“It becomes mine if you die for your principles.”
“And becomes mine,” she returned, “if you smother me for yours.”
Silence held between them, taut as wire.
Then Graham said, quieter, “If you have to choose…save yourself first. Not the paper.”
Eleanor looked at him. It was the first time he had phrased protection as a plea rather than a command.
“I will do what is necessary,” she said. “But I will not be made helpless for your peace of mind.”
His jaw tightened. “Agreed.”
The carriage lurched forward.
They turned once. Then twice.
Eleanor kept her face composed, but her mind ran like ink through water. The street-lamps did not fall into the pattern she expected. The rhythm of the wheels felt… too smooth.
Graham’s head tilted, the way it had when he listened at doors.
“One,” he murmured, barely audible.
“What?” Eleanor asked.
“We should have passed the second lamppost by now.” His voice remained calm, but his hand found the strap at her side—an anchor, a warning. “The route is wrong.”
The carriage gave a sudden jolt as it turned sharp enough to make the lantern sway, and Graham went still. His fingers pressed lightly to the floorboard, then lifted. He inhaled once—quick, assessing. A faint tang of oil sat beneath the leather and damp wool. Too fresh. Too sharp. He rapped twice against the roof.
The driver did not slow. Did not so much as shift on the box. It was as if he had been instructed to ignore any signal that did not come from his true employer.
Graham leaned closer, his mouth near Eleanor’s ear. “Keep your feet braced,” he murmured. “If I tell you to hold on, you do it without argument.”
Eleanor swallowed, mind racing, and set her hand—deliberately—over Graham’s where it rested by her side.
Whatever came next, it would not be met alone.
Chapter 6
The city outside the carriage window glowed with damp, wavering light—oil lamps throwing halos onto rain-slick cobbles, reflections shifting like secrets when you looked too long.
Inside, their lantern swung on its chain with a faint, anxious creak. Eleanor’s knuckles were white around her reticule, but her breathing stayed even, stubbornly controlled. Her other hand still covered Graham’s at the strap, a deliberate act of defiance that steadied him more than it should have.
Graham did not waste time on what he already knew.
The driver was not Mordaunt’s.
He had clocked it at the door—new gloves, plain livery, eyes trained to look past faces rather than meet them. Now he counted turns, mapping the city by instinct and memory, laying the expected route over the real one like tracing paper.
One.
Two.
Three.
They should have passed the second lamppost.
They had not.
