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Plotting the thousands of ways she could make him pay.
When she had glanced out of the window this morning and seen him striding away from the coaching inn with a man by his side and a satchel slung over his shoulder, she had reacted and run.
He was leaving.
So she had sprinted down the stairs with no thought as to where she was going or why. She just knew she had to follow him and there hadn’t been time to wait for Hilde.
A cart that had been stuck in the mud in front of her moved to the left and down the street and she spied the top of his head again. The dark hair that was too long—that didn’t have the crispness of the cuts that were fashionable with the men in London.
Twenty paces away from her, Mr. Robert Lipinstein turned to look at his companion as he talked, moving effortlessly through the crowd. His tall frame sent his stride long. Wide shoulders that brushed against all the people moving the opposite direction. A rock in a stream, and he never flinched, never faltered in his steps.
For a man that had just spent seven years in Newgate prison and two years at sea, he knew where he was going. And that made him all the more dangerous.
Torrie slipped out of the alley and moved quickly along the building to her left. The rough of the stone facade caught again and again on the sleeve of her jacket as she moved, pulling her arm backward. She sank into the shadow of the next alley and scanned the ships ahead, her look flickering back to the bastard so she wouldn’t lose him in the crowd again.
If he was getting on a ship and disappearing once more—fine. Hopefully it would sink.
But if he planned to stay in England, she needed to know.
The bastard rotting in jail was preferable above all else. Newgate had been perfect for that. But since that was no longer the case, she wanted him off English soil. Far away from her cousins. Far away from her. She hadn’t slept well since the investigator she’d hired to track him had told her he had stepped back onto English soil.
And she’d been dreaming of revenge ever since.
Her look caught sight of a brigantine in the middle of the docks.
TheFirehawk.
Apparently it had sailed from London to Truro in the last several weeks. The dock and the gangplanks leading onto the ship were frantic. Barrels rolled and buckets carried onto the ship. Mayhem with sailors running to and fro on the deck. Ropes unfurling. Men climbing the masts. It was looking to set sail.
Bloody tide.
She wasn’t ready. They were taking off with the waters. And she wasn't ready.
She’d thought him disappearing onto the sea again would suffice. But it wouldn’t. He looked too tall, too strong, too virile. There was no justice in that.
She wasn't ready for him to walk away from her again.
She’d witnessed him walk away before. Walk away from her family being crushed by a flaming roof. Walk away from her excruciating screams. Walk away from her legs being charred beyond all recognition. Walk away from the smallest act of kindness he could have extended but didn’t.
She’d been engulfed in the unimaginable pain of the inferno that took her family’s farm—of her flesh burning—her body no longer able to scream, to fight the torture, and she had turned onto her side in the dirt. Turned and seen his face.
Seen the horrification lining his features. Seen his dark grey eyes locked on her through the smoke and embers.
Those dark grey eyes. Dark grey eyes that had flickered, wanting to help. For one instant, he’d looked as though he was to move forward.
To help. Help her. Help her family.
But then, no. He had stayed in place, watching. Not moving.
A gust of wind had cut across him and bright orange flames had danced in front of his eyes. A torch. He had been holding a torch.
He was one of them.
One of the blackguards that had set her whole life to fire. To destruction.
A crash had thundered behind her and scalding bits of fire had singed her hair, her face. And then they had closed, those grey eyes.
He had shaken his head and turned.
