Page 95 of The Forsaken

“This was your takeaway?” he asked, as calm as he could manage, given the words he’d just read. “That I’m in danger.”

“Edgar, I will not let anything happen—”

His efforts failed him. “My God, woman,” he hissed. “How do you still not realize? My life is nothing without you. I will protect you. I will kill for you. I will die for you.”

Andromena’s lips trembled. “Oh, Edgar. I don’t want you to do any of those things, because my life is—”

Outside, there came the whinny of a horse.

Kerr held a hand up.

Andromena had already gone silent.

Positioned at the edge of the window, while Andromena retrieved a pair of breeches from decades past and drew a lawn shirt over them, Kerr peered out into the yard.

And then, he found him, because this wasn’t a man who was hiding.

The man could have been forty or sixty. In a canary-yellow tailcoat, with a cascading cravat of purple silk, he strolled up the cottage path, twirling his serpent-headed cane as he went, as though he could have been on a stroll down North Bond Street. He topped off his garish ensemble with a tall beaver top-hat.

From the corner of his eye, he caught Andromena near his shoulder. He gave her a look.

She shook her head.

She didn’t know the gentleman.

The gentleman began to sing.

“At the song of my Lady’s lace

Which a Derbyshire lady took ill

Quoth she to her neighbor Grace,

’Tis immodest! Immodest, I cannot sit still…”

“Not a gentleman that one,” Andromena muttered.

God, love her. Only Andromena McQuoid-Smith could crack quips in the face of peril.

Once the man reached the bottom of Andromena’s window, he doffed his hat. “My dearest, Miss Smith,” he called up, with a flourishing bow. “I am here straight from London with glad tidings.”

A frozen knot settled in his chest.

Why hadn’t he gotten her out of here faster?

Kerr took Andromena’s shoulder. “Go,” he mouthed.

She shook her head.

“First, the dowry.”

Her dowry?

That caught both their attention.

“Come, Miss Smith, you are a lady. You do know what a dowry is.” More fighter than gentleman, the man could have been pulled from the wharves. Each word that he spoke was a clue that brought them closer to an answer. “Your bridegroom could have chosen a much finer lady. But you have intrigued him.” He chortled. “Yer dowry did.”

He would not let her near this madman.