Chapter 2 #2
“Then let me offer a new deciding factor,” Leopold said coldly and glanced at the guard closest to the door. “Go kill the other man—no, wait. He might be useful to The Raven’s work. Kill the boy.”
Sebastian stiffened, was incredulous. Unfortunately, he didn’t doubt at all that Timothy would die in the next few minutes if he didn’t buckle under to the duke’s will.
Killing and mayhem were nothing to a despot like this man, just part of doing business.
If he hadn’t met other men of this type to know that, he might have suspected a bluff and even called it. But not with this man.
Curbing his own emotions, Sebastian said tonelessly, “You made your point. Leave the boy alone.”
Leopold nodded and called his guard back. He was smiling again, puffed up pleased with his victory. Did he really think Sebastian would honor a forced commitment?
“I’m curious,” Leopold said, his tone jovial again now that he assumed he’d won The Raven’s compliance. “The boy isn’t related to you, at least I’m told he bears no resemblance. Why would you break your oath for him?”
“I’ve made myself responsible for him until we find him a good home. He’s an orphan.”
“Commendable,” Leopold remarked. “Now that we’ve come to an amicable agreement, you might need this.” He removed a miniature portrait from his pocket, dropped it on the cot next to Sebastian. “She has assumed a new name, but she can’t change how she looks.”
That was debatable, but Sebastian merely said, “I’ll need better than that. What was she like?”
“Hot tempered—”
Sebastian cut in to clarify. “Not in relation to you, but to others.”
“She was hot tempered no matter whom she dealt with,” the man insisted. “Vain, greedy, condescending, spoiled. She came from a wealthy family.”
“Why didn’t she return to them, instead of running away?” The duke flushed slightly as he admitted, “They forbade her to marry me. They cut her off completely when she did. They no longer acknowledge her as one of theirs.”
That touched too close to home. If Sebastian’s sympathies hadn’t favored the wife before, they did now.
“My next question is pertinent,” he said. “Do you think she had the men you sent to England killed, or were they just afraid to return to you empty-handed? Were threats made if they didn’t succeed?”
The duke flushed with anger again but waved his hand dismissively in response. “There might have been, but that isn’t important.”
“I disagree. I need to know if I should be watching my back.” “A man in your profession would do so as a matter of course, would he not?”
Sebastian conceded the point. And he’d asked enough questions for a job he had no intention of doing. “We’ll be leaving in the morning,” he told the duke.
“Very good,” Leopold replied and glanced at his guards. “Escort The Raven and his man back to their inn.” He turned back to Sebastian, adding as an afterthought, “The boy will stay here, of course.”
Sebastian didn’t move a muscle, then simply said, “No.” “Oh, yes. Not here in the dungeon. That isn’t necessary.
But I will most definitely keep him. You didn’t really think I would let you go without—insurance?
The boy will be returned to you when you bring my wife back to me. You’ll have your fee then as well.”
Bloody hell. Keeping the boy is what Sebastian would have done, but he’d hoped the duke wasn’t that clever.
“You needn’t worry about him,” Leopold assured him. “I will turn him over to the palace women. They’ll spoil him to his heart’s content, so much so that he probably won’t want to leave. I have no reason right now to hurt the boy. Don’t give me one.”
Leopold’s meaning couldn’t have been more clear. He even smiled one last time before he turned to leave the cell. But he paused in the doorway as one of the guards began untying Sebastian.
The duke glanced back to ask curiously, “Why the name Raven? Why not The Panther? Or The Tiger? You have the eyes of a cat, after all.”
Sebastian looked directly at him, his tone expressionless as he replied, “I have the eyes of a killer.” He paused, waiting for the last of his bonds to slip away.
“You should have guessed that,” he added as he shot across the room and locked one arm about Leopold’s neck in a position that would require no more than a slight twist to break it.
The guards reacted quickly, drawing their pistols, but they appeared hesitant about firing in the direction of their employer. And it didn’t take but a moment for Sebastian to position Leopold in front of him.
“Drop them,” he said, looking at each guard in turn, “or I break his neck right now.”
They hesitated, not wanting to give up their advantage.
The duke snarled, “Do it!”
The pistols fell on the hard dirt floor almost simultaneously.
One discharged. The bullet ricocheted for several long moments, finally coming to rest in one of the guards’ legs.
The man screamed, probably more in surprise than pain, and fell to the floor.
From the looks of it, the wound was minor.
The bullet hadn’t hit an artery. But another guard bent down to help him.
“Tie that wound off,” Sebastian told the man kneeling by his friend.
“Fetch the rope you used on me to do it. The rest of you start removing your shirts, and be quick about it. You’re going to use them to tie each other up.
I’ll check the knots. If even one is loose, I’ll shoot the lot of you, rather than leave you. ”
Ten minutes later, the last guard to be bound presented his wrists and one of the cut strips to Leopold, there being no one else left to do the honors.
Sebastian loosened his hold on the duke slightly, so he could accommodate the fellow.
There were several long moments while Leopold decided whether he should or not, but in the end, he did.
With that done, Sebastian told the tyrant, “You, I’ll give a choice. I can smash your head against the wall to put you out for a while, tie you up with the rest, or I could just break your neck, to assure I’ve seen the last of you. Which shall it be?”
“You’ll never get out of here alive,” the duke spat back.
“Never mind, I’ll choose.” Sebastian moved closer to the wall.
“No!” the duke exclaimed.
Sebastian wasn’t going to give the man a reason to come after him again. He merely dragged him over to the cot, forced him facedown on it, and wrapped up his wrists with the remnants of the cut-up shirt.
“There’s a man like me in Vienna at the moment looking for work, a chap I’ve crossed paths with from time to time. Name of Colbridge. And that’s the extent of my ‘sympathy’ help, more’n you deserve.”
Sebastian checked all the bindings before he left the cell and locked it. He almost laughed when he found the last fellow, whom the duke had tied up, with loose bonds. A few minutes later, he was letting John and Timothy out of their cells.
“Did you kill him?” John asked as they hurried out of the dungeon. One guard at the top of the stone stairs had to be punched unconscious.
“No,” Sebastian said, rubbing the fist he’d just used. “I probably should have, though, just to save a lot of people a lot of grief.”
“You don’t think he’ll try to retrieve us, then?”
“No. I’m not the only one available for such work.
He knows that now. In fact, I steered him to Colbridge, that incompetent fellow in Vienna who should have no trouble failing.
Baum was determined to hire me merely because I was already here and could have started immediately—if I’d been willing to work for him.
I actually hope his wife continues to elude him.
I have the feeling he’d rather kill her than go through the bother of a divorce. ”