Page 96 of A Rogue at Stonecliffe

“Oh, yes.” Russell pulled out a small, torn sheet of paper and handed it to Sloane. “It’s just a scrap of paper, really. I only kept it because it was the last time I saw him. It makes no sense. It’s gibberish.”

“It’s code. A code I know.” Sloane stared down at the paper, stunned. It was a terse command to send information about troop movements in Portugal. It was signed at the bottom, not with a name but with a drawing of an eight-legged creature, a drawing Sloane had seen many times. “Spider.” Asquith’s code name.

It was Asquith who had given instructions to Winfield. Asquith who was the French agent inside his own network. Asquith who had tried to harm Annabeth.

“I’m going to kill him.” Sloane charged out of the house without a thought for Russell, standing open-mouthed in his study. He hailed the nearest hackney. Asquith would be at his office.

No wonder Asquith had been so eager to find Hunter’s confession. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to hire Verity to begin with. Asquith must have been even more afraid when Sloane entered the picture. Perhaps Annabeth was right when she suggested the attacks had been on Sloane, not her. Asquith likely believed that without Sloane Annabeth wouldn’t be able to find the document. Clearly he didn’t know Annabeth. Sloane had no doubt that if he hadn’t figured it out just now, she would have kept digging until she got to the bottom of it.

Asquith hadn’t needed to have someone follow him and Annabeth to the Haverstocks’ estate; he knew that Sloane was going to search Hunter’s workshop. He may have believed that Annabeth was safe at Stonecliffe with Verity, and all he had to do to stop Sloane’s investigation was lie in wait for him. It was possible, even likely, that Asquith might have searched the workshop before Sloane and Annabeth arrived and had been unable to find anything. Thank God they hadn’t told Asquith they were going to question Hunter’s valet, or Asquith might have wrested the desk away from Simpson before Sloane and Annabeth reached the man.

Sloane jumped out of the hack as soon as it stopped moving, shoving a payment in the driver’s hand without looking, and ran into the building. Asquith’s secretary popped up when Sloane strode down the hall toward Asquith’s office. “Stop. You can’t go in there.”

Sloane ignored him, going straight to Asquith’s door and turning the handle. It was locked. He swung back around to the secretary. “Do you have the key or shall I break the door?”

“I don’t have the key, and it’s pointless, anyway. Mr. Asquith is not in his office.”

Sloane narrowed his eyes, wondering if the man was lying, and decided that he looked too smug for it not to be the truth. “Where is he?”

“I can’t tell you that,” the man protested.

“Think not?” Sloane reached over and grabbed the lapels of the secretary’s coat, dragging him across the floor until they were eye to eye. The man twisted, trying to break Sloane’s grasp, but he was unsuccessful. “You are going to tell me, one way or another,” Sloane said in a low, calm voice made all the more frightening by his icy tone. “You might as well tell me now and save yourself some broken bones.”

“I—I—he’ll kill me.”

“No, he won’t. I am going to find him, and he won’t be coming back here.”

“I—he didn’t tell me.” But when Sloane grabbed the other man’s neckcloth and twisted, he squeaked, “But I hailed his hack for him, and I heard him tell the driver Lady Lockwood’s address.”

Sloane’s insides turned to ice. “Annabeth.”

He whirled and ran.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

ASQUITH GRIPPED ANNABETH’S arm and dragged her toward the entry. Annabeth resisted, but she knew she could not escape him. On the other hand, it was unlikely that he would follow through on his threat to shoot her because he needed her to take him to Simpson. Had she told him about Simpson? Anger and fear were swirling inside her, fogging her memory. She had only mentioned the desk, but perhaps Sloane had said more in the note he’d sent Asquith yesterday. It didn’t matter.

Either way Asquith needed her alive long enough to find out the location of the desk. Emboldened by the knowledge he wouldn’t shoot, she twisted, launching herself at him and slamming into his chest. She slapped him as hard as she could, digging her nails into his face for good measure.

Fury gave extra force to her blows. “You killed him! You killed my father!” Annabeth hit him again, raking it over his eye so that he jumped back. Even if Asquith won this fight, he wouldn’t be able to cover up these scratches. Sloane would figure out what had happened. She knew he would never give up on finding her.

Once he recovered from the surprise of her attack, Asquith tried to restrain her, but the gun in his hand impeded him, and Annabeth continued to hit and kick wildly. Her flailing arm hit his hand, and the gun went flying across the room. Asquith cursed, and Annabeth took advantage of his moment of distraction and jerked away from him. She ran and dove for the gun, but Asquith was on top of her in an instant.

They wrestled for the weapon, but he tore it from her grasp with such force that it sailed off again, slamming into the door frame and bouncing off onto the marble floor of the entry. The pistol went off, shattering a vase on the hall table, and spun to a stop at the stairs.

Asquith scrambled to his feet, yanking Annabeth up with him. One of his arms went around her waist, pinning her arms to her sides. She drew breath to yell, but then she felt a knifepoint against her neck, and she stopped.

“Shut up or I’ll slice your throat.”

“I can see where Sloane got his weapons-for-accessories sense of style,” Annabeth said.

Asquith grunted. “Well, I haven’t his appreciation of witty banter, so shut up. Let’s go.”

He started forward, releasing his hold around her waist and gripping her upper arm so that she was able to walk slowly. All the while he kept the tip of the knife against her neck.

There was a gasp and a quickly cutoff shriek down the hall behind them, and the butler exclaimed, “Miss!”

Annabeth could see a couple of maids now standing at the top of the stairs, looking shocked, and though she could not turn to see them, there must be some in the hallway behind them.