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Chapter Seventeen

I f Lily had given Colin more notice, he would have accompanied her from home to The King’s Head, but he had no idea when she would have left, for she never gave a time in her note. He assumed she would sneak out as soon as she had the opportunity.

He could only hope that she would do so safely.

He was about to open the back door of The King’s Head when it swung out toward him, nearly knocking him over as he quickly sidestepped into the alley.

“Colin!” Lily pushed the hair back away from her face. “I was beginning to worry you were not going to come.”

“Here I am,” he said, stepping toward her and stopping only inches from her face as he looked her up and down to ensure all was well.

Why it wouldn’t be, he wasn’t sure.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, noting her flushed cheeks.

“Nothing is wrong,” she said, excitement in her voice. “Not at all. I know what we need to do now.”

“Oh?”

“The answers aren’t here. They are at Lord Montgomery’s mill.”

She set off so quickly away from the club that Colin had to break into a slow run to catch up with her.

“What does Lord Montgomery have to do with anything?” he asked once they were in step once more.

“I was unsure if you received my note in time, so instead of waiting, I went into the club’s office alone.”

“Lily, what if you had been caught?”

“It would have been easier to explain my presence alone than had we been together. I would have said I was finding something I needed for my work. Only Pritchard would have known that was a lie. Anyway, I found money in the top drawer of his desk. It was in an envelope marked with an address that I recognize as Lord Montgomery’s mill. ”

“Did it say what it was for?”

“No, but I believe they were bribes. Only, I don’t think they were for Pritchard.”

“Why not?”

“Because then he would have taken them with him, not have left them in his desk drawer. I think Lord Montgomery is bribing others within the club.”

“Players?”

“Perhaps.”

“No,” Colin said, shaking his head, unable to believe it. “We are the ones who are suffering from this. Rhys has to pay his own money toward player expenses. Joey was hurt. We’re the ones with our bodies and reputations on the line.”

“I never said it was players for certain, Colin,” she said, frustration tinging her words. “I only said it might be. It could be them or a multitude of others within the organization.”

“What if it is your father?”

That stopped her mouth and her feet, but she set her jaw before continuing on the path ahead.

“Then it is my father, and I will confront him. I want to find the truth, Colin. Is that not important to you?”

“Of course it is,” he said, placating her. “But sometimes right and wrong are not so easy to determine.”

She shot a look over her shoulder at him, one that he hadn’t seen from her before. She was usually much more mild-mannered and at ease.

He felt that his parting words to her the last time they had been together might have something to do with her current feelings toward him.

“Lily,” he said, reaching out and placing a hand on her arm. “Could we slow down? Talk about what happened?”

“I am uncertain of what you mean.”

“Between us. In Nottingham.”

“I would prefer not to speak about that.”

He sighed. He knew he had likely hurt her by kissing her and then rejecting her, which was the very reason he never should have allowed himself to touch her to begin with.

But it was too late for that now.

“Very well,” he said. “Do you know the way to the Montgomery Mill?”

“Yes.”

“We should have gone left back there.”

She stopped, turning to him, her hands on her hips.

“When were you going to tell me that?”

“When you gave me the chance.”

She pushed back the hood of her dark cloak and rubbed her forehead.

“I am making a mess of this,” she said, closing her eyes before placing her hands over her face. “I only want to help, but I’m rushing things. Not thinking clearly. Muddling things with you. I?—”

Colin stepped toward her, his large hands covering hers as he lifted them off her face and held them so that he could see into her eyes.

“There is no mess,” he said softly. “We are just two people who do not know the right way forward yet find themselves drawn toward one another. Can we agree on that?”

Her eyes watered as she nodded. “Yes. I believe we can.”

“Good,” he said, moving her to the side of the road, which was rather desolate at this time of late evening. Only a few people were leaving a late shift at the mills and walking toward home, passing by them. “I missed seeing you this week.”

He shouldn’t have admitted that, but it was the truth, and he wanted her to know that she wasn’t the only one with conflicting feelings.

“I missed you as well,” she sighed. “I was trying to find reasons to see you. Not that tonight was devised,” she added quickly. “I truly did make a discovery and had to share with you.”

“Yes, you haven’t told me quite yet just what that was.”

“The ledgers make it look like you are stealing money.”

“What?” he said incredulously. “Me?”

“All of the amounts you requested make it seem like you were asking for more than you paid,” she said.

“I knew it wasn’t true and wanted to discuss it with you and see what Pritchard had noted.

But then I found the bribe money and the note from Montgomery and knew that was where we had to look next. ”

“I’m being falsely accused,” he said, his mouth dropping open.

“Most likely,” she agreed. “Now, do you know how to break into a locked door?”

While Lily knew that Colin’s anger was not directed at her, the news she had shared with him certainly dampened any ardor that had existed between them.

He walked rigidly beside her, clearly upset though unwilling to put it into words.

She allowed the silence to stretch between them, hoping that, if nothing else, it would give him space to come to terms with the fact that he might be blamed for something that was not of his doing.

Lord Montgomery’s mill was not overly far from the Harcourt Mill, and soon enough, the imposing, industrious sight rose before them, the brick structure looming against the twilight sky.

Flickering gas lamps glowed through tall, narrow windows while a towering chimney belched out black smoke into the deep blue of night.

The familiar hum of machinery sounded through thick wooden doors, along with the clattering of looms and the murmur of workers finishing their shifts.

“I forgot there would still be workers about,” Lily whispered, and Colin nodded brusquely. At first, Lily felt the heavy truth settle upon her—this was a burden she would never have to bear, yet it was likely a reality Colin faced each and every day.

The cobbled courtyard before the mill was littered with wooden carts and barrels, some piled with raw cotton or wool. It was not nearly as organized as the Harcourt Mill, and Lily wondered how much of that was due to her father hiring men like Colin to take care of things.

“How are we going to avoid notice of the workers?” she whispered.

“Don’t act suspicious, and you won’t look suspicious,” Colin murmured.

The people who did remain, their forms silhouetted against the light from the open doorway, appeared slouched and tired, likely not caring much about who was walking through the courtyard.

“The mill never sleeps, does it?” Lily murmured, staring at the river glistening in the moonlight beyond the mill, powering the great waterwheel.

“Not really,” Colin said. “Soon enough, the morning shift will arrive.”

“I would guess the buildings are laid out similar to ours,” she said in a hushed voice. “We likely need to find the administration building.”

“It is almost always high enough that the manager can look over the mill but not be subjected to direct sights and sounds,” Colin said, some bitterness in his tone. “This way.”

Lily followed him, staying close so she didn’t lose her way.

He led her toward a set of stairs next to the main building, picking up a lantern swinging on a rusted hook near the entrance at the bottom. As they ascended the stairs, it cast their shadows on the brick walls in front of them, and Lily couldn’t help but note that they were moving in unison.

As they had guessed, the top door was locked.

“Do you have a hairpin?” Colin asked, and Lily nodded, immediately interested. She had heard of how a hairpin could open a lock but had never seen it before.

After releasing the pin from her coiffure, causing a curl to tumble over her forehead, Lily passed it to Colin, who gave her the lantern in turn before kneeling in front of the door.

His calloused fingers were steady as he slipped the slender hairpin into the lock.

His head tilted upward, his eyes half-closed, he twisted the pin from one side to the other before murmuring “there” just before a faint click echoed through the night, and with a turn of his hand, the door creaked open.

Lily returned the lantern to him as she tucked her hand into his free one, which he allowed as he led them into the dark building, the lantern casting shadows on the walls around them.

There were a few doors off the corridor, and it took them a few tries to find the office they were looking for.

“This must be the main office,” Lily said as she took in the room that looked so much like that in her father's mill that she thought the same man had built and decorated both.

“We are becoming fairly practiced at this, are we not?” Colin said, raising a brow, a bit of his usual jovial self returned, likely with the intrigue of the night’s venture.

“I’d say so,” she said. “If all else in our lives falls to ruin, perhaps the two of us can become detectives.”

He snorted, and through unspoken practice, they each moved to one side of the desk, beginning to sift through the drawers before them.

“What if he keeps club business separate?” Lily asked into the silence of the room. “What if there is nothing here?”

“Then there is nothing here and we keep searching,” Colin answered. “Here is one of his ledgers, but it all appears to be warehouse business. Nothing to do with the club or personal matters.”

“Understood,” Lily said, looking up at him. “All of his personal business could be at his home?”

“Then we go there next, I suppose,” he said. “Do they live close to you?”

“Yes, in the next square,” she said.

She moved to a small cabinet on the other side of the room. On top was a decanter, likely filled with brandy, a few glasses beside it. She took care not to knock into either of them as she looked through the papers stacked behind the doors.

“Colin,” she said excitedly, looking up at him as her fingers tightened against the leather binding of a ledger. “This might be something.”

She hurried to his side, placing the small bound book in between them in front of the lantern as they took care not to move too close to the window that overlooked the factory floor lest anyone might see that someone was in the offices who wasn’t supposed to be there.

“The names here,” she said, pointing a finger down the list. “These look like player names on the team, do they not? There is a first initial, but most last names match.”

“They do, and beside them are written various amounts,” he murmured his agreement. “But look, here I am with numbers written beside my name when I haven’t accepted any bribes.”

“Perhaps this isn’t what he has paid in bribes but what he is trying to demonstrate you are taking? Do you think he could be the one trying to frame you?”

“I’m not sure,” he said. “What I do know is that this is all a mess.”

The lantern on the table began to flicker, signaling that its current fuel source was running out.

“We should take this and leave,” Lily said. “One of us could take it home to study it further and make sense of it.”

“I’m not sure about that,” he said. “What happens when Montgomery misses it?”

“Then he believes he misplaced it, and eventually I can place it somewhere that he finds it. Maybe in their home.”

“I do not want you going into a house where Lord Nathaniel might be,” he said through gritted teeth, his anger flaring again, but Lily enjoyed that it was directed at protecting her.

She touched his arm, feeling the hard muscle even through the layers.

“Thank you, Colin.”

She kept her hand on him as they walked back down the corridor to the outside door.

He put his hand on the doorknob, pulling it toward him, but the door didn’t budge.

He tried again, rattling it a few times, but it was useless.

“What’s wrong with it?” Lily asked.

“It’s locked,” he said grimly.

“Can we unlock it again?”

“No. It’s locked from the outside,” he said. “Which means we’re trapped.”