“I was so afraid I’d never see you again,” she said in a muffled voice.
“I’m here, love.” He pulled back to look at her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, thanks to Long Mikey and his friends. They got me out of the warehouse,” she said breathlessly. “Lisette is back there with Ralph Palmer. She’s—”
“Grigg’s daughter, I know.” Wick cupped his beloved’s cheek. “Go and wait in the carriage. Garrity, would you and your men keep watch over her and the mudlarks?”
“Of course,” Garrity said.
A clearing of the throat. “Hello, Beatrice.”
Bea looked beyond Wick. “Hadleigh?What are you doing here?”
The duke, Wick noticed, didn’t quite meet her eyes.
“You’re my sister,” Hadleigh said, his voice strained. “Did you think I would not help?”
Footsteps neared—Lisette and Palmer. Wick had an instant to see the shocked rage on Lisette’s face when she registered that Beatrice was no longer alone.
“Shoot ’em, Ralph!” she cried.
Palmer raised his pistol.
“Everyone, down,” Wick shouted, tackling Beatrice to the ground.
The shot went wide, the bullet blasting bits off the entry stall.
Wick jumped to his feet, returned fire. Kent did the same.
Lisette and Palmer turned tail and ran back into the yard.
“Garrity, take Beatrice,” Wick said as he reloaded.
“Come, my lady.” Garrity offered Beatrice his arm, his men forming a protective circle around her and the mudlarks.
“Be careful, Wick,” she called.
He jerked his chin in acknowledgement. Then he, Kent, and five men headed back into the yard. To his surprise, Hadleigh followed.
Wick spotted the dark figures entering the warehouse. “They’re headed back inside. You four,”—he gestured to three guards and Hadleigh—“cover the exits. The rest, follow me.”
He entered the ground level of the warehouse. Wall sconces illuminated the empty bays where wagons could be parked, coal dropped into them from the floor above. He heard a scuffling to the left of him—saw Palmer racing up the steps.
“Lisette went to the other end of the building,” Kent said. “I’ll take her. You go after him.”
Each accompanied by a guard, he and Wick raced in opposite directions.
Wick pounded up the steps, Wilcox behind him. Reaching the next floor, he motioned for the guard to go clockwise around the room, while he went the other way. The smell of coal was suffocating in the hopper. The hole in the ceiling let in patches of moonlight, shadows dancing over the walls, causing Wick to aim his pistol this way and that. The columns were disorienting, easily mistakable for a man in the dimness. Wick crept along the room’s perimeter, his weapon at the ready, when a movement caught his eye.
Palmer—coming out from behind a column, his pistol pointed at Wilcox.
“Look out!” Wick yelled as he took aim.
The shots went off simultaneously, two bodies hitting the ground.
Wick headed to Palmer, even as he called out, “Wilcox?”
“Fine, sir,” came the guard’s panted voice. “Bullet just grazed my arm.”
