Page 31 of A Daring Pursuit (The Clandestine Sapphire Society #2)

“B last it, Isabelle, it’s much too cold. And wet. Truly, dear, your parents will wish to do irreparable harm to someone, and that someone will be me.”

Geneva had slept like the dead. For the first time in years, there had been no great weight of worry on her shoulders… or so she’d thought. She had no desire to go up against Sander and Verda when it came to their precious—and she was precious—only child. After all, Geneva was trying to fit into the family, not undermine those whose acceptance she sought. “Have you forgotten the person who pushed me over the cliff has not been located? And that he could be a killer ?”

“Oh, yes. I see what you mean.” The words were delivered earnestly enough, but it was the innocent blinking of her large, gray eyes that gave Geneva pause. She further threw Geneva off with a quick hug, enveloping her in her white, muslin dress, and went to the door. “Perhaps later, then. I’ll see you at luncheon.” She tossed a sweet smile over her shoulder then was gone. But the determined expression on her face was all too visible—Isabelle cared nothing of what anyone thought: she was going bug hunting.

Geneva glanced down at her wrap. She wasn’t even dressed. Blast .

By the time she was donned in one of her own sturdy frocks Pasha would shudder at and Abra had shuddered at, Geneva ran for the stairs, but Isabelle was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Winfield. Frightfully vexing. There was no time to lose, and Geneva dashed out the front door.

Of course the headstrong child had disappeared. Logic told Geneva Isabelle would choose a place near the laboratory; then again, she would not do what was logical. Stretched before Geneva, past the sweep of the drive, was a line of tall oaks that looked as old as the land itself. Geneva started to turn, but a flash of white hit the corner of her eye from that line of trees.

“ Isabelle .”

The response was a short, sharp scream.

Geneva ran, now thankful for her unfashionable yet comfortable boots and sturdy frock. She breached the woods and heard the low growl off to her right. The proverbial head-splitting axe pierced her skull. She fought through a vortex of blackness dotted with tingly spots that nearly felled her to her knees. The thrashing of leaves kept her on her feet. “Isabelle,” she called out in a breathless and desperate rush. She burst through a canopy of low-hanging limbs that tore her hair from its fastenings and tripped over an exposed tree root. Pieces of the damp earth filled her nostrils—so different from the debris that blew over Berwick Street. Thankfully. She spat out the dirt.

“Please.” Isabelle’s whisper sent a chill weaving its way up and around her spine, raising the hair at her nape.

The heavy strands of hair blinded her and she shoved them away, coming face to face with none other than… “Papa?” She hadn’t seen him in almost a decade. No. That wasn’t it at all .

Starting at the crown of her head, the pain, agonizing and unbearable pain, moved to her temples and pounded with that ghastly visage that turned the fresh turn of the earthy fragrance about her into an instrument of immense torture. Even the slight breeze hit her face like shards of piercing glass. The ability to form a coherent thought fled her usually pragmatic notions.

Her vision was limited to silhouettes within the dark shade of the trees.

Isabelle whimpered. “Geneva?”

“Ah, the prodigal daughter of a seaman and his lady lives to face her adorin’ papa,” her father said. His inked arm sported a snake and flexed. The wicked-looking knife he held to Isabelle’s delicate neck sent another wave of icy-black panic through Geneva. Sheer hatred permeated the forest and cleared some of the cobwebs—

Her eyes flicked to the chain around Isabelle’s neck, where a corner of the locket for which she’d been searching exposed a large, red ruby.

The stakes had just heightened to an alarming degree. The compounding danger cleared every fleeting thought in Geneva’s head. With a deep breath, she came slowly to her feet and met her father’s seething malevolence. “It was you who pushed me over the cliff.” That she was able to choke out the words was just as miraculous as her surviving the fall, along with the memories crashing through her. The battering rain, the shock of seeing that straggled hair, the outstretched, calloused and stained palm that had landed on her chest and pushed without the slightest hesitation. The actual fall and landing were still locked deeply away.

And Noah. His voice screaming her name over the pounding surf from below.

Geneva kept her eyes trained on her father, praying Isabelle would stuff the locket from sight, keep him from seeing it. Otherwise, they were both as good as dead. “Let her go, Papa. She’s a child,” she begged.

“I’ll let ’er go, once I got you in me ’ands. Got just the place to stash yer bloody remains when I’m through with ye.”

“Lord Chaston, the cave…” she whispered, edging within his reach. She had to save Isabelle. “Why, Papa? Why try to kill me ? Your own daughter.” She kept her tone low, placating.

“Yer no child of mine. She was done ruined when she married me.” The stench of gin reeked with his menacing cackle. “’Er family cast her aside. Found ’er blubberin’ like a squall at sea in one o’ them fancy parks she done grew up near.”

Geneva managed not to cast up her accounts. He shoved Isabelle aside too quickly for her to get her footing and she fell with a sharp cry.

Geneva stepped to the opposite side, drawing his entire focus on her. She had to keep him talking. But she couldn’t seem to grasp his words. Not clearly… “Chaston? Lord Chaston and Mama,” she said faintly, distractedly. He suddenly had a bruising grip on her arm as another, horrendous, thought penetrated. “You. It was you who killed Lord Pender, wasn’t it?”

“That good-for-nothing dissolute had his way with my wife whilst I was at sea. She bore his bastard.”

Julius. It was true. Julius was her brother. “But… but why wait twenty years? It makes no sense.”

“I never ’ad a clean shot at ’em ’afore then. That’s why. Bloody bastard was too quick. Too quick for a toff. Should’a been dead years ago.”

Isabelle gasped.

He’d lost what little wits he’d ever possessed.

Geneva dare not pull her eyes from the glint of that blade. It was her attempt of willing him to drop it. She heaved in a deep breath as another horror hit her. “And… And the footman? You killed the footman.” The question didn’t require asking.

Without even trying his attention riveted on her. “Saw me, o’course. Now quit yer yappin—”

The revelations sliced through Geneva with the cut of the dagger he wielded, but there was also opportunity. “Run, Isabelle,” she screamed. “Run!”

It was just enough of a distraction the girl needed.

Papa swung back to her, his fist dealing a whopping blow to her cheek. Somehow, Geneva managed to stay on her feet.

It hurt and she saw stars. But as she’d blithely informed Docia, she’d grown up in one of the more challenging London neighborhoods and struck back, quick like, with a knee to his groin. Hard. He dropped like a pile of stones in the middle of a turbulent sea. She snatched up the nearest weapon at hand—the dropped knife—and raised it, aiming for the empty cavity of his chest.

She’d threatened him years before and had failed in following through. A mistake she wouldn’t make a second time.

“Set it down, Geneva. You’re safe now.”

“Noah?” she cried softly, sliding to the ground into a puddle of muck. “Isabelle…”

“She’s all right, Gen. She’s all right.”

Her eyes raised to see him brandishing a pistol pointed at her father. “Kill him,” she said, her voice trembling as bad as her hands. “He murdered your father and… and Docia’s”

Her father let out a choked cackle that raised bumps over her skin. “’e ain’t got the balls, gel.”

“I don’t think that will be necessary,” Noah said. “On your feet, sir.”

“Fuck ye.” Her father was as belligerent as she could remember and remained where he was, on the ground. She’d known him too long to trust anything her father said or did. A person’s mien spoke volumes if one took pains to observe.

Geneva came to her feet, clutching the knife within her skirts, this time, staying carefully free of his reach. “Don’t trust him, Noah. He’s wily.”

Noah’s eyes never wavered from him, the weapon steady in his grip. “I suspect he’s been in the vicinity for years. Isn’t that so, Mr. Wimbley? Or shall I call you ‘Harlen’?” Noah asked. Papa’s lips clamped tight, but Noah didn’t let up. “It’s been nigh on a decade, I’d wager.”

Geneva stopped, her head taking on that incessant pounding that didn’t bode well. “Since Mama’s death. You left after she died. This is where you’ve been. All these years…”

“Your father has been insinuating himself in the community. Quite the regular at the tavern, aren’t you, Mr. Wimbley?”

Papa let out another one of those skin-tingling cackles that grated over her.

“But why kill me? Why go after Julius?” she whispered.

Sneering, he said, “Ye think Pender was the only fool who done yer mama? ’E was jes the last in a string o’ lovers she spread those legs for when I was at sea.” He laughed again. “She couldn’t hide her fancy notions. I found ’er letters. I ain’t no fool. She owed me for givin’ ye me name.” Quick as a bolt of lightning, his arm shot from behind, a glint of metal piercing her vision.

But Geneva had prepared for this moment since the day of her mother’s funeral when her father had dared come after her. The dagger flew from her fingers. “Noah, fall !” she screamed.

The blade struck the only man she’d ever known as her father in his thick, inked neck the same instant Noah’s pistol fired, the bullet hitting Papa where his heart should have been.

She slid back down in the dirt and covered her face with her hands, ears still ringing with the thundering gunfire.

The gun thudded to the ground and strong arms instantly engulfed her. “It will be all right, darling.” Noah’s growl whispered against her ear. “He can never hurt you again. Never.”

Geneva fell against his chest, needing nothing other than the steady beating of his heart to right her world. “I love you,” she whispered.