A keening cry made Perry look up from the game of Patience spread before her and pull her shawl closer.

It was only the wind, soughing through the fireplace where the wood had ceased its spitting, the fire having long died down. Outside, the waves still crashed ceaselessly.

Jenny raised her head from the table where she’d fallen fast asleep. Lady Jane put aside the book she had been staring at for long minutes.

And then she heard another sound—men’s voices, growing louder.

Whoever they were, they were not being at all subtle. The tones were choppy, urgent. And soon enough they were right outside the oak paneled main door.

She glanced at the pistol on the mantel. Speaking so loudly, these surely must be their men.

“Wait.” Lady Jane ran right behind her to the door, pulling her back from the latch.

On the other side, a key rattled into the slot. Perry yanked the door open.

Alarm raced through her. Fox juggled a big body between himself and Farnsworth, the head drooping and swinging, the dark hair spraying droplets of dampness.

“Put me down now, you bluidy sods.” That voice was Kincaid’s.

“Save your breath,” Fox said. He moved a hand up to bolster his grip on Kincaid.

Fox’s hands were crusted with blood. The wet coming from Kincaid’s head dripped red too.

“Clear the sofa,” Perry called.

“No,” Fox said. “He needs a bed. Let’s get him upstairs.”

Perry caught a glimpse of other men, crowding in behind. “Have you sent for a surgeon?”

“No bluidy surgeon,” Kincaid said.

“Mac can sew him.” Farnsworth said. “Send him up, when he comes. You there,” he called to a man, “Help the maid fetch hot water and towels.”

“I’ll get my sewing kit,” Lady Jane said. “Sewing up Kincaid can’t be any tougher than stitching a hide.”

“We’ll put him in my bedchamber,” Perry said. “It’s the biggest.”

“No,” Farnsworth said. “Take him to the chamber Shaldon was using.”

Perry’s heart seized. Was using, Farnsworth had said.

“Where is Shaldon?” Lady Jane whispered.

“Missing,” Farnsworth hissed.

“Taken,” Kincaid croaked. “He’s alive. I set men to follow them. We’ll find him.”

“Aye,” Farnsworth said, “and let’s get you upstairs before you bleed all over the carpet.”

Fox watched Perry fussing over Kincaid as he lay in the small bedchamber, his back propped on a pillow, his bandaged chest carefully draped by a clean sheet.

The last hour had been a flurry of stripping, washing, and stitching the Scotsman. Fox’s own wounds, and those of the others, had been no more than scrapes and bruises.

He’d not had a chance to tell her about Harv. Face frozen in a frown, she’d insisted on washing the big man’s wounds, demanded to thread the needle for Lady Jane, and not flinched a bit as the stitching began.

His heart ached with pride in her, and relief that she’d stayed behind. He must find a way to get her father back.

Downstairs in the kitchen, the dragoons drank coffee, waiting for orders and guarding the guest Fox had shoved into the pantry.

The door opened and the MacEwens slid in with Davy, taking the last bit of breathing room. Fergus carried over a steaming cup. “A tisane.” He handed it to Kincaid who sniffed it suspiciously.

“’Tis whisky and summat for the pain. Drink up.”

Perry’s mouth firmed grimly. “Before you drink that and pass out, first tell us what happened, Kincaid.”

“Let him sip at it. He’s hurting.” Fox reached for her hand.

She let him take it, her face screwed up in a frown. “He’ll be woozy. He won’t remember details. And we need to get Father back.”

Kincaid stared into the cup. “I’ll not drink it if it puts me to sleep.”

“Wheesh, there’s not but the tiniest drop of laudanum,” Fergus said. “I made it myself.” He grabbed the cup, swallowed a sip, and wiped his mouth. “There.”

Kincaid grunted and accepted the drink.

“You’d best not be flat on your back after that.” Perry glared at Fergus. “My father has been taken, and I may need every one of you to help me.” She squeezed his hand. “To help us.”

She thought she was going with them.

Not in a blue moon. Not the way Sir Richard had drooled over her yesterday afternoon. “Here’s what happened, Perry: we did go south. Carvelle did disembark there, and another boat was headed in and turned back. We’d set a watch for the greeters on land, but they found us first.”

He told her about the attack, but not his killing of Harv. Not yet.

“We should’ve been with you,” the second MacEwen said.

“Aye.” Kincaid wiped his mouth and handed the empty cup to Jane, seated on a chair next to the bed. “Couple of the dragoons set to watch ran off.”

Fergus swore softly. “That lot downstairs—”

“No,” Farnsworth studied the carpet. “They didn’t run off.”

Perry went still.

He shook his head at Farnsworth. More details to share with her later, privately. They’d found the two men with their throats nicely sliced.

“Carvelle is dead also,” Farnsworth said. “Shot through the heart during the fighting.”

Kincaid muttered an oath. “’Twas Sir Richard who wanted him dead then. Our men had orders to take him alive.”

Perry’s thumb swept over the back of his hand. “Was he working with Sir Richard then? Was Carvelle bringing in the assassins for him? And why would Sir Richard wish to kill the King?”

She glanced all around. She still believed the King was the target.

And he himself no longer had any doubts.

Kincaid cleared his throat. “I saw them carry the Earl off.”

Perry’s breath came in small audible puffs. Her hand in his started to tremble. “Was he…was Sir Richard your informant?”

Farnsworth glanced at Kincaid and then paced to the window. “Sir Richard must have wanted him alive.”

“Alive,” Perry said. “But for how long?” Perry looked from Farnsworth to Kincaid, and then at Fox. “What is going on, Fox? What are they not telling me?”

Farnsworth exchanged a look with Kincaid. The MacEwens slouched, looking bored.

Fox didn’t know, and he’d warrant the cousins didn’t either. Lady Jane frowned at Farnsworth. Only Davy looked on with frank curiosity.

“It’s a fair question,” Fox said. “One I’d like the answer to, also. If we’re to get Shaldon back, we’ll need to know what you know, Kincaid, Farnsworth.”

“Who was Sir Richard to Father?” Perry shook loose his hand and stalked to the bed. “Tell me, Kincaid.”

“Let him rest, Lady Perpetua,” Farnsworth said. “I’ll explain. Sir Richard came to us a few months ago offering information on Carvelle. Said he’d heard we were looking for him. Which we were. I know you knew that much.”

She opened her mouth, closed it. Nodded. Took a deep breath. “He was your source. And why would you doubt him? He’s a justice of the peace.”

“We considered that.” Farnsworth paced again. “A justice of the peace. A baronet. A country man with no debts and no known enemies. There didn’t seem a reason for him to lie. Quite the opposite. He’s privy to rumors about the free trade in these parts and might be inclined to enforce the law.”

Farnsworth turned to Fox, his gaze boring into him. The skin around his fresh scar prickled.

“And then,” Farnsworth said, “one of our agents following up on a lead that Sir Richard provided was almost killed.”

Perry’s gaze followed Farnsworth’s and her eyes widened. “The fresh scar on your chest.”

The muscles in his back tightened like a death grip. Fox shrugged, trying to loosen them. Shaldon and his games—there was always more than one. “And you sent me here to recover, right under the man’s nose.”

“He never knew the identity of our man.”

Anger flashed through him. If Sir Richard hadn’t learned it, it was because Fox had killed the man who’d attacked him in Belgium. “So you say.”

Perry pulled her hand away and began to pace. “Sir Richard plays a double game. He’s a squire passing on information on a smuggler. And as John Black he runs a smuggling enterprise. Which might have stumbled last year when a substitute was tried and transported.”

“Why?” Perry asked. “Why would Sir Richard do this?”

“It may be he’s trying to take out the competition,” Fergus said.

Perry stopped in front of him and drew herself up into a tight determined line. “But why bring in an assassin? Why take Father?”

“I know why.” Lady Jane’s skirts rustled as she rose from the room’s only chair. “We talked about it earlier. Sir Richard wants the man who stole the woman he thought should be his bride. He wanted Felicity Landers, enough to try to wrestle her into a carriage and make off with her. He’s been stewing in anger for decades. He wants revenge.”

Perry went still. He moved his hand to her waist and felt anger trembling through her.

Kincaid grunted and Farnsworth shrugged.

The logic of women, those shrugs said. A man, educated, propertied, with a position in the community and a business to run—albeit an illegal one—wouldn’t stew thirty years about a bride who was lost, would he? Not even a brute like the Baronet.

His chest tightened. What had he done for many years about his brother’s bride? What had Shaldon been doing about the murder of his wife?

“Revenge?” Farnsworth said, sighing. “Not greed. Could it be that simple?”

Perry’s breath caught. “It’s that simple for Father.”

Farnsworth shared another glance with the other old plotter, Kincaid.

Was it truly that simple for Shaldon? Was it that simple for him?

Fox shook his head. He’d stewed in revenge, as had Shaldon, but neither had turned to villainy. Shaldon had his spying, not always honest, but always honorable, at least where his country was concerned. Fox had his painting—and Perry.

Could he truly have her honorably, with her family’s blessing? He would stew for decades if he were to lose this chance with her. He had to find a time and a place to tell her.

“Your father wants more than revenge,” Fox said. “He wants to know how your mother really died. He wants to know who killed her.”

Davy’s thin voice came from the place near the door. “It’s him.”

The eyes turned his way made Davy squirm. He cleared his throat. “I allus thought it was Scruggs what did it.”

Tension knotted Fox’s brain, right behind his eyes, and Perry’s face had gone stiff as a bad portrait. What the hell else had this little man kept hidden all these years behind tankards of ale and flasks of gin? Fox took Davy by the collar. “Tell the lady what you know.”

Davy’s fingers twisted, crushing his hat and he wobbled. “I saw it. I saw the lady’s…” he glanced at Perry and ducked his head. “Your mother’s killing.”

Perry eyed him up and down, as grave and contained as her father would ever be. “Lady Jane,” she said, with a softness that the old man would never have shown, “let us have that chair.”

Fox pulled the chair over.

Perry gave Davy a nod. “Now sit.”

“Oh, miss—”

“Before you fall. Please.”

Davy looked around and took the chair, sitting poker straight, like a man bracing for a beating.

“Go on,” Perry said.

“I saw the carriage on the road. Saw the accident.” He gulped for air.

“What happened?” Fox moved round to stand by Perry.

“I don’t know. Well, it may be the wheel slipped off. Or the driver swerved right off the edge of the cliff. I don’t know. I was below, in the cove, and couldn’t see all. I’d gone to—well, Scruggs had some barrels sunk in the water there.” He tucked his chin down and squeezed his eyes shut a moment. “I did start up the hillside to help. The carriage was tipping, the horses going wild, the driver trying to hold them.” He paused and gulped more air. “Then a man comes down the road from the house, all in black, he is, and I’m thinking, it’s Scruggs, and I says to myself, if he sees me tippling his tubs I’ll take a beating. I says to myself, no need to go up—he’ll help ’em.”

Davy’s face had gone ashen, the light from the lanterns and candles not finding a trace of pink in his flesh, the memory of that day draining the blood from him.

Shame did that to a man, drained the life out of him, made him walk through life like a cadaver.

“He goes behind the carriage and next thing I sees, he’s got the lady, and she was fighting him, and I’m thinking, slow down, stop hitting her, she’s panicked, is all. ’Tother lady came up, waving a pistol. Fired it, she did. Didn’t hit nothing before he slapped it away.”

The room had gone stuffy with exhaled breaths and the flames of the lights. Davy wiped a hand over his face and shuddered. “Coachman was off by then, horses going wild. Knew what was happening, they did. Gave a good fight the man did, but the big man beat him until he stopped.” His breath came, short and shallow. “Picked both ladies up and threw them over the cliff, he did. Dragged the man to the edge and rolled him.”

Davy’s eyes shone. “Looked, straight my way, he did. Scruggs’d know me, even at that distance. I pulled back, I stayed down, heard the carriage topple. Then I ran. Went around the point. Went home. Pretended I was there all day.” He gulped and shook his head. “I should’ve helped. I should’ve done something.”

Perry swallowed back tears and touched Davy’s shoulder. It was too late for her mother, too late for doubts, too late for recriminations. Davy couldn’t have been much more than a boy when her mother was killed, a slight boy against Sir Richard’s bulk. She couldn’t blame him.

And they needed him. “Help us now, Davy. You know these parts. Where would Sir Richard take my father?”

He screwed up his face with the effort of thinking and set his gaze on Fox. “Scruggs might know. He knows more.”

Fox’s mouth firmed in that obstinate, secretive way of his.

“Scruggs?” she asked.

“We had him brought in,” Fox said.

That had been when she and Lady Jane were wrestling Kincaid into submission.

“And?” Perry asked, wanting to throttle him. It was time for these men to talk to her, and to Lady Jane.

“We didn’t get much out of him,” Fox shifted. “We left off the questioning to come up here. He’s locked in the pantry.”

“MacEwen,” Kincaid said, “you and your cousin go talk to him. Send the soldiers outside.”

They didn’t know who to trust.

“Don’t beat him,” Perry said. “Not until after I have a chance to talk to him.”

Fox sent her a cryptic look. “Davy, go and wait in the parlor with Pip. Mac, have one of the soldiers stay with him to make it look like Davy’s a prisoner too. Don’t you dare leave.”

Or I’ll kill you myself, his tone said.

“No, don’t leave,” Kincaid said. “You’ll stay and help us, too.”

Davy frowned. “I’ll stay.”

He’d heard the or else in Kincaid’s tone. Honestly, these men could be brutes also.

Perry touched Davy’s shoulder. “If you must leave Clampton, we’ll find you work, and no matter what happens, we’ll look after Pip.”

Davy nodded, and followed the MacEwens out.

“The man’s been wallowing in drink for ten years to cover that shame,” Kincaid said. “Had enough of it he has. We can use him. Now, I’ve no more dignity left here—can one of your ladyships fetch one of the Earl’s shirts from that satchel?”

“You’re not getting up yet.” Lady Jane pressed him back. “You’ll lie there a bit longer and let that flesh knit.”

“She’s right,” Farnsworth said.

While Kincaid glowered and the others bickered, Fox settled an arm around her, and she curled into his warmth.

“You should sit,” he said.

She shook her head. “No.” While Father was suffering, she’d take no comfort.

How would Sir Richard torture him? A man that cruel might have many means.

“We need to plan how to get Father out.”

“We need to know where he is.” Lady Jane plopped on the narrow bed, abandoning all etiquette. “One of your men should have reported by now.”

“Aye,” Kincaid said. “It’s possible they can’t get away themselves.”

Lady Jane’s mouth firmed. “Or it’s possible they’ve been taken, or killed.”

Through this east-facing window, Perry could see the sun on the horizon.

She sighed into Fox’s shoulder. “A new day. A totally different day.” She lifted her chin and searched his eyes. “We have an invitation to dinner.”

Sir Richard had invited them to dinner even while plotting to take her father. Or maybe, he’d planned to take Father at the dinner and instead had availed himself of the earlier opportunity.

The silence in the room fairly buzzed, though no one uttered a word, and her attention was on Fox, so she couldn’t see whether brows were working into furrows as the two old spies and Lady Jane turned the idea around in their collective heads.

Fox was doing his own brow furrowing. “No,” he said. “And anyway, the invitation was for you, Lady Jane, and your father.”

“And Father is already there.”

“Maybe not. Maybe he has him stashed in some smuggler’s tunnel somewhere. We need to hear what Scruggs has to say.”

“And how will you get him to talk?”

His mouth firmed. “We’ll charge him with murder. Davy saw a big man do the deed. It could have been him.”

“We’re wasting time.” She turned in his arms. “Farnsworth, you and Kincaid. if you’re able, will come along tonight.”

“I’ll be able,” Kincaid said.

“And Fox, you’ll come as my fiancé.” Her nerves rattled and she took in a breath. She could do this. She would do this. “That should draw a reaction.”

“Sir Richard saw me at the cove,” Fox said. “And you want me to just come along to dinner?”

Outside, the first ray of sun stabbed through the haze. Dinner—even a dinner by country hours—would be hours and hours away. Between now and then, anything could happen to Father. Bad, cruel, horrible things.

“On second thought, we’re not going to dinner,” she said. “We’ll join Sir Richard for breakfast.”

“No.” The cry came from all the men, but the loudest voice was the one in her ear.