Seething with fear and anger, Lottie twisted her hands in her skirts.
It took only a quarter-hour to reach her parents' home, but to Lottie the wait was unbearable. When they arrived at the street of Tudor houses and Lord Radnor's carriage was nowhere in sight, Lottie allowed herself to feel a glimmer of hope. Perhaps she was not too late.
The vehicle halted, and Daniel helped her down. His calm face helped to steady her frayed nerves as she stepped to the pavement and allowed him to accompany her to the house. The front yard was vacant, her brothers and sisters strangely absent.
At Lottie's nod, Daniel used his fist to knock firmly on the door, alerting the occupants of the house to their arrival. Soon the door was opened by a maid.
"Miss 'Oward," the maid said uneasily, her eyes wide in her freckled face.
"I am Lady Sydney now," Lottie replied and glanced at the footman. "You may wait out here, Daniel. I will call for you if your assistance is needed."
"Yes, milady."
Entering the house, Lottie saw her parents standing in the doorway of one of the receiving rooms...her mother, looking pinched and determined, her father hardly able to lift his gaze from the ground. The signs of their guilt fanned her outrage into quiet fury. "Where is Ellie?" she demanded without preamble.
Her mother stared at her without emotion. "That is not your concern, Charlotte. As I made clear during your last visit, you are not welcome here. You cut yourself off from the family with your selfish actions."
A bitter reply rose to Lottie's lips, but before she could utter a word, she heard a determined thumping sound from the back of the house. "Lottie!" came her sister's muffled voice. "Lottie, I'm here! Don't leave me!"
"I'm coming," Lottie called and shot her parents a disbelieving gaze. "Shame on you," she said softly, each word an indictment. "You planned to give her to Radnor, knowing that would ruin any chance for her to have a decent life. How can you live with yourselves?"
Ignoring her mother's vehement outcry, Lottie strode to Ellie's bedroom and turned the key that had been left in the lock.
Ellie burst from the room with a flurry of grateful sobs, throwing herself on Lottie. Her brown hair was matted and tangled. "I knew you'd help me," she gasped, blotting her wet cheeks on Lottie's shoulders. "I knew it. Lottie, take me away at once. He's coming. He'll be here any minute."
Hugging the sobbing girl, Lottie rubbed her back and murmured quietly. "I will always come when you need me, Ellie. Go collect your things, and I'll take you home with me."
The girl shook her head vehemently. "There's no time, we must gonow ."
"All right." Keeping her arm around Ellie, Lottie walked with her back to the front of the house. "You can tell me everything once we're on our way."
"Lottie," Ellie continued to sob, "it's been so dreadful, so very-"
The girl stopped with a half-scream as they neared the entrance and saw the thin, austere form of Arthur, Lord Radnor, standing with their parents. He must have arrived the moment after she had. Lottie showed no emotion, but her heart thundered in her chest as she stared into his calculating dark eyes. She tightened her arm around Ellie's shoulders and spoke with a coolness she was far from feeling.
"I won't let you have her, Lord Radnor."
"Sydney!" Nick heard Sayer's loud cry from somewhere below. "Don't let go!"
"Not...planning to," Nick muttered, even as his blood-soaked fingers slipped on the rotting timber.
There was a dull roar in his ears. His arms felt numb, and his body was racked with excruciating pain. Strangely, his thoughts became calm and clear as he realized that Sayer wasn't going to reach him in time.
He didn't want to die. It was ironic, that had he been in this situation a few months ago, he might not have cared.A life short but merry...that was all he had ever expected. He wouldn't have thought to ask for more.
But that was before he'd found Lottie. He wanted time with her. He wanted to hold her again. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her, when he had never thought to feel love for anyone. And he wanted to take care of her. To think that he would no longer be able to watch over her...that she would be unprotected, vulnerable...his fingers slipped a bit more, and he gasped. Shutting his eyes, he clung hard to the beam, knowing that every second he held on was another chance of seeing her again. Demons ripped at his side with white-hot saws, tearing flesh and muscle, making sweat pop out on his face and drip down his neck in salty rivulets.
Lottie, he thought in fear and agony. There was so much he finally understood, now that it was too late. The thought of her would be the last of his life, her name the final sound his lips would make.Lottie...
Suddenly there was a brutal squeezing pressure on his wrist, as if an iron clamp had fastened around it.
"I have you." Sayer's steady voice cut through the clamor of his thoughts. Sayer was on the beam with him, despite the warning groans of the decomposing timber. Nick wanted to tell him to leave him, that the structure wouldn't bear their combined weight, but he couldn't summon the breath. "You'll have to trust me, Sydney," Sayer continued. "Let go with your other hand, and I'll pull you up."
Nick's every instinct rebelled at the suggestion. To release his grip, and hang suspended, depending entirely on someone else's strength...
"No choice," Sayer said through clenched teeth. "Let go, damn it, and let me help you.Now ."
Nick made himself release his grip on the timber. He swung free for one terrifying moment. He felt Sayer's grip tighten to a crushing vise and a mighty tug upward as the runner hauled him just far enough to balance his weight on top of the crackling wood. "Move forward," Sayer muttered, retaining his hold on Nick's arm, and together they maneuvered away from the perilous fall. When they had both retreated from the beam and found the safety of some relatively sound planking, they collapsed side by side, gasping violently.
"Damn," Sayer rasped when he had sufficient breath to speak, "you're a heavy bastard, Sydney."
Disoriented, his body racked with pain, Nick tried to make himself comprehend that he was still alive. He drew his sleeve over his sweat-soaked brow and found that his arm was cramping and shaking, the abused muscles going berserk.
Sayer sat up and regarded him with clear anxiety. "It looks like you've strained some muscles. And your hand looks like it's been pushed through a sieve."
But he was alive. It was too miraculous to believe. Nick had gotten a reprieve he didn't deserve, and by all that was holy, he was going to take advantage of it. As he thought of Lottie, he was seized with dark longing.
"Sayer," he managed to say hoarsely, "I've just decided something."
"Oh?"
"From now on, you'll have to find your own fucking way around Fleet Ditch."
Sayer grinned suddenly, seeming to understand the reasons behind his vehemence. "I suppose you think you're too good for this place, now that you're a viscount. I knew it was just a matter of time before you started putting on airs."
Lord Radnor was clearly astonished to see Lottie at her family's home. His hard, black gaze moved from her face to Ellie's, comparing the two of them, cataloging the differences. When he looked back at Lottie, his face was taut with a mixture of hatred and longing.
"You have no right to interfere," he said.
"My sister is an innocent young girl who has done nothing to you," Lottie flared. "She doesn't deserve to suffer because of my actions. Leave her alone!"
"I've invested twelve years of my life in you," Radnor said between clenched teeth, taking a step forward. "And I will be repaid for those years one way or another."