Eleanor returned to the desk, opened her notebook, and studied the ledger.
Behind her, Graham stoked the fire.
In a few hours tomorrow would arrive. They would go to the City, and whatever waited there would learn that Eleanor Hargrove did not intend to be erased.
Chapter 9
The sound of her pencil woke him.
Graham roused from his makeshift bed with the instinctive efficiency of a man who had learned to sleep lightly and rise faster. Gray morning leaked through the slats of the shutters, and the oil lamp had burned itself down to a stubborn ember.
For a heartbeat he lay still—listening, measuring—until he located the most dangerous thing in the room.
Not the street. Not the door.
Her.
Eleanor sat at the table with her shoulders squared and her hair escaping its pins. Her gown was ink-speckled at the cuff. Her bandaged forearm was bare and uncomplaining. She looked up only long enough to confirm he was awake, then returned to her notes.
Graham’s mouth still remembered hers.
He hated that his first thought, was the exact pressure of her kiss. Deliberate, chosen, as if she had stamped a claim on his restraint and dared him to pretend it had not happened.
Graham crossed the room and braced one hip against the desk. The movement brought him close enough to catch her scent—lavender soap, ink, and that indefinable sweetness that belonged to her alone. He kept his hands to himself.
“Have you decoded something new.”
Eleanor slid her pencil to a single entry and held it there.
C1 | Pope | “An Essay on Criticism” | 18-14 | Restricted
“Not exactly, but I have a new theory.”
“Yes,” Graham said.
She flipped to her notebook to where she had drawn a rough map of London and annotated it with ruthless precision. “C corresponds to the City, Cornhill and the lanes around it. The most sensible rendezvous is a coffeehouse. Not fashionable. Functional.”
Graham studied her work, then nodded once. “There is one.”
“Indeed.” She pointed to a spot on her map.
“The Jerusalem,” he said. “Off Change Alley. Noisy enough to hide a whisper.”
Eleanor’s gaze sharpened. “Then whoever is protected meets someone there at six.”
“And whoever is hunting them will arrive first,” Graham said.
Eleanor’s mouth tightened. “So we must arrive earlier.”
“You arrive nowhere,” Graham corrected. “I want you to stay here.”
Her eyes flashed. “You will not keep me locked away. Partners. You agreed and I shall not have it any other way.”
“I do not like it. Putting you in danger. But if you insist,” He held her gaze without flinching, “you stay with me. And you follow orders. No heroics.”
A beat.
Then Eleanor nodded. Sharp, begrudging, and entirely real. “I will watch faces,” she said. “And hands.”
