Page 93 of An Unexpected Earl

The door swung open slowly to reveal the waiting monk in his brown robe.

“Let me in,” Pearce said quietly, not certain that true demons weren’t lurking among the graves and might overhear.

The man stepped back without a word and let him pass. The door closed after him, shutting out the night.

Pearce made his way through the dusty church. Everything was in place just as before, right down to the same handful of lit candles flickering from the altar.

He descended the stone steps into the crypt where a handful of white robes had been tossed over a nearby tomb. He snatched one up and approached the second monk who guarded the door to the chambers below.

The monk made the sign of the cross.

“Wrong way,” Pearce muttered.

“Apologies.” Alexander Sinclair, Earl of St James, made the sign again, this time with the correct inversion.

“As long as no one else notices.” Pearce slipped on the robe. “How many so far?”

“Three dozen or so.”

“Has the abbot arrived yet?”

“Everyone’s arrived.” He added happily, “Including the nuns.”

Pearce tied the robe and eyed him askance. “Monks are celibate, don’t forget.”

“I thought I was supposed to do everything inverted.” He grinned, adding lasciviously, “Everything.”

“Just wait until you see what’s for dinner. It’s a religious experience, all right.” Pearce pulled the hood down low over his face, until only his chin and jaw were visible. All teasing humor vanished. “Give me ten minutes, then blow the horn.”

“Best be ready when it comes.” He opened the door to the chambers and stepped back to let Pearce pass. “All hell’s going to break loose.”

“Then we’re in a good place for it.” He hurried down into the lower chambers.

When he reached the bottom, Pearce slowed his pace and moved casually through the series of rooms, not wanting to draw any attention to himself. Not that anyone would have noticed, given that the men who filled the rooms were distractedly engaged tonight in the same debauchery as before. Smoke from the same incense pots, cigars, and hookah pipes saturated the ruins, the same exotic music pulsed against the stone walls. Drink flowed into golden goblets just as quickly, and disappeared down throats just as fast. The women were there, too, wearing the same flimsy costumes as they danced or draped themselves over the laps of the members.

Pearce didn’t give a damn about any of it as he slipped past, except that it had allowed the men of the Armory to take their positions inside without being noticed. Only when he reached the dark passageway that led down to the river did he pause. Trusting that no one in the room cared what he did here, he removed a lantern from its hook and started down the tunnel.

With his left hand holding up the lantern to light his way and his right hand beneath his coat on a loaded pistol, he moved carefully down the sloping tunnel in the shadows, expecting a guard to appear out of the darkness at any moment. But none materialized, the passage remaining empty.

When he reached the wooden door that barred his way, he paused to glance over his shoulder. He was alone in the tunnel. No movement, no sound. Not even muffled noise and lingering smoke from the party above. Only the dank, damp, and musty stench of the polluted river splashing quietly beyond the door.

He said a silent prayer and reached for the door handle, prepared to shoot the damn lock open if necessary. But the rusty handle gave way with a faint, metallic groan. He shoved it open just far enough to let himself into the darkness on the other side, then pushed it closed behind him.

Hanging the lantern from the door handle, he took a step toward the stone sarcophagus, and his boot sank into filthy water up to his ankle. The river had risen from the day’s rain and overflowed its culvert, flooding up onto the stone ledge.

Christ!He ran to the sarcophagus, afraid that it had filled with water. The lid rested in place, but a half-inch crack had been left open at the top to let in air.

“Amelia!” His pulse pounded with dread as icy cold as the water that had surely seeped through the porous stone.

Silence.

“Amelia, can you hear me?” Panic surged through him like an electric jolt. Was he wrong? Had Arthur Varnham hidden her someplace else? “Please, Amelia, answer me!”

If the bastard had hurt her, he’d rip the man apart limb by limb with—

“Brandon.” The breathless whisper came so softly that he barely heard it over the rushing river. But her fingertips reached out tentatively through the slit between the stone lid and the case.

“I’m here, darling.” With a strangled sound of relief, he grabbed her fingertips to reassure her that she was going to be all right. Dear God, she was cold as ice! “You’re safe. I’m going to get you out of there.”