“You best get out of town,” Tommy said, wiping blood off his face, knowing that Jenkins would be useless to them if he stayed, for Blackwood was sure to see him dead.
Jenkins nodded and groaned as Tommy dragged himself out the door. His nose was dripping blood, and it felt like his organs had been rearranged in his stomach, but he was alive,he could walk, and he was determined. He was going to find Minnie.
He had to.
How, especially alone, he had no idea, despair filling him as he looked one way through the shipping containers and then the other, wondering which would follow her and which would lead him nowhere.
“Tommy!”
He whirled around at his name, relief coursing through him when he saw Jonny running toward him, Rhys and Colin close behind.
“Am I happy to see you,” he breathed out. “How did you know where I was?”
“Heard from a friend who saw you enter the customs office,” Jonny said, his brow furrowed. “What the hell, Tommy? Why did you go without us?”
“Thought I could do this on my own,” Tommy said, only to meet Rhys’s disapproving glare.
“We’re a team, Tom,” Rhys said in a gravelly voice. “You don’t do things alone. Especially something like this.”
“Where’s Minnie?” Colin demanded, and it felt like a vise had gripped Tommy’s throat.
“They took her,” he said, forcing the words out of his mouth.
“Who?”
“Blackwood’s men.”
Rhys swore as he and Colin looked around, their eyes as confused as Tommy was.
“Follow me,” Jonny said, much more confidently. “I know where they would have gone.”
“How?” Colin demanded, but Jonny waved him away.
“We’ll discuss that over tea sometime,” Jonny said in response, rolling his eyes. “Now, let’s go.”
He led them through the maze of shipping containers andmerchandise stacked on the docks, Tommy’s eyes on alert as Colin passed him a handkerchief and Tommy pressed it against his nose, surprised to find how much it was bleeding. He hadn’t even noticed in his panic to find Minnie.
He felt some relief that Jonny seemed to know where to go, what to do, and he put his faith in him as he led them through the docks, knowing the way like he had been raised in these back alleys.
Perhaps he had been. Tommy didn’t know the extent of his story, and he doubted they would discuss it over tea as Jonny had promised.
“Shh,” Jonny said suddenly, motioning for them all to get down and be quiet. When they heard the lapping of the waves, the sound of wood upon wood that meant a boat was being prepared to leave the docks, and the low murmur of men’s voices, it took everything within Tommy not to rush out and try to immediately save Minnie, but thankfully, the little reason he had left prevailed. He would be no help to Minnie if he were dumped into the river.
“What do we do?” Tommy whispered.
“There are three of them, four of us,” Jonny muttered, having become their unofficial leader in this endeavor, before his eyes flicked over Tommy. “Well, three and a half.”
Tommy snorted in disdain, but it hurt his nose to do so, and he winced as Jonny continued. “When I count to three, we three each take one of the men. Tommy, you get Minnie out of here. Understood?”
“I can fight,” Tommy argued, but Jonny shook his head.
“You’re at a disadvantage and would be in our way. Just save your wife, all right?”
Tommy nodded, not admitting to them that his vision was slightly darkening from time to time, and nausea swirled in his stomach. Jonny was right, as much as Tommy hated to admit it.
Suddenly, there was a shout and a splash, which was enough of a signal for them all to spring into action.
Tommy leapt forward into the clearing beyond the shipping containers, his mouth gaping open when he saw Minnie not in the river as he had worried, but standing there unencumbered, just out of reach of Garrick and one other man. She was ready to bolt, her skirts already flying as she turned, until she saw the four of them appear, her eyes widening in surprise as she came to a sudden stop.
