Chapter 8 #2
“Of course you do,” he said. He realized he was barely keeping his temper in check, which wasn’t usually the case for him.
In his defense, it had been that kind of day so far.
“I don’t know why you’re involved in this and quite frankly I don’t care.
Just give me the lace and we’ll call it good. I won’t see you prosecuted.”
“I don’t know what you’re talk—” she began.
“How stupid do you think I am?” he demanded.
She looked up at him. “I don’t know,” she said slowly, “how stupid are you?”
Stupid enough to continue to push a woman who looked like she was on the verge of throwing up.
He suffered a small feeling of pity but squelched that immediately.
She was a thief and a liar. At the very least, she had been willing to take employment with a couple who had caused a very lovely old man a great deal of distress.
“I’m not stupid enough to find myself standing in front of a magistrate,” he said briskly, “which perhaps makes me just a bit more clever than you. Now, where is the lace?”
She would have made a lousy poker player. “I don’t have it.”
He started to speak, but his phone rang. He shot her a warning look. “Don’t move.”
Her mouth worked for several moments, then she drew herself up. “Go to—to—to, um . . .”
“Hell?” he finished for her. “Already there, thank you.”
He thought not for the first time that he really had to make a few changes in his life. He needed a girlfriend, one who could tell him to go to hell without sounding as though she’d never considered the thought before. He answered his phone, surprised that Oliver would ring him instead of texting.
“You’re surrounded,” Oliver said urgently. “You need to move, now.”
He almost dropped his phone. “What?”
“Two behind you and two up the way. Two we know, two we don’t. Very unpleasant sorts.”
“Perfect,” Derrick said. “I’ll find a cab—”
“Rufus will be pulling up to the curb if you can last another two minutes,” Oliver said. “Though that may be a stretch—”
“I’ll manage.”
“Thought you might. Must dash.”
Derrick supposed he must as well. He hung up, then realized that Samantha was ten feet away from him, engaging in a bit of a dash herself. He caught up with her easily and took her by the arm.
“Let’s go.”
“Are you insane?” she squeaked. “Let go of me!”
He stopped abruptly and glared at her. “Listen, you silly girl, someone is after you and it isn’t me. If you want to die, just stand here and wait. Otherwise, stop acting like an idiot and come with me.”
“Are you out of your mind?” she wheezed.
He pointed back over his shoulder. “Would you rather take your chances with those lads back there?”
She looked, then blanched. He thought that was a show of good sense after all, so he continued on until they’d reached the curb, then looked over his shoulder.
They were being followed, hard, which might not have alarmed him except that the woman next to him was carrying an enormous piece of priceless lace.
He looked to his right, then didn’t bother to suppress his sigh of relief.
He continued to hold on to Samantha Drummond until Rufus glided to a stop right there where the handle to the back door was within reach.
He opened it, urged Samantha inside as gently as possible, then dove in himself.
“Get off me!”
He heaved himself up into the seat, trying not to crush her in the process, and fumbled for the door to pull it shut as Rufus sped off. He sat back, dragged his hands through his hair, and sighed deeply.
“Thank you, Rufus,” he said. It seemed a rather feeble display of appreciation, but he supposed he might frighten the good Miss Drummond if he fell upon Rufus’s neck and sobbed like a bairn.
“Where to now, Master Derrick?”
“Away is enough for the moment,” Derrick said. He shifted on his seat and looked at Samantha, who was still fumbling with her seat belt. Safety first, he supposed, which he wasn’t going to argue with. Far easier to get his lace back if she wasn’t trying to get out of the backseat.
He watched her for another moment or two, then reached over and buckled her seat belt for her. Her hands were shaking too badly to manage it herself. A guilty conscience, no doubt. Add to that her absolutely white features and there he had a criminal caught red-handed.
And on the subject of being red-handed, he looked down at his own hand, covered as it was in blood that had dripped down his arm. He was fairly sure it wasn’t anything more than a scratch, so he ignored it in favor of staring down the miscreant sitting next to him.
“Where is the lace?” he demanded.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said faintly.
“Of course you know what I’m talking about.”
He watched her hand creep under her apron.
He wasn’t altogether sure she didn’t have a knife with her, but he supposed being stabbed by that couldn’t make his arm hurt any more than it hurt at present.
Plus, he wouldn’t have any trouble disarming her.
He waited until she had started to fumble with whatever she’d found before he lifted the apron of her dress and removed what turned out to be a small notebook from her trembling fingers.
“Give that back,” she said, reaching for it.
He held it away, then glared at her. “Give me back the lace first.”
“I told you, I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Listen, Miss Drummond—”
“How do you know who I am?”
He shot her what he hoped had come out as a supercilious look. “I know all kinds of things,” he said curtly, “including the fact that you have in your possession a piece of lace that does not belong to you, a piece of Edwardian textile—”
“Elizabeth—” She looked at him, the word dying on her lips.
“Elizabethan?” he asked politely. “How interesting that you should know that. Now, where is it?”
She shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He wasn’t in the habit of throttling those of the fairer sex, but he was tempted to shout at her at least. He might have wondered if she were actually telling the truth, but she just looked so profoundly guilty. He looked at her sternly.
“I want answers.”
She looked absolutely terrified, which began to leave him slightly unsettled. He wasn’t about to credit her with anything of an altruistic or noble nature, but the woman didn’t look as if she could have stolen a sweet from a shop with any success.
“I don’t have any answers,” she said, “so you might as well let me go.”
“Straight to Scotland Yard, if I had any sense,” he said grimly.
“A dangerous place for you, I’d imagine,” she said, looking down her nose at him. Unfortunately, the fact that her teeth were chattering ruined the aura of bravado.
“What does that mean?”
“It means how do I know you aren’t a textile thief?”
He frowned. Things were not going quite as he’d expected them to, which bothered him. He was accustomed to knowing what would happen before it happened. This business of the unexpected . . . well, he wasn’t sure he cared for it.
“Derrick, we have a couple of friends behind us,” Rufus interjected suddenly. “What do you want me to do?”
Derrick considered furiously. His arm was about to make him daft with its throbbing, he had a very uncooperative courier sitting next to him, and they were both being followed by unknown quantities.
He couldn’t imagine that they were friends of the woman sitting next to him.
Perhaps some time in a quiet location would cause the answers to bubble to the surface.
With the way his companion was wheezing, he didn’t suppose that would take very long.
He texted Oliver. Hotel?
Already done.
Where?
Ritz, of course. Cameron’s buying.
He’ll bill me.
Prob.
Derrick wasn’t a fan of big, splashy hotels, but the security and visibility of the Ritz was undeniable. A difficult place in which to find oneself mugged. He sighed. “The Ritz, please, Rufus.”
“Very good, Master Derrick.”
Samantha Drummond was making noises that sounded remarkably rodent-like.
If he hadn’t known better, he would have thought Cameron’s Mercedes had mice nesting under the seats.
He pursed his lips, then looked at his companion.
Her face was only occasionally lit by the traffic, but he saw all he needed to. She was absolutely terrified.
“I’ll scream,” she said, sounding as if she would only scream after she’d lost what lunch she’d managed to ingest.
He shifted so he could look her full in the face.
“I have no intention of harming you,” he said, though he would most certainly and with a certain amount of cheerfulness turn her over to the authorities once he’d had his lace back from her.
“I don’t think the others following you are nearly as altruistic. ”
“Bald guy?”
He nodded.
“Skinny guy?”
He nodded, deciding that perhaps it would be discreet not to mention the other two Oliver had seen in the crowd. For all he knew, there were even more.
“What do they want from me?”
“What do you think they want from you?”
She put her hand over her mouth and turned to look out the window.
Derrick wasn’t unused to waiting people out.
It had served him very well over the years, that waiting.
He could surely outlast a simple scholar from across the Pond, even one who was foolish enough to try to make a little extra from a bit of thievery.
Perhaps she’d considered lifting the lace herself.
He imagined with enough time and a handful of disappointed looks, she might be dissuaded from a further life of crime.
A pity she would spend so long in prison.
He didn’t imagine she would look quite as lovely after her stint.
But that wasn’t his worry.
Why he couldn’t have done that at a cheap hotel, he didn’t know, but there it was. At least he would get something decent to eat out of the bargain.
He leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes. He pressed his free hand against his shoulder and almost lost consciousness. That wasn’t good, but it could wait.
He gave Samantha Drummond half an hour before she was singing like a lark. His arm would last that long.
Or so he hoped.