Page 85 of The Last Chance
Joanna laughed, then frowned. “You mean you won’t try to stop me?”
“No. I’ve been waiting for you to come to your senses. Only a fool breaks an oath to Aaron Chance. He’ll never trust me again if he thinks it was my idea.”
She released a long exhale. “Then I insist you take me back to London. We need to reach town before the magistrate calls at eight.”
“You’ll need to twist my arm, quite hard, I suspect.”
It would be impossible to hurt him physically.
She would have to play the shrew.
“If you don’t agree, I’ll run away and accept a ride from the first unsavoury gent with space in his carriage.” Joanna raised her skirts. “You had better pray you’re quick enough to catchme.” She took to her heels, purely so neither of them had to lie to Aaron.
Sigmund was surprisingly fast for a burly man. Despite heaving for his next breath, he caught up with her in the yard of The Ship Inn.
“Forgive me,” she said, slapping his face lightly and stamping on his foot. “Nothing you could say or do will make me change my mind.”
A hoarse laugh escaped him. “We’ll have a job finding transport home. Don’t make me bind your wrists and hurl you over my shoulder.”
“You brute,” she teased. “Mr Chance won’t be happy if you manhandle me.”
“He’ll kill me if he knows I’ve restrained you. Though I don’t suppose it matters. I’m a dead man anyway.”
Chapter Seventeen
Tension clung to the air in the drawing room like a storm on the verge of breaking. Aaron’s family sat rigid, their emotions hidden, no one daring to mention the grave situation.
The incessant ticking of the mantel clock heightened Aaron’s unease. Soon, the magistrate would know Joanna had absconded. She would be a fugitive—a felon on the run, a wanted criminal—until he found Lord Howard’s killer.
What if they caught her before then?
What if the truth eluded him forever?
A sharp knock echoed through the house. Their eyes met in silent dread, each of them straightening like they were on trial, each drawing shallow breaths.
The magistrate was early. Damn him. There were real criminals to apprehend. Why harass an innocent woman?
In Sigmund’s absence, Aramis went to greet the caller. He returned, clutching an unsealed note. “It was a penny boy. Miss Bryant escaped without detection. I asked her to inform me once she arrived home safely.”
Aaron gave a curt nod. “That’s one less worry, I suppose.”
Silence ensued.
Aramis settled into his seat, gently took his wife’s hand and kissed it with quiet affection.
The loving gesture tightened the knot in Aaron’s gut. Living without a woman’s company was no hardship. Living without the woman he loved would be unbearable.
For the second time in his life, he considered letting his family fend for themselves. They were children when he first crept out of the house, leaving them sleeping. He walked thirty yards before guilt gripped him with hawk-like talons, the piercing pain in his heart forcing him to abandon the moment of madness and return to their room above Mrs Maloney’s bookshop.
The situation was more complex now.
If only he could be in two places at once.
Another loud knock on the front door cut through the silence.
Aaron stood slowly, dread coiling in his gut. “Wait here. I’ll deal with the magistrate. He will demand answers and a full explanation. Expect me home by dawn unless Berridge has another trick up his sleeve.”
Delphine stood, her face etched with grief for a tragedy yet to occur. “I’ll wait with you in the hall. You’ll need someone to pretend to fetch Miss Lovelace.”
