11. Charge for the guns
Charge for the guns
For a breath, there was silence.
Then everybody spoke at once.
Gabriel Dalca demanded answers from Commander Masters, Masters tried to get clarification from the judge, and Philippe and Jean-Claude asked their questions to nobody in particular. The only one not talking was Louna, who had turned to lock her gaze with Tennyson as he stood frozen in the aisle.
“Mon loup,” she whispered.
His thoughts snapped to action. “Mitchell and Alvarez,” he said. “Where are they?”
“I’ll find out,” Philippe said, pulling out his phone.
Louna looked back to Commander Masters. “Who called for the trial to be moved up?”
“Your office filed for the change,” Masters said sharply. “Are you saying you didn’t know?”
“I learned of it an hour ago,” Louna said. She was several inches shorter than Masters, but she rose to her full height and stared up at the woman, completely unintimidated. “When did you find out?”
“0800,” Masters replied.
They turned to Dalca, who shrugged. “Around the same time.”
A lawyer’s response if he’d ever heard one. Tennyson edged further into the aisle to keep an eye on the bailiff, who was still holding an animated conversation with the judge.
Philippe had turned away to make his call, but he looked back at Tennyson as he finished it.
“Yes, I understand. Thank you.” He ended the call and shoved his phone in his pocket.
“Mitchell and Alvarez are fine—they never left holding. The secretary at Bran Prison said Lindsey got into the transport with his guards forty-five minutes ago. They should be here.”
“He couldn’t have escaped from the guards,” Jean-Claude said. “Where would they go?”
Tennyson didn’t answer. It had to be Harlow—or, specifically, Hartmann. If it were Tennyson, he would have taken Lindsey during transport, too. The security was weakest between the jail and the courthouse, and a getaway would be hardest to stop, and to track.
He should have seen it coming.
Jean-Claude waited, but when Tennyson stayed silent, put his hand on Tennyson’s shoulder and caught Philippe’s eye. “I’ll talk to the judge,” he said. “See what I can find out.”
That would take too long. This was Harlow’s second strike—the one that would force Tennyson to react defensively, keeping him from proper strategy.
No matter what he did now, he would be playing into Harlow’s hand.
It didn’t matter. If there was any chance that he could catch up to them before Hartmann reached whatever safe house he’d found, he had to try.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!Charge for the guns!” he said.Into the valley of DeathRode the six hundred.
He glanced around the room. Louna was still arguing with Masters and Dalca, and with only one Verdier to deal with, he wouldn’t be outnumbered.
Tennyson pulled out his earbud and gestured for Philippe to do the same.
Philippe complied without question, and his faith churned the growing guilt in Tennyson’s stomach.
He stepped out of reach and waved towad the door. “I’m going after him.”
To his mingled relief and annoyance, Philippe didn’t look surprised. “Do you think Harlow is behind this?”
“Lindsey’s disappearance solves all of Harlow’s problems,” Tennyson answered.
“No defendant, no trial, no scandal. Harlow can publicize whatever story he wants, and there will be no one to argue it. You, Jean-Claude, and Louna should stay here and keep an eye on Mitchell and Alvarez—Harlow may try to silence them too.”
“One of us should go with you,” Philippe said.
Tennyson tried a smile. “When I find Lindsey, we’ll be in and out in no time. Anyone else will just slow us down.”
Philippe’s usually genial expression was hard and serious. “You haven’t been partners in a long time. He hasn’t spoken to you, even with the earbud—I know you’ve tried. What if you don’t work together as well as you used to?”
He would take that chance. If it kept Louna and the Verdiers safe, it would be worth it.
As if guessing his answer, Philippe exhaled and gave a single, brisk nod. “Be careful.”
“You’ll look after them?” Tennyson said, flicking his gaze toward the front of the room.
“I will.”
“And yourself,” Tennyson said, reaching out to take Philippe’s hand.
“Go on,” he said, pushing Tennyson gently away.
He went, slipping down the aisle and into the empty hallway, out the front doors, and across the street to where they’d parked the car.
He pressed his earbud back in and listened, but Jean-Claude was the only one speaking.
The car was just ahead. The others would have to rent another, but then, maybe Ilya had some stashed away somewhere.
He may even come out of the woodwork with Tennyson gone, and Louna would have one more set of eyes and fists to take his place.
Tennyson reached for the driver’s door, digging for the keys in his pocket, and froze when he found it empty.
Louna rolled down the window and lifted her eyebrows. “Ready to go?”
Half a dozen curses rolled through his mind, but he swallowed them back and forced his fists to unclench. “I thought you were talking to the prosecutors.”
“I was.”
“How did you beat me out?”
“There’s a door in the front of the room for them to bring prisoners through,” Louna said. “It leads directly to the front lobby.”
Tennyson shook his head. “It would be safer to stay here.”
“Do what you want,” Louna said. “I’m going after Lindsey.”
She rolled the window back up, and Tennyson let out a resigned breath and moved to the passenger side. He texted Philippe to let him know Louna was going with him—or that he was going with her—and settled back in his seat without looking at her.
“Looks like you still need a thief after all,” Louna said, pulling out of the parking lot.
Tennyson frowned at her. “I never said I didn’t need you.”
“No,” she said. “Just that you didn’t want me.”
He hadn’t said that either—he’d said he wanted her to go, and that wasn’t the same thing. But the angry set of her jaw told him she knew exactly what he’d meant, and she didn’t find the difference worth mentioning.
“Harlow is dangerous,” he said, as darkly and seriously as he could. “As long as you’re with me, you aren’t safe.”
“Life isn’t safe,” Louna countered.
Tennyson snorted. “Is that supposed to help?”
“No,” Louna said. “This isn’t something you should need help with. You were in the military, weren’t you? You knew that wasn’t safe, but the risk was worth it, so you chose to do it anyway.”
“This risk isn’t worth it,” Tennyson said.
She glared at him. “That isn’t your decision.”
“If anything—”
“It was Hartmann, right?” Louna said, looking away. “Where would he go?”
He took a breath. “I don’t know. Without tracks to follow, I can’t—”
“Where would you go?”
Tennyson clenched his jaw shut. He looked out the window, glaring at the buildings and listening to the road noise. “I’d leave the city,” he said finally.
“Which direction?”
The nearest of Harlow’s safe houses was in Budapest, but that was a nine hour drive, and crossing the border into Hungary with a prisoner would be risky.
If he only had to hold Lindsey, any rural building would do, but Hartmann would want to make sure they couldn’t be happened upon by unsuspecting villagers.
“North,” Tennyson said. “Into the mountains. If they plan on keeping him alive, they’ll need a place to hold him without witnesses.”
“And if they don’t plan on keeping him alive?” Louna asked.
He answered in an steady voice, ignoring the sick, uneven beating of his heart. “Lindsey can take care of himself.”
“So can I.”
She said it casually, but her expression was cold. Tennyson watched the way her fingers tightened over the steering wheel and took another slow breath. In four seconds, hold four seconds, out four seconds.
“I know,” he said at last. “I’m not worried about your skill.”
Louna flicked her gaze at him, then back to the road. “I’m not ignoring your warning. But I’ve dealt with dangerous men my whole life. I do not need a white knight to take care of me.”
Tennyson snorted at white knight, and her eyes flashed. “You don’t believe me?”
“I believe you,” he said. “But Harlow—”
“I will handle Harlow my own way,” Louna said, jabbing a finger at the radio button. A fuzzy concerto crackled through the speakers, and she turned up the volume and focused her attention on the road.
Yes, she was handling it her own way. Tennyson had awoken that morning to find her bedroom empty and her window open, and by the time he’d tracked her to the little tea shop a few miles away, she was coming outside.
He’d waited until she disappeared around the corner before going in and casually interrogating the owner: what a cold morning it was, and what a nice selection of teas, and how long had she been in business?
She hadn’t—the shop belonged to her sister’s husband, and she was visiting from Russia in between terms. She taught history in St. Petersburg—about which Tennyson expressed a sudden lifelong interest—and she launched into an overview of her thesis.
What that had to do with Louna, he couldn’t tell, but he let the professor speak and found himself genuinely intrigued by the end.
She made him a cup of Earl Grey tea to ward off the chill, and he bought a bag of it to thank her for her conversation.
He couldn’t bring it back to the Nest without Louna finding out that he’d followed her, so he gave it to an elderly woman he passed on the sidewalk and hurried on with his morning, no closer to discerning Louna’s plans than when he’d started.
He’d known she had another motive in following him to Bucharest. Timing suggested it had something to do with Harlow—possibly the reason he’d let her leave his studio in Spain without more of a fight—but as far as he knew, Harlow didn’t have any interest in Russian history.
But Harlow had been lying to him, probably since they’d started working together. There was no way to know what Harlow had been looking into behind Tennyson’s back, and he couldn’t afford to discount anything.
Louna wouldn’t talk to him about it now, but he would try to ask her later. Once they found Lindsey, and ensured Mitchell’s and Alvarez’s safety, and prevented Hartmann from coming after any of them again.
Tennyson held in a sigh and prepared himself for a long, silent drive.