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She’d found it, after all. Perhaps it would not be terrible to keep it.
Odd to find peace like this in the midst of a melee, but somehow it seemed appropriate to a girl raised a princess among thieves.
“Could do with another tie here!” Imogen said, and Adelaide started for her friends, already working to pull a ribbon from her skirts. She looked down, losing the room for a split second, no longer noticing the crowd or the location of everyone within it.
A split second was all it took.
A heavy arm banded across her stomach, pulling her tight to a tall, foul-smelling body.
Danny.
“Not so fast,” he said. “You should have stayed gone.”
“Adelaide!” Henry’s shout came from across the room, and he was approaching, a newfound pistol in hand. “Let her go, Danny.”
“Nah,” Danny said, “I don’t think I will. Do you know how long I had to listen to Alfie whinge about how he’d lost his best thief? His best cutpurse? How Addie was the only one who could pick a lock fast and clean? Do you know how many times some starry-eyed girl asks me if I knew Addie Trumbull?” His breath was hot and acrid in her ear, the blade of his knife at her throat. “I’m going to enjoy making sure that this time you’re gone for good.”
Henry was approaching, eyes glittering with anger, and Danny didn’t care for it, pulling her tighter to him. “Lay down your weapon, Duke.”
The blade tightened, biting into her skin, and Adelaide squeezed her eyes shut, bearing the sting. When she opened them, Henry was crouching several feet in frontof them, his blue eyes on hers, lowering the firearm to the ground. “Lady Imogen?”
“Yes, Your Grace?” Ever casual under pressure.
“It is warm in here, don’t you think?”
Adelaide’s breath caught in her chest.
A wide grin passed over Imogen’s face. “Terribly so.”
Adelaide turned her head, as Imogen punctuated the words with another brilliant flash and a smoky bang. Unable to see, Danny loosened his grip, and Adelaide pulled free, moving out of the way before—
A gunshot rang out.
“He shot me!” Danny cried from the floor as the smoke cleared, revealing Henry, pistol in hand. “The bastard shot me!”
“It’s about time, if you ask me,” Duchess said, as though she were at a croquet match and not a church brawl.
Henry caught Adelaide in his arms, a hand coming to her cheek. “Are you hurt?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Not now that I am with you.”
He kissed her, quick and firm. “I don’t believe you.” Worry furrowed his brow as his fingers traced down her neck to the spot where Danny’s blade had been tight to her skin. He scowled at whatever he saw there, a muscle ticking in his cheek as he made to set her aside. To go after him. To finish the job.
Adelaide reached for him, holding him back. “No.”
Henry didn’t like that—of course he didn’t, her warrior, pledging his sword. Instead, he looked to Danny, who writhed on the ground, hand to his thigh. “Give me a reason to let him live.”
“Because the South Bank don’t like traitors, do it, Danno?” And then she pulled a long ribbon from her skirts, and offered it to Henry. “Instead, I suggest we leave my father a gift.”
Danny was the last of the fights, and while Henry dealt with him, Adelaide considered the chaos they’d left inthe chapel that day, pews upended, a candelabrum on its side, smoke still dissipating from Imogen’s explosion, a dozen men either knocked out cold or headed for a night wishing they had been.
In the midst of it all, Duchess and Imogen were assuring the vicar that not only would they pay for the damage to the alcoves and pews, they would make a generous donation to repairing the stained-glass window that had been cracked for as long as Adelaide could remember.
The vicar assuaged by this, and the promise that he could use the Duke of Trevescan’s finest carriage to visit his sister in the country that very day, Duchess turned to the rest of the group from her place at the end of the aisle, by the door, and said, “Considering Imogen has caused two rather loud noises, I think we ought to do our best to escape notice while we still can?”
“I beg your pardon,” Imogen pointed out. “Those loud noises saved the day.”
“So they did,” Henry said, softly, tucking Adelaide beneath his arm and pressing a kiss to her temple as they made their way up the aisle. “I’m very grateful to you for that, Lady Imogen. Would you allow me to purchase you a gift of some kind?”
