Starlight (40 page)

“Polly!”

Like a fish fighting its way upstream, he shouldered past fleeing bodies and called again for his wife. He broke through the crowd but she was gone. He spun in search of her auburn hair.

A crack of fire surged through his jaw. Thought was blown from his head. Reeling, as pain raced like a bullet from skin to bone to brain, he staggered backward and caught his balance against a crate. Another blow smashed the base of his skull. The crate beneath his hands gave way. The whistle of another descending blow gave him a blink of warning.

He flipped onto his back and swung his walking stick. The wood slammed against a man’s forearm. With his attacker doubled up, cradling the wrecked limb, Alex lurched to his feet. To his surprise, he was gathering details with uncanny sharpness. His opponent was one of Livingstone’s cohorts, some ungainly troll with carrot-orange hair and huge shoulders. And the walking stick in Alex’s hand was a much less satisfactory weapon than a nearby pipe.

He snatched up the hollow length of steel. “Where is she?”

“You broke my bloody arm, you bastard,” the brute said with a snarl.

Something grated behind Alex’s left ear when he spoke. So he wasted no words—simply hefted the pipe in one hand and the walking stick in the other. “Where?”

“That man’s bodyguards have her. I was only supposed to scatter the crowd.”

“What man? Livingstone?”

“No! Some Yankee.”

Alex slammed the stick across the man’s upper back, then raised the pipe. “Where is she?”

“Out to the north docks, with the lightweight craft.” The troll’s words were squeaky with panic.
“Us and Livingstone were supposed to follow. We’d be paid then. To a schooner called the
Mamie
.”

No.

Throwing the weight of his frustrations behind it, he jabbed the pipe into the man’s ribs. His stumpy opponent groaned in agony and slumped to the floor.

Alex met him there, grabbing his collar and giving him a shake. He ground the toe of his boot between the man’s legs. “Who has the gun?”

“Livingstone.”

Heath burst into the warehouse. “We saw them!”

Alex shoved the troll’s head against the planks and snatched up the makeshift weapons. Fear like he’d never known made his heart shake like a terrified animal’s. No coincidences. Not now and not like this. Threads of information laced together, weaving a funeral shroud for Josiah Todd.

He left Tommy with Polly’s younger brother. “Wallace, rouse the constables. Invoke my name and send them to the north docks. Make it happen.”

Then he and Heath shot down the alleyway. The young man had found a jagged piece of wood, which he hefted over his shoulder like a cricket bat. Their footfalls slapped against the moist cobblestones, straight toward the docks. Each pounding step crushed pain up through Alex’s jaw and the base of his skull. He focused on his aches rather than fears.

So many times he’d led with his brain, as if his body was just a container to carry his thoughts from place to place. Now his body was his most important
asset. He’d beat Josiah Todd into oblivion with his bare hands. If Livingston or anyone else was stupid enough to intervene, they’d get the same.

“Here!” Heath tore around a corner, Alex on his heels.

A dozen yards later, they burst onto the main walkway that ran parallel to the docks. Ships of all shapes and sizes cluttered the River Clyde, maybe a hundred in all.

“A schooner called the
Mamie
,” Alex grated out.

Heath hesitated, concentrating. Then he nodded. “This way.”

The lad worked these docks. If anyone could help find Polly, her brother would make it happen.

“It came into port in April,” Heath shouted over his shoulder. “Big vessel, for a pleasure craft. I don’t remember it unloading cargo, which is why I remember it at all.”

Alex had believed his former father-in-law a despicable but ultimately cowardly man—one more apt to use stealthy, backhanded means rather than overt action. Had Todd truly descended to the point of madness, intent on taking revenge on Alex for having married Mamie? For taking Edmund?

Just how far would he go?

Polly
clutched where a stitch jabbed under her ribs. The corset beneath her funeral garb was laced too tightly. She’d hustled to keep up with Livingstone. He hadn’t let go of her wrist since dragging her bodily out of the ramshackle warehouse. Once up the ramp of a schooner and through the hatch, he
threw her down against the inner hull. Only thick carpeting cushioned her landing.

Livingstone spoke to a lackey who descended the ladder into the hold. “Stay with her, Hollis. I’m going to find the others.”

Then he was gone.

Hollis sat on a leather-padded bench that curved along the port side. Polly sat half propped on her elbow. She had smashed her knee against a crate during the mad flight from the warehouse. Blood seeped through her stockings. She shoved tangled hair out of her face.

The posh interior of that small schooner made Alex’s residence look fit for paupers. Decorated with elegant paintings and even a foot-tall marble bust, it more resembled a palace than a boat sitting in industrial Clyde Harbor. The scent of flowers was too absurd to believe, until she spotted a beautiful glass vase filled with freshly cut blossoms. A sideboard next to Hollis’s bench was full to bursting with crystal decanters, delicate wineglasses, and even a tray of ripe strawberries.

Trying for calm, she flicked her eyes to where Hollis sat leering. He smirked, then licked his lips. Polly hid the shiver that slunk down her spine.

“Where are we?” she dared ask.

“Shut up.”

Fine. No sense talking to a man who made a living beating up innocents. He sported a number of scars on his face, and his nose jutted at a strange angle toward his left cheek. Livingstone was a bully, but he’d always been clever enough to strut through town with bigger men at his beck and call.

Her thoughts kept jerking back to that warehouse and the fear she’d battled. Livingstone, Hollis, and that other, stumpy hunk of ugly muscle. All of them threatening the workers she’d only just reassured, rousing them against Polly’s entreaties for calm.

With one bullet, Livingstone had scattered her people as if they were terrified sheep.

And Alex. She’d met his gaze across that sea of fear, before he, too, was swallowed by the chaos.

She shouldn’t indulge thoughts of him or why he’d barged into the warehouse. To break up the meeting? Had he brought constables with him? Perhaps he’d really taken to such extremes. Now that she knew the pressure he faced to make Christie Textiles profitable, much of his obsession made sense.

Yet Livingstone was now her most important consideration. What game was he playing? What “others” had he gone to find?

The wail of a baby shocked her from her musings. She recognized that cry.

Edmund!

Although her first reaction was to distrust her own brain, her instincts were stronger. Edmund. With both the baby and Polly on board that schooner, Livingstone—or whoever was funding him—had gathered two of the few people on earth who mattered to Alex Christie.

A place in her heart sank in on itself, slowly, like an apple rotting from the inside. Alex would die before letting anyone hurt his son. She knew it like she knew that she loved him.

She wouldn’t sit by and watch that happen.

Turning away from Hollis, she faked a hard cough until her eyes watered. “Please. Water. Anything.”

The man sneered. But another round of hoarse, heaving coughs left her gasping. Blinking past wet lashes, she saw his frown of concentration. Lord, he looked dumb.

Come on, you pillock. Be just dumb enough.

She almost laughed when he stood and trudged with giant feet toward the sideboard. He opened a decanter of clear liquid, but Polly didn’t wait long enough to find out what he poured. Leaping up, she grabbed the marble bust off its plinth. It was heavier than she’d estimated, like lurching with a boulder. Her arms burned, and her back nearly bowed.

But she would not be deterred.

Hollis turned. She heaved the bust into his abdomen. He doubled over. Not waiting for him to recover, she grabbed the decanter. Rather than shatter, the glass thumped heavily against his skull, almost bouncing out of her hands. Another sharp blow, this time to the marble sideboard, splintered the decanter into shards. Its slender base fit neatly in her hand—an impromptu knife of jagged glass.

She attempted to jab his face, but had to skitter away from his sloppy attempt to grab her legs. She thrust the wicked decanter down again, this time connecting with the top of his spine. Blood spurted from his ragged skin. She kicked him in the kidneys, one boot after the other. He gurgled and slumped forward.

Part of her shook with the fear that she’d killed him.

Part of her wanted to kick him again.

But Edmund needed her.

She searched the long, narrow room in the belly of the ship for a better weapon. On the wall behind a wide oak desk hung a series of daguerreotypes. The sepia tones revealed unfamiliar hunting destinations. In each photo, a man with white hair and a full white beard stood over dead animals—elephants and tigers and a whole menagerie’s worth of wildlife. Whoever owned the boat was quite the hunter.

Now Polly was, too.

Because at the center of that pictographic arrangement hung a sword, a ceremonial pistol, and a small machete.

She grabbed it. Lord knew if she’d be able to use it without hurting herself. No matter. She adjusted her grip on the engraved silver handle.

Passing the sideboard, she grabbed the drink Hollis had poured and tossed it back, gratified to find it was liquor. The sudden blast of alcohol fired her brain—just what she needed. She couldn’t climb the ladder in her skirts while holding the machete. So, with the knife clamped in her teeth, she grabbed the rungs. Nerves made her swift. Years growing up defending herself against brothers and a neighborhood of curious young men had made her strong.

At the top of the ladder, she paused. The hatch remained open. Cautiously, so slowly, she peered into the night. The sky was murky with cloudy shadows, stealing her sense of perspective. But the men who stood there were easy to identify. Livingstone. Winchester. And the white-haired man from
the photographs. Another figure caught her notice. Huddled nearby, with her back against a crate, sat Agnes. Edmund was in her arms, quieter now and wrapped in a blanket that glowed white in the strange evening haze.

Their gazes met.

Agnes’s eyes opened wide. She shook her head minutely.

Polly took the knife from her teeth and raised a finger in what was probably an unnecessary gesture for silence.

Three men. Winchester was a nasty old tycoon, but Livingstone was tough, muscular, and still had his pistol. The other man obviously had a penchant for killing innocent creatures. Polly didn’t like her odds. Not at all.

“You
owe
me.” Livingston sounded even more angry than usual. More importantly, he sounded betrayed. “I did everything you asked—the looms, the fire, the charges against the girl. She’s in your hold because I threw her down there. I deserve what you promised.”

Livingstone. This whole time. Everything had been his doing. The rumors about Jack Findley had been a ruse—whispers in the right ears, playing on who she would trust and suspect. The wild-goose chase had wasted valuable time enough to let the union rip itself open, and the masters would never be blamed.

The man with white hair snarled in that polite way gentlemen were best able to manage. “I paid you—both of you, goddamn it—to ruin Christie Textiles.
I won’t pay up until that happens, and last time I checked, it’s still open for business. ”

“You’ve got his wife and his son,” Winchester said. “Isn’t that enough?”

“Not by half. I want him broken.”

Polly’s feet were growing numb on the rung. She needed to make a choice. Hide. Go to Agnes. Charge like a wild warrior woman.

“Josiah Todd!”

The three men turned their backs to Polly, but they didn’t obscure her view.

Alex!

Her husband stood at the top of the gangplank. He appeared ghoulish, like a burly Celtic warrior of old. Fierce and fiery. The suit he’d worn to the funeral, the one she’d so admired for its cut and quality, had been dragged through hell and back. His top hat was gone. His sandy hair was a rugged mess in the twilight. He carried a metal pipe in one hand and his walking stick in the other. Both weapons paled next to the grim determination that fixed his expression in stone.

“Ah, Alex. Good of you to join us,” said the man with the white beard.

My God.

He was Josiah Todd. Mamie’s father. For Polly, everything fell into place. This was the fiend who had ruined a woman’s life—his own daughter, no less. The monster whose callous perversions had driven Alex to take such desperate steps to save her.