Introducing Miss Joanna (Once a Wallflower #2) - Maggi Andersen Page 0,56

on sending her back.”

“Your mother would never stand a chance with my father,” Jo said. “He is merely amusing himself with her.”

“I’d shut my mouth if I were you.”

Tears pricked Jo’s eyes, and she lowered her head in case he saw them. She would never give him that satisfaction.

Virden pushed her into another bedchamber, which was obviously his mother’s. He pulled a sack from under the bed. “Gold.” He weighed it in his hands, then pulled the drawstring open to peer inside. “I will need this.”

While the bag of gold distracted him, Jo pulled her locket over her head. Her fingers closed on it as she held it in her palm. “You are stealing your mother’s money.”

He shrugged. “I’d leave her a bit, but she won’t be back here. She will get by. Has a talent for it, as I told you. Still a good-looking woman, my mother. Can mix with anyone.”

“She’ll get on well with those in Newgate then,” Jo said.

“Don’t provoke me. I warn you.” He tucked the gold inside the portmanteau and stood. “It’s time to go. We don’t want to miss the boat, do we?”

The coach they’d come in waited in the drive. Dressed in an oilskin, a bulky figure hunched over on the box as the rain pelted down. Jo let the locket slip from her fingers onto the porch. Reade had once commented on it. Perhaps he would remember it and know she’d been here. She clung to the hope he’d find her. For if she lost all hope, the fight would drain out of her. And she intended to fight Virden the first chance she got.

In the carriage, Virden made Jo lie on the squab beneath a rug. It smelled chokingly of dust and horse. Trying not to cough, she thought over what he had told her. Who was behind this gang of procurers? It was not Virden, he wasn’t smart or powerful. Nor would it be his mother. A woman wouldn’t have overseas connections. If Reade had been investigating them, he might have some knowledge of where Virden was taking her. But dusk was not far off, and at dawn the following morning, the tide would turn and sweep her away from England. It seemed impossible to believe. Too scared to cry, she put her fist to her mouth as her throat tightened on unshed tears.

When Black went to arrest Rivenstock, Reade saddled Ash. Within minutes, he was on the road to the Virdens’ house.

The cottage had a shuttered look. No servant answered the door. Reade broke a window and climbed inside, moving from room to room, gun cocked. In the upstairs bedchamber there was evidence of a hasty departure, but no sign of Jo. When he emerged again through the front door, something bright caught his eye, lying on the porch. He bent and picked it up. A gold heart-shaped locket. He released a slow breath. The last time he’d seen this dainty piece of jewelry was around Jo’s slender neck.

He threaded the fragile chain through his fingers. At first, he feared Virden had ripped it from her, but he was wrong. The clasp was fastened. Might she have dropped it on purpose? As a sign? It told him Verdin had brought her here, but not where he took her. With a curse, he tucked it into his waistcoat pocket.

No staff and no horses in the stables. Virden was on the run, and Jo was with him. Why? Did he intend to sell her as he had so many before? In that case, he didn’t intend to return here. They were shipping Charlotte overseas, was that Virden’s intention for Jo? Reade groaned. His men would have to watch the docks. He’d need a shipping list. Boats departing London within the next week.

Mounting Ash again, he rode to Bow Street. He had lost too many he cared about. Well, it would not end that way. Not this time. He would find Jo and restore her safely to her home. If he didn’t, his life wouldn’t be worth living.

In the mood to draw blood, even should it be aristocratic, Reade set Ash at a gallop and rode through the streets toward Covent Garden.

Chapter Seventeen

The rain eased to a drizzle as Virden’s coach traveled along beside the brick walls rimming the docks where tradesmen and port workers unloaded sugar, tobacco, and spices from trading vessels in the soot-filled air. Through the darkening sky, a sea of masts could be seen rocking on the Thames