He drew his knife and pressed the tip to James’s jugular, deep enough that it stung. “Stay silent, or you bleed out,” he whispered.
“Is there a woman in there with you? I heard you speaking to someone.”
“No!”
The door handle turned, and George shouted, “Ginny, you cannot come in here.”
“Why not?” James’s sister demanded. “Who is in there? What are you doing? If you have some hussy in there, I swear to God I will end our betrothal and have William banish you to the swamps.”
“There’s no woman!”
“Prove it!”
“There’s no woman in here! I swear it.”
James didn’t want Ginny caught up in this, but she was his only chance to save Ahnna, so he willed his sister to be true to her stubborn self.
“I’m coming in.”
The door flung open and Virginia appeared. She was dressed in black with a veil over her hair, her cane in one hand.
“There’s no one in here,” George repeated, his knife tip digging deeper into James’s skin. “If you go downstairs and wait, I’ll finish what I’m doing and take you to join Alexandra for the execution.”
James watched his sister’s face, seeing the focus in her features as she leaned into senses that had grown acute to compensate for her lack of sight. “George, do you know where my brother is?”
“With Lestara. Or at the execution. I don’t know.”
James felt blood dripping down his neck. Heard the faint splats as it hit the wooden floor beneath him.
“Not William.James.Do you know where James is?”
“What?” George said the word a touch too quickly. “Ginny, you know that Ahnna has confessed to his murder. But we’re still looking for his body.”
If it weren’t his wife and his life that were being discussed, Jamesmight have admired the genius with which Alexandra tied up loose ends.
“I find it hard to believe that Ahnna killed him.”
“Why? She’s a murderer, Ginny. You know what she did to your father.”
Ginny tilted her head, lips pursed the way they always did when she played cards with James and William, listening for tells. Her nostrils flared, scenting sweat and blood. “You are lying.”
“I’m not. I don’t know—”
“James?” Ginny interrupted. “Are you here?”
He didn’t dare move. Scarcely dared breathe, given that George’s hand was trembling.
A tear trickled down Ginny’s cheek. “Let James go, Georgie. If you love me at all, you will not harm my brother.”
“I can’t.” George’s voice was strangled. “It’s because I love you that I can’t let him go. There are things you are better off not knowing, Ginny, but I promise you that everything that I’ve done was to protect you from the worst of truths.”
“Which truth would that be?” she asked, taking a step closer. “That I’m a bastard? Let me guess, my mother enlisted you to aid her schemes because she feared for my future and reputation, is that right? What has she manipulated you into doing, Georgie? What else have you done?”
George didn’t answer, but his knife hand was shaking now.
“What else have you done?” She shouted the words, and George flinched, his blade digging deeper.
“It wasn’t that I didn’t believe my mother was guilty.” Ginny took two steps closer. “It was that I didn’t understand how she could have done it. She’s not strong. Not brave. And my father was a big man who knew how to defend himself. It had to be someone else, and that someone else was you, wasn’t it?” She drew in a shuddering breath. “You stabbed my father forty-seven times. You took him away from me, and now you aim to take my brother as well.”
