Chapter Thirty-Seven
The dust had not settled. It drifted through the lamplight like ash, catching the last churned breath of the carriage that had carried Lila away. Marcus stood at the mouth of the alley, chest heaving, hands clenched so tightly his fingers trembled.
His confession still hung in the air. The vow held. It did not need words now.
And then she was gone.
Not from battle. Not from illness. Not from the slow cruelty of fate.
From him. From his arms.
His vision narrowed. Not a blur. A line. The line where the wheels had cut into the dirt. Fresh. Deep. Two horses. Driven hard. The carriage had turned left toward the broader street rather than right. A driver who knew the city’s veins and meant to disappear into them.
Marcus stepped forward.
Behind him, the noise of the Lyon’s Den poured into the alley. Shouts. Chairs scraped back. Bessie’s voice rose, sharp and commanding, the sound that bent a room to her will.
He did not turn.
Boots pounded down the corridor. Someone shouted his name. Richard. Then Townsend. Questions followed, urgent and overlapping.
Marcus kept moving.
He dropped to one knee and pressed his fingers to the wheel track. The earth was still warm, unsettled. The second carriage horse bore less weight, its step uneven. Old injury, perhaps. Age. That narrowed the stables by half.
He lifted his gaze to the street again.
A woman’s kerchief fluttered in the gutter. Not hers. Wrong color. Wrong weave. He scanned farther along the stones and caught a faint scrape where the carriage had clipped a corner too sharply. The horses had been pushed.
Marcus rose.
Richard reached him then, breathless, his face gone pale. “Marcus, dear God, what happened? We heard—”
Marcus did not answer. Not yet. Words meant nothing until action followed. He turned his head just enough for Richard to see his eyes.
Richard’s voice died in his throat.
Townsend skidded to a halt behind them. “Where is she? Marcus—”
“Gone.” The word landed low, anchored by iron. “Fenwick took her.”
Richard swore. Townsend surged forward, but Marcus lifted one hand. The man stopped as if checked by an unseen line.
“They went east,” Marcus said. “Fast. Two horses. One favors the right foreleg. Unmarked carriage. Driver knows the alleys.”
“Then we ride,” Townsend said, already turning.
Marcus did not move.
A breath passed through him, cold and absolute. Not panic. Not despair. Something far more dangerous.
Purpose.
“I will reach them first,” he said. “You follow the main road. Richard, take the lanes behind the baker’s quarter. Townsend, cut toward the river. Do not engage him. You find where he stops.”
Richard hesitated. “Marcus. Henry. Should we bring the boy?”
“No.” Marcus’s voice cut clean. “Bessie will keep him safe. And she will keep him from seeing what comes next.”
He looked down the road once more. The last echo of wheels faded into the city’s pulse.
His throat tightened for the space of a heartbeat. Not enough to stop him. Only enough to remind him that he had spoken the words aloud once—and that whatever had been taken from him before would not be taken again.
He crossed to the stables behind the Den in long, driving strides. Richard and Townsend followed, but neither spoke. They felt the storm gathering in him. Not loud. Not wild. Condensed. Lethal.
Marcus threw open the stable door.
A young groom looked up, startled. “My lord—”
“Saddle the black,” Marcus said. “Now.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And bring me a lantern, a fresh pistol, and whatever powder you have.”
The groom ran.
Marcus stepped into the stall and laid a hand on the horse’s neck. The animal lifted its head, sensing urgency, but did not shy.
“Good lad,” Marcus murmured.
The horse trembled once. Then steadied.
Richard hovered at the threshold. “We will find her.”
Marcus tightened the cinch. “I will find her.”
Richard flinched. “Marcus, she cannot have gone far. Fenwick may only want leverage—”
“He took her because he believes she breaks me,” Marcus said. “He is wrong. She makes me clear.”
Richard swallowed.
The groom returned, arms full. Marcus strapped the pistol at his belt, hung the lantern, and swung into the saddle with a fluid motion that drew Townsend’s sharp look.
“Marcus, wait for us to mount,” Townsend called.
“No,” Marcus said. “Every moment I wait is a breath she loses.”
He gathered the reins. The black pawed the earth.
“He will not take her from me.”
Marcus drove his heels in. The horse surged forward, out of the stable yard, across the street, and into the narrowing dark where the tracks led.
He did not look back. He did not slow. He did not doubt. He followed the path as if it had been carved for him alone.
He claimed the truth at last. He loved her. And he would not lose her now.