“Who said such a thing?” he asked.
“It doesn’t matter. I need to look for him. I can’t imagine where else he would be.”
“Surely not. Perhaps he has returned to Casa Beaumont,” Giovanni suggested.
“I just came from there. I didn’t pass him on the way.” She took hold of the young man’s sleeve. “Please, I’m worried. Can you show me the cellars?”
“To the dirt and damp? It is no place for a lady,” he insisted.
“I’m not so weak! Show me the way,” she demanded.
“There may be rats.” If he was trying to frighten her, he didn’t know his target. “I cannot allow—” he began.
“It isn’t for you to allow!” she snapped. “I ask only the direction.”
Giovanni’s perpetual mask of calm slipped a bit. A flash of something ugly flew across his face and confused Nora momentarily.
“Very well,” he said with his normal good manners. “But I insist on accompanying you. It isn’t safe for a lady to go down there alone.”
She took his arm with relief.
Deep in the cellars,Jamie’s lungs ached from the damp air. His muscles ached from one fight too many the previous night. Nothing impeded his hearing. The sound of a weeping child, faint but unmistakable, tore his heart out.
“Silence! You make my head hurt,” a voice growled in Italian.
The weeping continued. Jamie felt along the damp walls, searching for an opening he missed, a hallway he failed to find. He pressed his ear to one side of the wall. Nothing. He took a step back and listened again. The sound came from the other side, low down, and over to Jamie’s right. It came from a spot where wooden kegs had been stacked.
The muffled voice spoke again, “I told you my head hurts. If you don’t stop that whining, I will leave you alone here.”
A wail drove Jamie wild. He began tossing kegs left and right until they rolled in every direction. He tore at them until he found it. A door of rough nailed planks covered an opening that came to Jamie’s waist. He knelt and pressed his ear to it.
The crying had faded to sniffles. “You hit me,” Isabella complained.
He knew he should move with caution so as not to alert Isabella’s jailor, but the sound of rolling kegs made it much too late for that. He broke open the door with a roar and charged in, ducking under the doorway into a hidden storeroom.
Isabella crouched beneath a thin blanket on a large barrel shoved against the far wall. Two rusty lanterns hooked high on the walls cast flickering shadows.
“Uncle Jamie!” she cried, throwing off her cover and scooting toward the edge. Even in the dim light, Jamie could see that she clutched two little dolls.
Next to her, Luciano slumped on a campstool, holding his head in his hands. He looked up at Jamie with red-rimmed eyes but made no effort to get up. The entire conspiracy, with one hung-over jailor and no weapons that Jamie could see, bordered on farce.
“You,” Luciano moaned so calmly Jamie wondered if surprise, disappointment, or relief lay behind the word.
Isabella flew into Jamie’s arms and wrapped her hands around his neck.
“Did you doubt that I would find her?” Jamie growled at Luciano.
“We knew Castellimonte would not. He makes great show, but he trusts everyone.”
“I knew you would find me,” Isabella said. Jamie kissed her head.
“You trusted me.” The thought warmed him.
“Yes, I did,” she said. Isabella looked uninjured and as spunky as ever. “I called and called you until he told Luciano he had to stay to keep me quiet.”
“He?” Jamie looked at Luciano.
Voices in the hall interrupted whatever answer Jamie would have gotten. Nora was calling him.
