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Something fierce and primal surged up in her. They’d hurt the man she loved and now she wanted them to pay.

There was a noise to the right of the door, and she slunk back in the shadows a little farther.

“I’ll take care of this myself.” Douglas’s voice prickled the hairs on the back of her neck, and she slipped her finger onto the gun’s trigger.

She could do this. She could make both Douglas and Mrs. Wark beg on their knees for mercy.

She tried to draw the hammer back with her thumb, but it wouldn’t budge. Her hands shook as she tried again. Nothing. Of all the guns in the world, Gillie had to give her one that seemed to be jammed.

What was she doing? Lavinia had never held a gun before. She didn’t even know what to do with it other than point the barrel and shoot. And even if she did manage to get the bloody thing to work, wasn’t there recoil or something equally ominous sounding to worry about? And that wasn’t even considering that if she missed, she risked hitting Andrew.

She was a woman who wielded scissors and needles and words, and at the moment, all she had were words. Even a knife would’ve felt more comfortable to her.

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of her silver cloak pin. Her very pointy cloak pin. She might not have her usual tools, but she wasn’t entirely without resources.

Undoing her cloak, she slipped the heavy silver pin from the fabric. It wasn’t particularly thick, but she kept the point wickedly sharp to manage the heavy fabrics she secured with it. Clasped in her hand, it looked almost like a stiletto . . .

She slipped her gun in her pocket as she heard Mrs. Wark’s voice call out from a little way away. “The boat will be here in an hour and a quarter.”

“I’m aware of that, my dear.”

“I told you that was too much time between the kidnapping and the boat’s arrival.”

This was her chance. Mrs. Wark and Douglas were distracted with their bickering. If she was going to fell this plot with a cloak pin, she was going to need the element of surprise.

Toeing off her slippers, she gathered up the edges of her skirts to keep them from rustling around her legs. Then, as quietly as a girl slipping out of her bedroom window to meet the boy she loved, she snuck into the room.

“And then there’s the matter of him. What do we do with him?” Mrs. Wark asked, sweeping her hand out to gesture at Andrew.

“It was your men who attacked him. I saved us a lot of bother by bringing him here,” Douglas said.

“My men? You hired them and foisted them on me. Four footmen who can hardly manage a dinner service.”

“It was your choice to make them footmen,” said Douglas.

“And whatever was I supposed to do with four men hanging about the house? People would’ve noticed,” said Mrs. Wark as Lavinia crept to the next stack of crates.

“I think we should use the time to become more acquainted with Mr. Colter,” Douglas said.

Andrew’s head was hanging down, but still she could hear his response clearly. “That will be as much a waste of your time as it is mine.”

She would go for Mrs. Wark. Mrs. Wark was taller than she, but the woman was unused to any physical labor. She’d never hauled bolts of fabric up three flights of stairs, moved iron sewing machines, or hefted jugs of water for a bath.

There was another advantage: Lavinia had no doubt the woman was ruthless and wouldn’t think twice about letting Douglas die. Douglas, however, seemed to harbor some sort of affection for his partner in crime. Better to put Mrs. Wark in peril and let him hesitate.

Ten feet and Lavinia would be right up on Mrs. Wark. Nine.

“I want to know the names of the government bureaucrat who sent you, and then I want to know how it is that you know Mrs. Parkem,” Douglas said.

Andrew lifted his head at that, and there was no conceivable way he could miss her creeping up on his captors. Instinctively she held her index and middle fingers low but visible. It was their sign, the same one he’d used when he’d walked into her shop what felt like a lifetime ago. She prayed that, injured and vulnerable though he was, he would understand.

Other than the faint flinch of his brow, Andrew’s features stayed schooled in an expression of utter boredom. He’d understood.

He lifted his lip in a scowl. “I won’t speak of Mrs. Parkem with you or anyone else.”

Five feet. Keep talking.

Douglas sighed. “I’ll tell you what I think. You asked Mrs. Parkem to weasel her way into Wark’s bed so she could extract secrets from him. She contrived to faint at the dinner party so that she might search the house.”