Page 52 of The Wallflower Ruse

“Please explain to me what I must do to help you win the wager, so at least I know what to expect.”

“Accompany me to the masquerade. That’s all.”

She sat back, trying to think. She would have to play by ear, so to speak. Who was the man who had called her name? Might it be Restive’s man?

Maybe, maybe not, but Restive would come to the masquerade, and so would Davis. Somehow, she would find them and escape.

~ * ~

“They’ve taken her!” Jonas, the man who’d been sent to watch Lucinda, lunged into Restive’s study and halted, panting.

Restive’s heart seized. “Miss Belair?”

Davis cursed. “These fellows are damned good.” They had already received the news that Mrs. Pearce had disappeared. After doing the daily marketing, she’d been jostled in the street and had fallen, dropping her parcels. A passing lady had offered her a ride in her coach, but hours later, Mrs. Pearce had still not returned home.

“Yes! She hurried out of the house in the direction of the hackney stand but stopped to talk to someone in a coach, and by the look of it she was about to get in, so I called her name. The groom tossed her inside and shut the door, and they drove off. I’m sorry, sir, but I was down the street a way, to make sure she didn’t realize I was following her.” He gulped more air. “I ran after the coach, but lost it after a mile or so. It was headed west.”

“Towards Chiswick,” Davis said, “and the masquerade?”

Restive’s first instinct was to run headlong out the door, but he forced himself to stop. And think. Running like a fool wouldn’t help her, himself, or anyone else.

“You said...she stopped to talk to someone in the coach,” Restive said. “If she was about to get in, it must have been someone she knew. Can you describe the coach? Was there a crest on the door? Or a lozenge?”

“Yes, sir—a widow’s lozenge, but I can’t say I recognized it. Dark green coach, wheels picked out in yellow. Clean and in good condition. Perfectly matched chestnuts.”

“Sounds like the same coach that took Mrs. Pearce,” Davis said. “Reluctantly, I’m impressed.”.”

“Thank you, Jonas,” Restive said. “Go join the others at Chiswick as originally planned, and if you see the same coach and/or horses, find out whose they are.”

The man left, and Davis said, “I don’t think they’ll harm Miss Belair, or at least not yet. They need her for something. We have time.”

“Easy for you to say,” snapped Restive, and got ahold of himself again.

“I understand, but if you dash in there, breathing fire, you’ll give us away.” Davis paused. “That is, if they aren’t already onto us.”

“Why else would they take her?” Restive demanded. “It would make more sense to cancel their plan, whatever it is. Taking her by force seems foolhardy.”

“Maybe they feared she would change her mind about going to the masquerade,” Davis said. “It’s one thing to talk loosely at a meeting and another to behave that way.”

“She’s not a loose woman,” Restive snarled.

“That’s what I just said.” Davis rolled his eyes. “Calm down, coz.”

How the devil was he supposed to calm down when Lucy was in peril? Even if she would never speak to him again, he was responsible for her. For her involvement in this fiasco. He had to save her.

“She defended herself against Wharton,” Davis said. “She’s not as helpless as she seems.”

“If she has her reticule with her.” Restive held himself still, remembering. “She must have, if she was heading for the shops.”

“We already have eight men in Chiswick,” Davis said. “Four temporary footmen, four outdoors helping with the carriages and preparing the bonfire by the river. They’ll take note of any arrivals, in and out of costume—and guests won’t be expected for a while yet, so they should spot her easily.”

“Good, but we have to go after her,” Restive said. “We can’t afford to wait.”

~ * ~

Lucinda took note of their route as best she could without spending every moment staring out the window. At last—in Chiswick now, she assumed, since they had left Hammersmith behind—they pulled up before a gate in a stone wall. A servant emerged from a nearby cottage to ask their business. Mr. Pearce let down the window and said, “Good day, Rollins. You may let us in.”

So...the coach, and likely the coachman and groom, were unfamiliar here. Hmm...