Page 155 of Whispers of Wisteria

And, for some reason, I couldn’t get past the feeling of being exposed.

I scooched backwards, only stopping when my back was against the hard wall. I couldn’t answer her, and I ignored Gloria, as I curled inwards, making myself as small as possible.

Jameson was gone, but I still had no idea what had just happened.

Why was I feeling so vulnerable?

“Bianca?” Maria repeated my name, more harshly this time. I turned my gaze to her. She watched me with large, reassuring brown eyes that urged me to respond. And I wanted to…

The last thing I wanted to do was to disappoint her. To cause her to worry.

I had to say something.

The chains dragged across the floor as I pressed my hands to my mouth. Mostly, it was an attempt to gather the courage to speak—to coax a single sound—but my tongue was still stiff with silence.

I watched them from behind the loosened strands of my hair. Maria’s eyes glittered in furious gold. Her jaw clenched, and her teeth bared as she rounded on the other Officers.

“What happened?” She was speaking to them both, but her focus was on Ada. “Why does she look like that?” But before Ada could reply, she moved her glare to Gloria. “How could you have allowed her to be taken? I thought you were looking for Cécile?”

“It’s Jameson.” Gloria was watching the ceiling, unperturbed by the lioness’s anger. “He’s working with the Guild.”

“Jameson?” Maria’s posture stiffened. “But…” An air of nervousness moved in the space between the three of them, but I couldn’t place why. My thoughts were too frazzled to make sense of anything anymore.

“What are we going to do?” Maria asked no one in particular. “We need him.”

Ada glared at the floor, while Gloria, still in chains against the wall, stiffened.

“We can’t let Jameson’s betrayal set us back,” she said, shaking her head. “These things happen. We need to improvise and regroup once we escape.”

Her attention moved back to me. “Does he know who she is?”

“Yes,” Gloria replied. Her attention flickered to me. “But he hasn’t done anything further. He’s planning something.”

“What are you talking about?” Ada cut in, looking between them.

But Maria ignored her. “We need to escape before that happens,” she told Gloria. “Losing him is a devastating blow.” She looked at me and pushed her hair behind her ear. “Don’t worry, Bianca, Titus is here too. He’ll break us out once he realizes you’ve been taken.”

“Titus really is captured, then?” Ada asked

“We didn’t plan for it to work out this way,” Maria said, biting her lip. “We went to meet Albert Yates with a question we had about the Richards case. But it was a setup.”

Gloria’s head snapped up. “What would Albert know? He isn’t one of Richards’s known associates. You had no right to move without my input.”

Maria hesitated. Her gaze flickered to me. “It’s not Richards himself we’re investigating,” she admitted. “We’ve found recent evidence of Patterson’s movements.”

A tremor passed through me, and my skin chilled. Titus and Maria had been caught while trying to helpme. I had to pull myself together.

“That falls under my team’s jurisdiction now,” Gloria said, frowning.

Maria squared her shoulders. “Titus doesn’t think so. He was working this case before you stepped in. He’s not willing to risk delays—not with what’s at stake.”

“No one is delaying anything,” Gloria snapped. “This is exactly what Gregory was warning everyone about! Titus needs to let the rest of us do our jobs. Now look, he’s gotten himself captured!”

“You’re captured too!” Maria shot back. “Or did you forget that part?”

“That’s completely different,” Gloria replied.

Their discussion was cut short as the door opened and Jameson strolled down the stone stairs. He ran his fingers through his now skewed hair as he stopped at my cell door.