Page 22 of Grave Expectations
"You must go somewhere safe, Charlotte. Somewhere that no one will look for you. I know just the place. Leave it to me."
Lincoln's fingers dug into my shoulder. I wasn't certain he knew how hard he was holding me. "She's not leaving."
"We're being extra vigilant," I said. "Once this killer is found—"
"There will be another," Gillingham said. "Then another and another. There will always be someone after you."
"He's right," Lady Harcourt said, in a tone that was a little too silky to be genuinely sympathetic. "Let us find you somewhere safer to live. London is too—"
"If Charlie leaves Lichfield then so do I," Lincoln growled. "We're engaged."
Dense silence filled the library. Seth and Gus exchanged glances, but otherwise, nobody moved. It was as if time had ceased, trapping us in that moment.
"What!" Eastbrooke's explosion shattered the eerie quiet.
"We are to be wed." Lincoln's voice was all calm authority, with a hint of steel that perhaps only I noticed.
"You bloody fool," Gillingham sneered.
Eastbrooke's hand curled into a fist on the chair arm. "We cannot allow it."
"Agreed."
"It's not up to you," Lincoln said.
"Think, man," Gillingham said. "Think what you're doing. You'll ruin yourself."
"Then I'll be a happily ruined man."
I touched Lincoln's hand at my shoulder and smiled up at him. His troubled gaze watched me intently, perhaps for signs that the tirades upset me. They did not. I didn't care what these people thought.
"You can't," Eastbrooke stated with an emphatic shake of his head. "We forbid it."
"You have no power to forbid me to do anything."
"You're the head of the ministry and we're the committee—"
"I'm the leader because of the prophecy, not because youchoseme. The committee has no power over Charlie or me."
Eastbrooke hauled himself to his feet and took a step toward us. I felt Lincoln's fingers tense again. "I raised you," the general snarled. "I took you into my home and treated you like a son, and this is how you repay me! By going behind my back to court this…this…"
"Tutors raised me, and occasionally the housekeeper. Granted, you provided a roof over my head, for which I am grateful, although I hold no illusions that you did it out of the goodness of your heart. You never treated me like a son, General. Don't pretend otherwise."
Eastbrooke sat down heavily. He stared at Lincoln, his mouth ajar, his chest heaving with his deep breaths.
"This is outrageous," Gillingham said. "I knew we should have gotten rid of her as soon as the matter with Frankenstein ended. None of this would have happened if you'd all listened to me."
"That's enough, Gilly," Marchbank said. To us, he added, "Your mind is made up?"
"It is," Lincoln said.
"Then we must live with it, I suppose, although I agree that there are some concerns."
"She's safer here with me to watch over her."
"I'm not referring tohersafety, but to the ongoing effectiveness of the ministry, and yourself, Fitzroy. Hear me out. Say she is kidnapped again and forced to raise a witch with the power to overrule her commands. Say the only way to send the witch back is to kill Charlie. Will you do it?"
"That is an unlikely event."
