Chapter 7 #2
Not for the first time this past day, she wondered if he might be seeing someone else—a widow, perhaps, or an opera dancer he had taken a liking to.
It was not unusual for a gentleman to have a mistress, she knew—she had even heard her aunt and uncle arguing over it more than once.
And if she had thought about it in advance of her wedding, she might have even considered such a thing inevitable.
But now, at the consideration, her breath hurt in her throat, like swallowing glass.
She looked away for an instant to blink away the thought, and when she looked back up, the crest was nowhere to be seen. She scanned the crush of carriages, gnawing her bottom lip. Vanished. A coach and four did not simply vanish. Where could he have gone?
Very little about this quarter of York felt familiar to her, though a few signages reminded her of a route her Uncle Vernon would take them through on their way to his favorite food place.
Dismounting by an alley, she tied her mare to a lamppost, tiptoeing above several heads in the near distance and scanning the crowd.
One of the parked carriages looked familiar, but before she could get any closer, a strange figure planted itself in her path.
“I knew you would come,” he exclaimed.
Isadora jolted back, peering through the darkness to see who this new assailant might be. He was of perhaps average height, average build; then the hat came off, and the gaslight lit the face beneath.
Nathaniel?
Her heart gave a lurch, but it was more panic than any warmer feeling. What was he doing here? And where on earth had Nicholas disappeared?
Then again, perhaps it was fortunate he was not here to see this.
“Mr. Windham…” she said tightly. “I was not expecting to see you here.”
“Oh, leave the formalities. It is Nathaniel to you.” He gestured at a swinging sign across the street. “And I requested you meet me, if you recall.”
Mrs. Ellwood’s Tea Gardens. Clear as day. Except, this place had seemingly been abandoned and barricaded off over a year ago by the looks.
Once again, her heart lurched in her throat, and this time she thought she might be sick from the force of the sensation.
“That was not—” she stammered, then stopped. “I… I didn’t come here to see you.”
“Then who did you come to see?” He squinted at her, then swung his gaze to the tavern occupying the alley behind her. “You know only lightskirts pass through those doors, Isadora. It’s no place for a lady.”
Indignation rose hot in her chest. “Nothing about this area is fit for a lady, yet you requested I meet you here.”
“Only so no mutual acquaintance might recognize us.” He extended his arm as though nothing at all had passed between them, as though he hadn’t left her standing in yellow silk before half their parish. “Come with me.”
Isadora glanced back for her mare, but the horse had drifted several steps away. Mr. Windham had never paid her this much attention during their two years of courtship, nor looked at her with that hungry expression on his face, as though he had just conceived of a newfound desire to eat her up.
She did not trust that look.
“Thank you, sir,” she said, doing her best to be polite, “but I would rather just return home. I see I have made a mistake in coming here.”
“Stay, Isadora.” His hand closed around her arm, firm enough that she could not slip it without causing a scene. “Come now, I have been waiting for you since early afternoon,” he chuckled half-heartedly.
“I never asked you to! And I certainly never asked to be held like a runaway hound.” She wrenched, and his grip only settled deeper. “You left me, sir, need I remind you. That chapter of my life is finished. We should both simply get on with our lives.”
“Sir?” Something ugly passed over his expression. “But what if I don’t want to move on with my life? What then?”
“My, my… now what’s we got here?” A throaty rumble came from behind them, deep and filled with pleasure. It dragged a shiver up her spine like a fingernail. “A little mousey and the terrier who be chasin’ her.”
Mr. Windham stiffened and turned. Isadora, rather foolishly, expected him to stand in front of her, protecting her from view, but instead he took a step away.
She stared at the two men approaching, their heads shielded by flat caps and their greatcoats patched and muddy.
They moved with a swagger, as though they already knew their place in the world, and it was several levels above them.
In this part of the city, it probably was.
Her mind raced, frantically trying to think of something to say that would get her out of trouble, but all she could think of to say was that she had no money, nothing they could possibly want.
Mr. Windham took another step back.
“Don’t—” the first man snarled, but before he could get in another word, Mr. Windham bolted past her and past them, sprinting deeper into the alley, entirely to disappear into the establishment he’d only minutes earlier claimed was for ladies of the night exclusively.
The two men watched him go for a moment, bemused, then, shrugging, they advanced, backing her against a jagged wall. She should have run when Mr. Windham had, but he had been further from the men, and he had not been wearing skirts.
“Such a pretty thing…” the first man crooned, reaching out to twirl a lock of her hair between his fingers.
“S-stay away!” Her voice came out weak and desperate. “I have nothing for you—”
“I’d say you do, little miss,” said the second, seizing her hand and wrenching the ring from her finger. She cried out in pain, but eventually it slid off, and he examined the gold in the glow of a gas lamp.
Her wedding ring. She felt sick at the sight of it in his filthy hand.
“Not that!” How could she possibly explain to Nicholas where she had been if her wedding ring was stolen?
“A rich little mouse,” the first man murmured, leaning close enough that she could smell gin and old wool. Her heart battered its cage. “I wonder how loud this one squeaks…”
“Step away from her.”
The words came down the alley quiet and level, the way frost comes overnight, and both men went still as if the temperature had actually dropped.
“N-Nicholas?” she breathed.
He loomed over her assailants, a mystery in the darkness, a highwayman’s mask covering his face. But she would have recognized him anywhere, no matter what he wore—or didn’t wear.
“Please,” she gasped.
Something flashed—a knife—and the next thing she knew, the man wielding it was on the cobbles, and Nicholas stood over him, barely breathing harder.
He had moved so rapidly, taking the man’s arm and twisting it so his shoulder popped from its socket, then sweeping his legs out from under him.
Isadora had never seen violence met with such chilling composure.
Her breaths were coming too quickly, but on instinct, she struck at the man holding her.
Her knuckles connected with his bony jaw, and pain leapt up her arm from the connection.
That had… hurt.
Nicholas closed the distance, yanking the next man by his collar and holding him against the sooty brick like a moth to a board. Isadora’s ring clattered to the floor, and she dived for it, splashing around in whatever unmentionable liquid lay there until she found it.
“Should you ever be so unfortunate that I see your face around these parts again, I won’t hesitate to kill you,” Nicholas snarled, his voice deathly quiet.
“I w-won’t come back, sir. Not here, n-not again.”
Nicholas dropped the man in silence, who scrambled on all fours before leaping to his feet and making a run for it. The other man, still on the cobbles, groaned as he rolled to his heels and hobbled away.