Page 109 of The Duchess Curse

Shadows at the end of the conservatory took shape. “Right here.”

Madame Poppy looked like she wanted to spit. “Oh, bugger off. What are you doing here?”

“I work here,” Hesperus drawled.

Bran pointed to the woman again. “And you’re going to stick to her like a damned shadow, do you understand?”

“Why?” Grant asked. “She’s no one. At best a criminal. I’ll hand her over to⁠—”

“She’s someone until I know where Guin is and why she’s done… this!” He stomped off. “Don’t let that women leave this house!”

“You can’t stop me!” she yelled. “I’ve got a brand-new shop to run! Don’t you dare think for one moment because I’m young and American and a woman, I’ll let you…”

He turned the corner and thanked Jupiter he couldn’t hear her anymore.

Guin had given her shop away?

It made no sense. She would never do that. That woman had to be lying. She’d done something to Guin.

As he stomped up the stairs, he bellowed, “Ned! Ned!”

Almost immediately, he heard the rapid thundering of footsteps behind him. “Whatcha need?”

At the landing, he faced the other man. “Tell me everything.”

“She took her walking stick and that’s all. I didn’t think much of it. She can’t leave now, can she, with the queen tellin’ her what to do.”

True, and that slowed Bran’s pulse a bit.

“I searched the shop high and low, but she weren’t in there.”

“Did she give any hint about where she was going?”

Ned shook his head.

And Bran made for his bedchamber. Artemis swooped in from the bathing chamber as soon as he threw open his wardrobe. She perched on top of the cheval glass and cawed.

“I’ll bring her back,” Bran promised.

Something sparkled from the bird’s beak, and Bran reached up for it. Artemis dropped it willingly into his palm—the silver necklace, the potion bottle charm. He held it enclosed in his palm, then opened his hand. Lovers kissing now.

He shoved the necklace in his pocket. “Many thanks, Artemis.”

Then he bound his wound the best he could on his own and dressed, strapping blades where necessary. He was riding out of the mews a quarter hour later and at the docks just as quickly.

He stopped outside Biira Shipping Company, hitching the horse to a post and slamming his fist on the door. When no one answered, he knocked again, louder. In the distance, a man’s voice wobbled into the night air on a sea shanty.

Bran’s stomach roiled.

And the door flew open. Ndege stared up at him. “Bran… is something wrong?”

“Has Guin been here.”

“No. She’s missing?”

Kikulwe appeared behind his wife. “What’s the matter?”

Ndege rested a hand on her husband’s arm. “Guin has disappeared.”