A dull ache drummed in the back of her head, rolling down to her neck. Perry opened her eyes and blinked, clearing her vision.

Her stomach rolled and bile rose. This dark chamber was Sir Richard’s drawing room and…she looked down…she was seated in the same worn chair her father had vacated.

She wiggled her hands and her toes. Still working, and she wasn’t bound.

A loud thwack pulled her attention across the room and her blood roared.

“Stop that,” she yelled.

Sir Richard turned.

The loud drumming in her head picked up, making her shake. Fox slumped in another chair, tied and gagged. Sir Richard stood by him, his shirt and hands bloodied.

“Awake are you, mishy?”

She remembered. She’d been about to lock the door when it slapped open and knocked her back.

He waved a hand and a short barrel of a man limped from the corner. Only two bodies littered the floor and she recognized neither. Fox must have felled one of the new intruders, and this one was the only one to survive. Father and Jane and Kincaid must have escaped.

They would send help. She and Fox must stay alive.

Sir Richard approached and she stumbled to her feet, reaching into her pockets. Her pistols were gone. Her knife also. She’d left the pistol on the floor but she’d seen it in Father’s hand when he left.

“Looking for the pishtol?” Sir Richard’s eyes glittered. His mouth was twisted, his jaw swollen, and one eye blackened. Either Fox or Kincaid had done that damage, bless them. “Bringing pistols and knives into my home, Felicity?”

Her skin slithered and crawled. It wasn’t pain making his eyes glitter, it was insanity.

Little bolts of panic sparked through her and her chest tightened. Battered or not, nothing was stronger than a madman, and the henchman looked hale. He’d escaped any knife, or bullet, or fist aimed at him.

And Fox couldn’t help her, tied up as he was.

Perhaps they hadn’t found the daggers in her boots. She wiggled her ankles. The warm steel still crowded them. She shoved her hand deeper into her pocket.

And she still had the picks she had scrabbled from the floor.

She opened her mouth and said “Perpetua,” but it came out like a squawk.

“Frightened, are you?” Sir Richard’s smile revealed bloody gums where a tooth had gone missing. “Cat got your tongue?”

Fox or Kincaid had done that. A laugh bubbled up in her, bringing bravado with it.

She cleared her throat. “I said, Perpetua.”

His gaze traveled the walls behind her. “Oh, aye, Felicity and Perpetua.”

“Yours is quite an unrestful manor, Sir Richard.”

His eyes focused in on her, widened, darkened. A hand shot out to her neck. “Unrestful.”

She leaned back, trying to contain the fear, mind reeling. Fox roared through his gag, and one of Sir Richard’s eyes ticked.

She must distract him before he turned back on Fox. “Unhand me,” she said calmly.

The muscles around his eyes worked. He was confused. He thought she was her mother, whom he had wanted. Perhaps she should use that against him.

She summoned the memory of her mother’s calm tone. “Unhand me, please, Richard.”

He took his hand away, looked at it, looked at her neck. “Felicity.” There was disgust in his tone. “I’ve left blood on your fichu.” He reached for the scrap of cloth.

“No.” She tried to hang onto the scarf but he snatched it away and let it drop.

“What the devil?” He peered closer. “Who did this to you?”

You did. But I can’t remind you of who I am now. “I…I bruise easily,” she said.

His brows drew together. “No. Barely touched you. That’s old. He did it. Who is he to you, Felicity?”

Her mind raced. Could she get to one of her blades in time? Or a pick?

The henchman pulled Fox’s head up by his hair and she saw the fierce gleam in his eye. He still had fight in him.

“Unrestful,” she said again, sternly. “How could you expect a woman to want to live in a house—”

“A lover.” Sir Richard paced in front of Fox, who followed the Squire’s movements with his eyes.

Perry slumped forward in the chair, and none of the men noticed. She moved a hand under her skirt and slipped out the razor sharp sgian dubh.

She slid it into her pocket, praying it wouldn’t cut through the stitching or cloth before she could use it on one of these villains.

“Leave that man alone,” she said.

He jerked around to look at her, mouth firmed. “Well, it doesn’t matter. Untie his feet. We’ll settle this.”

Prickles raced down her arms and legs. “Just let that man go. He’s nothing to me, and he’s no bother to you.”

“No bother, eh? Killed two of my men, here. And you coming in with him. And…” He drew his brows together again and shook his head. “Shaldon.”

He leveled a steady gaze at her and she could see the moment the fog in his head cleared. A laugh rumbled up inside him. She eased herself up, flexing her hands and stiffening her back. Alone, she would run. But she wouldn’t leave Fox. She had to delay whatever Sir Richard planned. The others would come for them.

Keep him talking. “What is your quarrel with Lord Shaldon?” she asked.

“He took what was mine.”

She saw Fox’s head move in the smallest of shakes.

“Gorse Cottage?” she asked.

The Squire’s laugh was nasty. “Not even a fare-thee-well. Didn’t even waltz in for a courtship. Brother died, and he swooped her up with the title. Bloody greedy bastard. All arranged by letters until the wedding itself. Busy saving the country, the great man.”

“Why did…why did you hurt Felicity?”

“Hurt her?” He smashed a fist on the table. “Left her alone, I did, her and her spawn. Never wanted to hurt Felicity. She just wouldn’t…she just wouldn’t come. Wanted the title, she did. But John Black had ways.”

“Ways? What ways?”

He glanced at the door to the servants’ exit. “I’ve a whole army outside, enough for a beaten ox, an old woman, and a jackanapes who’ll collapse any moment from the tea I fed him.”

Her heart raced. “He spat it out.”

“There’ll be enough to sicken him and make it easy for my men.” He strolled closer, lifted her chin, studying her neck, and grunted. “Never send a Frenchie to do an Englishman’s work.” He nodded to his henchman.

The man raised his hand, steel glinting.

“Wait,” Perry screamed. “Fox.”

“Hold there.”

The henchman stepped away at Sir Richard’s command.

“Fox, you said?” He went back to study Fox’s face.

Perry gripped the hilt of the dagger.

“Fox.” Sir Richard laughed. “Well, well. I knew Goodfellow was not your real name, but I had no idea…” His head jerked up and he eyed Perry. “Alone at the cottage, were you? Aye.” He jabbed a thumb at his man. “His feet. I said untie them.”

The bloody hand clamped on her upper arm. There’d be another bruise there that Sir Richard would pay for.