The Wicked Widow Meets Her Match

by Stefanie Sloane

  “Crow,” Marcus said as he abruptly stood, “what is going on?”

  Grace pushed her chair back, the legs screeching across the planked floor. “Marcus?”

  “The King was right about you, Mitchell,” Crow growled. “You, too, Widow Crowther. Seems you two are thick as thieves.”

  Marcus casually walked around Grace and roughly shoved her chair in. “What do you mean, ‘the King was right’?”

  “The King suspects you’ll turn traitor and let the Widow go,” Crow’s accomplice said, a gap-toothed grin breaking across his face. “And you know what the King does with traitors.”

  Marcus claimed the chair next to Grace. “While this might be difficult for a man of your limited mental capability,” he began, staring down at the gap-toothed man with superiority, “I do hope you’ll try your best to keep up. The Widow and I are close. And do you know why?”

  The accomplice shrugged his sloped shoulders.

  “Because that is precisely how I want it to be. If I deliver the Widow to the King, he will be most grateful—so grateful, one might even say, he would consider allowing me to leave the Kingsmen. But first, it was necessary to gain the Widow’s trust. Without it, I could not have pried her away from Mr. Clark.”

  Marcus offered the two men a condescending smirk, while beneath the table he reached out and clasped Grace’s hand in his. “And then you two showed up, tromping about my rooms while Clark’s men wait below.”

  Crow quickly glanced at the door, unease in his eyes. “I knew you didn’t have it in you to go against the King.”

  “Thank you?” Marcus replied, squeezing Grace’s hand reassuringly. “Now, what is your plan? Clearly the King does not intend to meet Mr. Clark’s demands.”

  “The King’s tired of playing games,” Crow began, pulling a menacing knife from an interior coat pocket. “Pushed him too far, Mr. Clark did. Destroying the Four Horsemen was a mistake, and the King’s intent on making the man pay.”

  Grace listened to the man, his distinctive voice cutting through her mind, forcing her back to the hidden room in the house on Bedford Square. Her flesh crawled as she watched his mouth form the explanation and realized she stood before the man who’d taken Timothy’s life for no reason. Killed an innocent boy simply because he wanted to. And he’d enjoyed it. She looked about the room frantically, searching for a weapon.

  “I assume there is more to your explanation,” Marcus announced, anger seeping through his tone.

  Crow eyed his partner and chuckled, the sound low and gargled. “He thinks he can tell us what to do, doesn’t he?”

  The gap-toothed Kingsmen sneered at Marcus. “Always has. Can I tell him?”

  “And deprive me of the pleasure?” Crow asked, moving closer to Marcus and Grace. “Not a chance.”

  He scratched his chin with the hilt of his knife. “The King wrote a letter to the Widow. Said there was information to be had and she better come quick. He signed your name, Mitchell, because he suspected the Widow just might do what you asked. And he was right, wasn’t he? She came running as fast as she could. Smart man, the King.”

  Grace looked hard at Crow, sizing up his knife.

  “You were there, weren’t you?” the man asked her, his eyes narrowing. “In the house when I killed the doctor and the boy.”

  Grace nodded, unable to find her voice. She cleared her throat, loosening the hatred and disgust boiling within her. “I was. I heard everything. Timothy did not deserve to die. There was no reason for you to murder him.”

  “You needn’t bother trying to make me see the error of my ways, Widow,” Crow replied dryly, his indifference palpable. “I’ve killed those who didn’t deserve to die before, and I’ll do so again. Makes no difference to me. You can keep your shame and force it on the next person who does you wrong.”

  Grace lunged forward and slapped the man in the face as hard as she could. “You will pay, one way or another, Crow. I will see to it.”

  Marcus yanked her back then held up his arm to ward off Crow. “She won’t be of any use to us dead.”

  “Will be hard to do while locked up in the hull of the Resurrection. But I’ll enjoy watching you try,” the man spat out, gingerly fingering his red cheek.

  “We best be going,” the second man urged as he moved toward the window. “Before anyone comes looking for her.”

  “So that is the King’s plan? Take the Widow by force? Then what?”

  “Mr. Clark wasn’t going to let the woman go—you know it as well as me,” Crow answered, gesturing for Marcus and Grace to join the second man across the room. “This way, he has no choice in the matter. He’ll be right upset, I imagine, too. And before you know it, we’ll have him on board as well. Like I said, the King is a smart man. Wouldn’t you agree, Mitchell?”

  Grace looked up at Marcus with determination. If he disagreed, Crow would take him for a traitor and end his life right then and there. But if he agreed and played along? There was a chance both of them could stay alive—and even catch the King. She squeezed his hand hard.

  “That is why he is the King,” Marcus confirmed stonily.

  “Good,” Crow replied.

  The second man opened the casement window and peered out, waving his hand as if sending a signal.

  Crow pointed to the window. “Now, jump.”

  Marcus hauled Grace up and shoved her toward Crow. When they drew nearer, both stuck their heads out and looked down. A cart, piled high with hay, stood in place beneath the window. And two Kingsmen waited.

  “You cannot be serious?” Marcus asked incredulously.

  Crow nodded. “Afraid? It’s only two floors. We can’t risk running into any Hills Crossing men on the stairs. And we won’t put up with no screaming either, Widow,” he said, looking pointedly at Grace. “Go quickly and quiet-like, or I’ll kill you here.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Grace countered, though she knew the answer.

  Crow smiled at her bravery. “Oh, I would, and you know it.”

  Marcus leaned in and whispered in her ear, “You will be safe, I promise you.” He helped her up onto the ledge, holding her waist tightly. “Don’t go and break your neck.”

  Grace looked down at the cart once more and signaled for Marcus to release her. And then she jumped, landing squarely in the middle of the hay.

  The great hulking prison ship loomed in the distance, the violent cries and shouted expletives that carried on the wind from it chilling Grace’s blood.

  Marcus’s hand held tight to Grace’s shoulder as Crow and the others led the way along the wharf.

  “You are a fool to trust me with your life,” Marcus whispered in her ear. “You are smarter than this. You never should have come to see me.”

  “I was desperate,” Grace replied, anger rising in her throat. “And you are a true friend, Marcus. Besides, you lied on my behalf.”

  “Though it is hard to imagine, you are in even more dire straits than I believed you to be, if I am your most trustworthy of friends,” he replied. “And what makes you think I lied? We are on our way to meet the King, are we not?”

  Grace searched his face for the goodness and respectability she knew existed within him. “You will not betray me. You will help me. And when the Kingsmen are destroyed, you will be free to build a life for yourself in America. To practice law. To marry and have children.”

  “Is that why you are risking your life? For my benefit?”

  She continued to watch him. Had she not been looking so intently, she might have missed the brief flicker of pain in his eyes. “No. I ask this of you first and foremost because it is in my best interest—and that of the man I love. Though I am no less happy that you, too, will be given the chance at a new life outside the gang.”

  Crow looked back and scowled. “Hurry it up, you two.”

  Marcus gently shoved Grace forward to please the man. “You always were the most honest individual of my acquaintance, Grace. A trait I would normally appreciate—though I find it ra
ther difficult to do so at the moment.”

  “Mr. Clark is not who you believe him to be,” Grace offered, treading softly. “He is a good man, Marcus. I hope, as my friend, that will give you some comfort.”

  “It does,” he replied, then fell silent.

  The wind picked up, carrying more cries from the Resurrection. Grace waited for Marcus to respond.

  “Well,” he said at last, a measure of defeat in his voice. “If you dared to trust me, it must mean you truly believe I will do the right thing.”

  Grace smiled with relief. “I’ve always known you were the sort of man who would act honorably when given the chance.”

  “I would not claim a victory just yet,” he warned her. “First, tell me what you need.”

  “Understand that I have no other choice, Marcus,” she began, the stale river air whipping about her. “I would never ask you to put yourself in harm’s way.”

  “But you are about to, aren’t you?” he asked somberly.

  Grace squeezed her fingers together until they ached. “I need you to play along with Crow as long as is needed. And when he decides what to do with me, you must find Langdon. You must find him and fight by his side.”

  His gaze searched Grace’s eyes as if attempting to read her soul. “Why are you here, Grace? You had planned to leave London—to disappear and never return. Do you remember when you told me of a favorite spot in Devon where your family once holidayed and where you hoped to return? I would not have betrayed your secret, Grace. Not for anything in the world.”

  “Marcus,” she replied, his words bringing her close to tears. “I still believe in that life—with all of my heart, I do. But I was given the opportunity to destroy the Kingsmen. And now I am offering you the same chance. Help me, Marcus. Help me make them pay for taking a young woman’s life, full of dreams for the future, and turning it into a nightmare even God himself would cower at. For stripping a man’s soul of hope until he believes all that remains is spoiled and unworthy. He kills. He maims. He destroys. Isn’t it time we stopped thinking on what the King can do and began to ponder what he cannot? The King cannot stop those he’s wronged from coming for him. Let’s see if he cannot stop us from succeeding, too.”

  “Did she get the best of you, Mitchell?” Crow shouted, a sharp, broken laugh punctuating his joke. The rest of the Kingsmen joined in, a chorus of rude, rough chortles ricocheting off the growing wind.

  “Please, Grace, do not ask this of me,” Marcus said, shoving her ahead of him. “I want nothing more than for you to have the justice you deserve. But if it means endangering your life? Let us leave, right now. We will find a cottage in the wilds of Devon and never think on London again.”

  Grace tucked her chin and looked down, fearful Crow might see the concern creasing her forehead. “You know we cannot, Marcus—I cannot. I must see this through. With or without you.”

  Marcus quickened his step and came to walk beside her. He nodded, a small, sad smile forming on his lips. “I would have regretted not having asked, Grace. And I fear I am overburdened with regrets. Could not fit one more in my pocket if I tried.”

  Marcus looked again at the prison ship, then back at Grace. “And if the King is not on board? What then? I cannot guarantee your safety. Even if he is, there is no telling whether he will question you and keep you alive or question you and have you killed.”

  “Not odds I would have wished for,” Grace answered honestly. “But I can live with them for the chance to take down the Kingsmen. Can you?”

  Marcus scanned their surroundings, his brow furrowing as his eyes settled on the prison ship. “I do hope that man of yours is as trustworthy as you believe him to be.”

  “He will come, Marcus. That I would be willing to bet my life on.”

  “You already have,” he replied grimly, then grabbed her hand in his and set off for the Resurrection.

  Langdon was frantic. Enraged. Terrified. And he had been from the moment Midge had tracked him down at the Young Corinthians Club. Grace had been lured to Mr. Mitchell’s apartment with the promise of information, that much Mrs. Templeton could attest to. And by the time Midge had forced his way upstairs and broken down Mitchell’s door, Grace was gone, a letter from the King requesting the honor of Langdon’s presence aboard the Resurrection left in her place. Carmichael had promised to send all the men he could to the Resurrection and Langdon had left.

  “Faster,” he urged his horse, the chestnut snorting with effort as he flew through the empty streets of London.

  Langdon had once gone aboard the Resurrection’s sister ship, the Providence, to interrogate a prisoner being held there. What he remembered most about the visit was the smell. Desperation, mixed with sickness and a heaping dose of hopelessness, had joined the Thames’s fetid stench to create one of the most memorable and miserable smells he’d ever had the bad fortune to encounter.

  Even now, as Langdon raced toward the prison ship, with Niles following closely behind, he could swear the rancid odors tickled at his nostrils. Or perhaps it was the stink of his own fear.

  Niles brought his horse even with Langdon’s and shouted, “It will do no good if the horse dies beneath you!”

  Langdon looked down at his mount’s neck and shoulders, where sweat darkened the chestnut hide but, thank God, he could see no foam as of yet. “I will capture the King tonight. Not kill a horse. I promise you that.”

  The two riders and their mounts pounded recklessly through dark streets, the bay’s and chestnut’s hooves slipping on the wet paving stones as they raced down Hastings Street.

  Bent low over the chestnut’s neck, a hunk of his mount’s mane clenched in one fist, leather reins in the other, Langdon looked straight ahead, hardly aware of the dangerous pace. Truth was, he’d been hardly aware of most everything since Midge had told him of Grace’s abduction. More and more questions piled up in his mind. Did Marcus force her to go with him? Would he offer her up to the King? Or could the man be trusted and it was Grace who was risking her own life to capture the King?

  He urged the gelding on at an even faster clip. God Almighty, but Langdon would kill the King himself if anything happened to Grace.

  His nerves jolted with every last pebble and pothole the horse’s hooves encountered. He should have listened to Grace when she’d come to him with Imogen’s information. He should have ordered Niles to look into the rumor more seriously. He should have investigated the threat himself.

  He should have done so many things differently. Langdon yelled, catching Niles’s attention, and pointed toward Highchester Street. The two horses took the turn without slowing, wheeling in unison as if they were in harness.

  Regrets would do him no good now, Langdon knew. All he could focus on was what came next.

  Saving Grace—no matter the cost.

  The wharf came into view, and with it the briny reek from the Thames. Langdon pulled up the gelding, slowing him to a trot, and scanned the river beyond, searching for the Resurrection.

  “There,” Niles said, pointing down the wharf toward the hulking ship that rested west of where they stood.

  “What the hell is it doing there? Why isn’t it anchored further out in the river?” Langdon couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “It is supposed to be,” Niles said, his voice hard. “I’m sure the location fits snugly into the Kingsmen’s plan. We should wait for the rest of our men.”

  Langdon looked at his friend as though the man had sprouted a third eye. “There is no way in hell I am waiting. If you would prefer to, by all means do so. But I’ll be boarding the Resurrection now.”

  “I was required by Corinthian code to suggest such a thing,” Niles explained, nudging his horse into a walk. “Of course I bloody well knew you’d refuse. Would have been disappointed if you had not,” he added over his shoulder.

  Langdon’s heart warmed at his friend’s loyalty. “God knows I would not want to disappoint you.” He caught up with Niles and the two settled their mounts into a brisk
walk.

  “And as much as I love a martyr, you must know our current predicament is not your fault.”

  The situation was what it was. “On a purely practical level, I am in charge of this investigation. Therefore, any missteps are to be attributed to me and me alone.”

  “Did you kill Lady Afton?” Niles asked simply. “Are you responsible for Grace being gambled away to the highest bidder?”

  “Of course not, you imbe—”

  “Therefore, on a purely practical level, our current situation—which stems from a hundred different decisions that had nothing to do with you—is not your fault,” Niles said, then patted his horse’s neck. “Damn, but it feels good to be right.”

  “I cannot lose her now, Niles. Not when I’ve just found her.”

  “You will not lose her, Langdon,” Niles said with certainty. “Not now. Not ever. So, let us cease with the self-pity and devise a plan. And by ‘us,’ I mean you. Put that enormous brain to good use.”

  “A plan, then?” Langdon breathed deeply, pushed every ounce of fear from his mind, and considered Niles’s words. “Whether Marcus took Grace by force or she went willingly, they are on that ship. The battle will be fought aboard the Resurrection.” He focused intently on the ship’s dark bulk, wondering where was the most likely place on board for the Kingsmen to hold her.

  “And if Marcus was not knowingly part of her abduction?” Niles asked.

  Langdon knew Grace was capable of much more than anyone knew—even herself. Still, when pitted against a criminal mastermind who had managed to go undetected for decades? God, he wanted to believe it was possible that she was alive on board the Resurrection. He needed to believe. Otherwise …

  “I do not know, Niles,” Langdon admitted, though it killed him to do so. “Get me on board that ship. Then we shall see.”

  “No plan, then. I like it. I like it very much.”

  “Is that Crowther’s whore?”