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The other man—Mac, I presumed—tossed a heavy rope toward us, dust kicking up as it landed near my face. Eddie tied my hands behind my back, then wrapped a length of the same rope around my feet, drawing them back. When he finished, he stood over me, his face filled with disgust, as he kicked me in the gut.
“Enough,” Reggie said. The clip-clop of horse hooves caught his attention, and he peered out the door. “The lorry’s here.”
Mac and Eddie left me and rolled the carriage door wide open. Reggie picked up the lantern from the floor, the light flickering on the cobblestones as he stepped outside. He called back to the two of them. “Get the chest out. And careful with it.”
“Where do you want us to stow it?” Eddie asked.
“Put it in the Grey Ghost. Should be safe enough in there.”
The two men dragged a small chest from beneath a tarp. Whatever was in it was heavy, and the two had difficulty lifting it.
Recognition hit me when Reggie’s lamplight flickered on the gold-leafed royal crest on the outside of the chest. “The train robbery, Reggie? You?”
My cousin looked surprised. “You think I’m not capable of something that daring? That always was your problem.” He walked over to the Grey Ghost, standing aside as Eddie and Mac brought the chest over. “By tomorrow night, once I deliver the forty-fifty to my buyer, your father’s investment in Rolls-Royce Limited will be for naught. And with my profits from the robbery, I’ll have enough cash to buy back Payton Manor and all the lands your father stole from mine. What I won’t be doing is wasting my money on those charities you support.”
“The children—”
“That orphanage your father started will be the first to go.”
“Finlay!” Reggie called out to the man in the driver’s seat of the lorry. “A hand!”
The man secured the horses’ reins, jumped down to pull out the ramps from beneath the lorry’s bed, before climbing up to work the winch. He drew the length out, tossing the end to Eddie as my cousin walked around the vehicle, the lamp’s light reflecting on the polished grey paint.
Eddie secured the winch to the Ghost and Finlay started pulling it up.
“Does this car really work?” Finlay asked, as Eddie and Mac started pushing the car toward the lorry. “Why don’t we just drive it out of here.”
“And get caught?” Reggie said. “Don’t be an idiot. If a night watchman hears that engine starting, he might come ’round to investigate. Load it up, put the chest inside, and get the tarpaulin over it, before someone sees it.”
Once the car was safely on the lorry, Reggie stood aside as Eddie and Mac hefted the chest, carrying it up the ramp. Whatever was in it was heavy, and Eddie nearly lost his grip, the chest slamming into the bed of the lorry.
I heard the ring of metal hitting metal, imagining what sort of treasures would be in a royal chest. Gold and jewels, perhaps.
“What about your cousin?” Eddie asked, when they were finished loading the chest. “What’re we going to do with him?”
“Kill him, of course.” My cousin’s emotionless voice sent a chill down my spine. “Quietly, though.”
Eddie looked over at me as though contemplating how best to carry out my demise. When he turned away to help the others cover the car with the tarpaulin, I shifted, trying to get to my cane, which had landed somewhere behind me. I felt it with my fingertips, managing to hit the release for the dagger hidden in the shaft. But then I heard the soft scrape of footsteps.
As I twisted around, I saw a flash of white from the corner of my eye. Whoever it was grabbed the cane from my fingers, drew the hidden dagger from the handle, and clamped a hand over my mouth.
59
Arthur Oren passed through airport security and walked to the executive lounge to wait for his plane back to the UK. If he’d had his way, he’d be in Paris to personally take possession of the car today, not Monday.
The video he’d seen before bidding on the car had erased all doubts that he was looking at the Gray Ghost. Still, it galled him that he’d had to pay such an exorbitant price to recover the very car that he’d stolen himself. And it angered him even further that he had to wait for his bank transfer to clear before he could view the car in person.
Still, it was now a matter of a day or two before he’d have the Ghost safely back in the UK. Only then would he learn the secrets she held.
Assuming the Fargos didn’t interfere . . .
The phone buzzed in his pocket: Colton.
At last.
“You got my message?”
“I did,” Colton said.
