Page 59 of Choosing Her Earl at Last
“As long as we deliver Rebecca safely back to her family, all will be forgiven,” Michael reassured her.
“I was left with the impression that, even then, she may still hold resentment toward you. The things that the two of you said to each other will not simply disappear without coming to some resolution or pitched battle.”
Michael gave Colin a side-eyed look but said nothing more on the matter. He shifted the paintings within his grasp for a more secure hold and continued forward. It was not that he wished to put Rebecca in peril, far from it, but he was not willing to allow Emmeline to place herself at risk for any reason, no matter how compelling an argument she might make.
As the cousins approached the designated meeting spot, Michael felt an uneasy queasiness in his belly when, instead of Mr. G, there was a much younger, rougher-looking man awaiting them.
“Did you bring the money, the paintings, and the girl?” the younger man demanded to know, his eyes held cold blue steel as his left hand opened and closed anxiously around the handle of the blade that he had strapped to his belt.
It was clear from his attire and the anxious flittering of his eyes to and fro that he had grown up on the dark streets of London and that staying aware and vigilant had kept him alive. Michael was not certain which man was more dangerous, the coldly lethal Mr. G or the nervous, flittering youth.
“Where is Mr. G?” Michael asked, refusing to answer or hand over anything until he had an answer.
“Where is the lady?” the younger man pronounced each syllable carefully as if Michael were hard of hearing or slow of wit.
“We will not hand over anything or tell you anything until we have seen that Miss Rebecca Frampton is unharmed and standing in front of us,” Colin bit out, his love for Rebecca and fear for her safety pushing him to the limits of emotional bearing.
“First the ransom, then the hostage,” the younger man demanded, pulling his blade from its sheath. “You do not want me to be forced to use this.”
“There will be no need for that,” Michael reassured him. “We simply wish to know that Miss Rebecca is alive and unharmed. That is a reasonable request.”
Before either of them could get any more information out of the anxious criminal, Bow Street Runners began to pour out from every direction, taking the unsuspecting younger man into custody. “No!” Colin cried out in frustration. “He is not Mr. G, and he has not yet revealed to us the location of Miss Rebecca’s imprisonment!”
“We saw the blade and moved to your defense, my lords,” one of the Runners explained as they tied the man’s hands together, having disarmed him in short order, while only gaining a few cuts and scratches in the doing.
The man looked all about him as if expecting his colleagues to come pouring forth in his defense, but no one came. Fear began to dawn in his eyes, replacing the bravado that had been there but moments before.
“I do not want to hang,” he gasped out in desperation as he struggled against his bindings. “I did not survive all that I have just to die at the end of a rope!”
Michael, seizing on the moment, ordered the Runners to halt their arrest. “Allow me a moment to speak with the prisoner?”
The head Runner nodded in consent.
“What if there was a way to make certain that you did not hang?” Michael asked, his agile mind concocting a plan.
“What would it cost me?” the younger man panted in fear, his eyes wide, showing the whites.
“The truth,” Michael answered. “Tell us where Miss Rebecca Frampton is being held prisoner, and I will see to it that you do not hang.”
“Are you a magistrate that you can make such promises?” the younger man asked, suspicion warring with desperation in his eyes.
“I am not, but I am friends with one, and I am a powerful earl whose family holds much sway in London.”
The man looked Michael up and down as if deciding whether to believe him or not. “If I talk, Mr. G will have me killed.”
“If you do not talk now, these gentlemen will make you talk in a most excruciatingly painful manner, and then you will still die,” Michael reminded him.
The young criminal gulped nervously as he contemplated his fate. “You swear upon all that is holy that you will not allow me to die at the end of a noose?”
“I swear it,” Michael reassured him.
The man nodded. “I will do it. I will tell you where she is.”
Colin practically leaped forward onto the man in a rush of emotion. “Where?! Where is she?!”
He eyed Colin warily. “Excitable, lad, are ye not?”
Colin drew back a fist, threatening to punch the man in the face.
