill a vow he’d made as a boy. But … what took him so long?

And what did they do now? What if he found his treasure? The one that’d meant so much to him, he’d left her at Southbourne Grove for how many years to chase it. He’d mentioned suffering and servitude, but the Rook had been in the papers for the better part of five years. The sun had risen one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five times, at least, since she’d first heard of his exploits as the Captain of the Devil’s Dirge.

In an age where a fast steamship could cross the Atlantic to America in six days and circumnavigate the globe in a matter of weeks … why hadn’t he come for her?

And why come for her now?

Was it this? Her gaze traced the lines of the familiar waterways of her home. The Claudius Cache? Maybe a part of him wanted her, but this was his real quest.

Treasure.

He was a pirate, after all.

Veronica stood, startling everyone and obliging all gentlemen to do the same. Everyone, that was, but the Rook. “Now that you have what you came for, may we be released?”

“Absolutely not.” Moncrieff’s hazel eyes shouted silent warnings at her. “You are now privy to our plans. It wouldn’t do to have you contact the authorities and tell them where we are whilst we’re pilfering the treasure.”

“Released?” Farah echoed, a worried frown deepening her cherubic dimples. “As in … from captivity?”

“Yes,” Veronica hissed. “We’ve been the Rook’s prisoners for days.” She put her hand on Lorelai’s shoulder. “We just want to go home.”

“Prisoners?” Blackwell turned to Lorelai, whose thoughts and emotions were as unruly as a litter of curious kittens. “I was told you were his wife.”

“She is my wife.” The Rook stood, towering over her.

“Why didn’t you mention your captivity before?” Farah pressed.

“Because we weren’t certain we hadn’t simply changed one captor for another when we were beset upon at the beach by your guards,” Veronica answered.

“That was more for your safety than anything else,” Dorian said.

“No one is a prisoner here,” Farah reassured them. “You are free to leave at your leisure. Though I’d suggest prevailing upon our hospitality until the morning.”

“She goes nowhere,” the Rook stated in a voice hard enough to shatter diamonds. “She is my wife.”

A new tension sliced through the library, robbing it of air. All the moisture deserted Lorelai’s mouth, but she had to wipe freezing, clammy hands on the skirt of her borrowed gown, unable to look up from her lap.

Lord, she hated this. Detested it when people stared. When their voices rose in both pitch and sound. She loathed aggression or conflict of any kind.

Pain always followed.

She could feel their gazes, heavy with expectation. They were waiting for her to pull the rope on the guillotine. Veronica. The Rook. The Blackwells. Even Moncrieff.

Air. She needed air. Where had it gone? Had the black void in the Rook’s chest swallowed it all?

Her lids began to flutter. If she were lucky, she could just leave. Sleep. And wake when the carnage was over.

Escape. Like the coward she’d always been.

Farah Blackwell’s abidingly soft voice whispered through the atmosphere thick and hot with suspicion and challenge as she rested a hand on Lorelai’s shoulder. “Lorelai, dear. Are you…” She paused. “Do you consider yourself married to the Rook?”

His gaze burned a hole into the crown of her head. She didn’t have to look up to fathom the possession and demand in his eyes. “I—I don’t know. I couldn’t say that our ceremony was exactly legitimate.”

“It was by the rules of maritime law,” the Rook insisted.

“It’s true that I’ve been more of a captive than a wife,” she confessed, her cheeks burning with mortification. “And … the marriage hasn’t been consummated.”

“Thank God.” Veronica sighed with more relief than Lorelai, herself, felt.