“While Honora’s behavior did become more difficult in the last year, the past few months were different,” Miss Knightly said slowly. “She was disciplined more than once for skipping classes or being found absent from her dormitory at night.”
Jane gasped. “You wrote to me about some poor behavior, but never that she was missing like that.”
Ripley squeezed her hand gently and she looked up at him. She saw his gentle understanding, his support, but she also saw that he was trying to rein her in. He was the one who wasn’t emotional about this situation. She dropped her head.
“Please continue,” she whispered.
Miss Knightly shifted. “I have some of her things that were left behind. I intended to send them on to you when I had the time. But that’s truly all I know.”
Jane pulled away from Ripley and paced over to the window. She could hardly breathe as the facts hit her from all sides. This was no information at all, unless somehow her sister had left clues of what had happened to her in her things. And why would she do that? Nora was no fool, she had always been clever. If she’d left of her own volition, she wouldn’t have wanted anyone to find her. And if she hadn’t…well, how would she have known to leave breadcrumbs for a sister desperate to find her?
So this trip, just like the one to see her mother, was a waste of time. They were no closer to finding her sister and now she had no idea of what to do next.
She heard Ripley speaking softly to Miss Knightly, but she couldn’t hear the words. She continued to stare out into the garden behind the school, watching as girls strolled by in pairs. Every time she saw one with dark blonde hair like her sister, she caught her breath.
“Oh, Nora, where are you?” she whispered.
She heard the door behind her close and pivoted. Miss Knightly had departed and Ripley was coming toward her in a few long strides. She stepped into his arms without hesitation and he held her tightly, as if he could somehow save her with just his warmth and presence.
He almost could.
She looked up at him at last. “I’ve wasted so much of your time and money.”
He shook his head. “You haven’t done either of those things. We know now that she was restless and unhappy and that something changed in the last few months of her being here. That leans toward her leaving the school of her own volition. And that’s better than her being taken, isn’t it? Miss Knightly said she would bring the items Nora left behind and also have Nora’s two best mates join us shortly to discuss the matter further.”
Jane pulled away from his arms and let out her breath in a shaky sigh. “Thank you for managing this. I would never have convinced her to do anything at all for me.”
“That’s why I’m here,” he said. “To support you however you need me to do so.”
She smiled despite the situation. “When you were facing off with her I kept thinking of how you were in the ring. You were treating her like a fighter.”
His lips tightened. “Well, I certainly didn’t intend to take the confrontation to violence.”
She shook her head. “Oh no, I didn’t mean that. I meant that when you fought, you fought with your mind. You were always thinking, I could see it back then. It was always such a beautiful thing to watch you. And you used those same tools today. I never would have thought to threaten her with blows to her school’s reputation.”
“You see me through rose glass,” he said with a smile. “Just because of a few orgasms.”
“More than a few,” she teased back gently.
He shrugged. “I suppose that to threaten to reveal the lack of care toward her charges was the best strategy under these circumstances.”
“You see,” Jane said. “Always thinking. Do you…do you miss fighting?”
He swallowed. “I assume you’re asking me this to pass the time until we can question Nora’s friends?”
She nodded. “It helps to think of something else. But also, I’m curious. I’ve watched you fight, I’ve seen you train others, but we’ve never talked much about it, and it was and is such a big part of who you are.”
He shifted, and in that moment she realized that this was an uncomfortable topic for him. Despite the fact that he’d been a champion, that he was the best at what he’d done and that he continued to make his living from his skills, he found no pleasure in discussing it.
“You don’t have to tell me,” she said softly.
“You’ve cut yourself open for me. I suppose it is an even trade.” He let out a shaky sigh. “I originally fought because I had to. I didn’t want my mother to have to do what she did. Some of her protectors were fine enough and treated her with some level of respect. But others weren’t. I wanted to…to save her.”
Jane caught her breath. How often had she thought the same of her mother, especially when she was younger. In her case she thought if she could save her, her mother would be better.
“I turned to fighting to make money eventually. Found I was good at violence.” He shook his head. “You speak of my days in the ring as if they were something to be proud of. But I hurt people for money.”
“No,” she said. “I suppose sometimes that was the outcome. But don’t forget that I watched you, Cam.”
