Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
Despite all that was threatening them from every side, Jonny still had to go to work the next morning. He couldn’t very well tell Fawkes that he had to stay home to protect his wife from the underworld where he had once lived and worked.
“I’ll walk you to the blacksmith shop on my way,” Jonny said as he sat down to his bowl of oats. Ada nodded, lifting a sheaf of papers before taking the place across from him.
“Before you go, I found something last night,” she said. “I’m not sure if it will prove anything, but it might be better than nothing.”
She slid the papers to him, and Jonny noted the date and time at the top.
“Ada,” he said as his eyes ran down the page, his heart rate picking up as he realized what it all was. “This is the manifest of the shipment. It shows everything Sharpe smuggled, how much it’s worth, when it came in, and where it’s going.”
“That’s what I thought.”
He looked up at her incredulously. “This is amazing.”
A small smile played around her lips. “It was a shot in the dark.”
“Well, we’re lucky you have such excellent aim.”
A knock sounded at the door, and Jonny met Ada’s eyes before he walked over to answer, wondering if it would be her father returned.
No, not her father, but it appeared to be someone who worked for him, judging by the horse sitting outside the door and the finery the footman was dressed in.
“For Miss Jones,” he said, holding out the note before turning to depart.
“Do you need to wait for a response?”
“No,” the footman said over his shoulder, obviously thinking that he was above Jonny as he mounted and rode away.
“Who was that?” Ada asked when he returned.
"One of your father’s footmen, I believe,” he said. He began to open the note, but Ada took it from him before he could.
“I believe it’s addressed to me,” she said, eyeing him, and he nodded, lifting his hands as he realized his mistake.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I was too worried about what it said.”
She studied him for a moment, seeming satisfied with what she found before sitting beside him so that they could read it together.
At her proximity, he longed to wrap his arm around her and pull her into his lap, where he could bury his nose in her hair before showing her just how he felt about having her here, in his house, in his life, in his heart — but it wasn’t the time.
Not yet.
They silently read together.
Ada,
Your actions have disgraced our entire family. We hoped we could provide a satisfactory conclusion to avoid this, but you have gone too far this time. Never grace our door again. Never ask us for anything again.
We raised you better than this and are ashamed that you have treated us so.
Mr. and Mrs. Edward Jones.
He felt Ada stiffen as she read the words, and he turned, taking her hands in his before she could walk away.
“Ada,” he said firmly. “You know that none of this is true. That they are the ones at fault. You have done nothing wrong.”
“I know,” she said, although her face said she believed otherwise.
“All you did was choose for yourself and not the life they wanted for you,” he said.
“Your father was the one who worked with Blackwood, who was going to sacrifice you to gain the legitimacy that he lost himself. They are sour because you didn’t go along with what they wanted, because they lost their own wishes.
What they should truly be upset about is losing you, for you are the greatest prize of all. Trust me. I should know.”
When she looked down at him, she was rapidly blinking away the tears in her eyes.
“That is kind of you to say.”
“It’s the truth,” he said, standing and wrapping his arms around her, pulling her in close.
“Anyone would be lucky to have you in their lives.”
“Even you?” she said, her voice slightly muffled from being smushed against his shirt.
“Most especially me,” he said, placing a kiss on her hair, longing to say the words she needed to hear — that what he felt for her had become stronger than he had ever imagined could be possible.
But he couldn’t say them now, for if he ended up being beholden to Sharpe or taken to jail, she would be left without him, and he would only be hurting her all the more.
For the truth was, he was more than willing to sacrifice himself to save her.
He had tried to do so already. Finch had come to him at the shipping office, and while Jonny had initially thought he was coming to take him in, it had been, in fact, the opposite.
Finch had seen through his ruse and told him that all would be forgiven — he only needed to help him bring down Sharpe and his operations.
Jonny was more than happy to oblige.
“You need to get to work,” Ada said, and Jonny nodded, wishing he could stay here and hold her all day but knowing that wasn’t an option if he wanted to provide for him — for them — in any way.
He walked Ada to the blacksmith shop, stopping in to greet Minnie and Tommy before continuing on to the shipping office.
He greeted Fawkes and a few other workers, getting on with his day despite everything on his mind.
He was just a few minutes away from leaving at the end of the day when the door opened and someone walked in who instantly gave Jonny a feeling that he wasn’t here to book a shipment.
“Jonny Tate?”
“Yes,” he said, looking at the grizzled man, who was staring at him with a look in his eye that was altogether too happy with himself.
“Heard you’ve been seeing a bit more of your brother lately.”
“More than I’d like,” Jonny bluffed.
“Well, we’ve heard it’s a bit different than the two of you have let on.
He’s still with Sharpe — but not quite under the same circumstances as before,” he said, his eyes glistening.
“Sharpe found what you left, a little note that was supposed to place him under suspicion, hmm? And then your brother let you go so easily. Well, your plan’s foiled, Tate.
And if you’d like to see your brother again — alive — bring what you stole the other night.
You know where to find us. We’ll be waiting after dark. ”
With a chuckle, he left, leaving Jonny standing, frozen but for his hands, which had clenched into fists that made him want to go after the man and show him what happened when you messed with the Tates. But he would do this the smart way this time. Not by himself. Not just with Ada.
He would be going in at full strength. Sharpe wouldn’t know what hit him.
Jonny cringed when he heard the cry of pain.
Will.
Jonny had to fight every instinct within himself to keep from charging into the warehouse and demanding that Sharpe release his brother, but that was exactly what Sharpe wanted and would only hurt all of them in the process if he went too soon.
Still, hearing Will, feeling Ada shudder beside him… it was nearly more than he could bear.
All he could do was wrap his arm around Ada, trying to provide her comfort even as she provided it back to him in turn by simply being there with him.
“It’s nearly time,” she murmured, as they waited, watching Jonny’s pocket watch. It all had to be timed perfectly.
“A few more minutes,” Jonny said grimly, even as Sharpe opened the warehouse door, calling out into the night.
“Oh, Jonny, are you out there? We’re having a grand time in here and can’t wait for you to join us. Isn’t that right, Will?”
When Will cried out, “Do not come in, Jon!” Jonny nearly surged to his feet and would have done so had Ada not been holding onto his hand.
“I don’t like you going in alone,” Ada said in a soft voice a few minutes later, as the time ticked down.
“I’m never alone,” he said, turning and meeting her gaze. “Not with you in my heart.”
Her eyes widened at his near-confession of love, the closest he had ever come to telling her what he truly felt for her.
But if he didn’t return from that warehouse — despite all of their precautions, there most certainly was a chance — he needed her to know that what he felt for her was real. True.
“Don’t leave me,” Ada said, her words nearly desperate as she gripped his hand, and he knew she didn’t mean in this moment — she would be fine out here.
She meant forever.
“I will do my very best,” he said, leaning in and pressing his lips hard against hers for a moment that was both too long and too short in the same breath. When he finally pulled away and checked his watch one last time, he nodded at her, before beginning a slow walk toward the warehouse door.
He wanted to look back, but he knew doing so would only weaken his resolve.
He had one chance at this, to make right all the years his brother had stayed in this hellhole while Jonny had been free, and he refused to squander it.
He banged on the door.
“I’m here. Let me in, Sharpe.”
The door opened to reveal Sharpe himself, standing there with a near-gleeful smile on his lips.
“Why, Jonny. I was beginning to think you wouldn’t show,” he said. A pistol gleamed in his hand, and he waved it inside, motioning Jonny in. “I’ve saved you a seat next to your brother.”
He pointed the gun toward a chair, Will sitting beside it. He was tied to his chair with a rope, his nose bloodied and cuts above his eyes, but besides that, there didn’t appear to be any further damage.
Jonny let out a long breath.
“What do you want, Sharpe?” he said, taking the seat beside Will. “Why did you bring me here?”
“I wanted to have this out,” Sharpe said, sitting across from them, pistol still in hand, although it was no longer trained on them.
“Blackwood might have let you go, but I had no such arrangement with Will. Then imagine my surprise when I found out that the two of you were much closer than you ever let on.”
“We’re not close,” Jonny bluffed. “Our mother forces us to speak now and then.”
“I would have believed it, had Will not let you go the other night,” Sharpe said. “That was far too coincidental, along with the note you left to convince my men to turn against me. It was all a setup. The two of you want to take over operations.”
Well, he was close, but at least he hadn’t guessed the entire truth — that the second part of their plan was turning this all over to the authorities, to shut them down completely.
Jonny had to keep Sharpe talking, to provide time for the plan to fall into place.
“What happens if we don’t agree to work for you?” he asked.
Sharpe’s lips began to turn upward. “That, my former friend, isn’t an option anymore.
It stopped being an option when Will began working against me.
Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to go for a little walk down to the river.
Then the two of you are going to take a swim.
Tie him,” he ordered one of his men, who walked up to Jonny and roughly began to tie a tight knot around his wrists.
He desperately wanted to fight him off, but he knew to do so would be futile.
As Sharpe marched them toward the door, pistol against the back of Jonny’s head, Jonny closed his eyes, taking a deep breath in.
Perhaps this was the end, then.
At least Ada knew how he felt about her. He should have told her he loved her. He hoped she would guess.
For it seemed he would no longer have the chance to tell her himself.