“Did I say I’d kill you?” Oakham answered. “Oh no. I can put a bullet in you that will deaden your legs. Alive, if not lively.”

“Do you intend to split the fifty pounds with Sally or keep it for yourself?”

David lunged, grabbing the woman lurking at the edge of his vision, dragging her in front of him, deaf to her curses and shrieks, though her heavy cheap perfume burned his nose and turned his stomach. Sally’s hair fell draggled and loose down her back as she wrestled with him, but his grip was firm, and a forearm across her tender throat quieted her quick enough.

“How skilled are you, Oakham? How desperate to win Callista’s heart? Do you think she’ll welcome you with open arms when you come to her with the blood of her lover on your hands?”

The pistol wavered as Oakham fought his temper. “You’ll never escape. The law has men scouring every road for you. You’re to be arrested and taken back to London in the name of the king.”

“The king of the stews, perhaps. I’ve just rid the world of three black-hearted killers. If I go to London, it will be to be accept a knighthood for my valiant action.”

Oakham steadied hand and voice. “Let Sally go.”

“By all means.” David leaned down, his lips almost brushing Sally’s ear. “You’d have been better off with my coins. Your loss.”

With a shove that sent her staggering into Oakham, David threw himself behind the booth, rolling to his feet and into the mob thronging the wider alleyway. He braced for the gunshot that would take him in the back, but it never came, and Oakham was left behind. Still, he remained armed and dangerous. Add his pursuit to Corey’s, who, once he realized his men had been killed, would send more and many to finish the job. The fair and Callista must be left behind now . . . this instant.

David’s body simmered with a wild, driving power like a summer storm charge. The wolf smelled the blood on his skin and woke hungry.

The woodland was close. He would lose himself within the tangle of trees and thorny undergrowth. No swayback mount for him. He would run beneath the moon, follow the hidden ways used by badger and hare and fox, slink unseen past lighted villages and lonely farms, until he reached Gray and safety.

Where, before, the fair’s crowds swarmed close, now they parted for him like waves breaking upon a rock. Fearful glances, hissed whispers, and shrinking bodies; he noted and dismissed them in the space of the same heartbeat. They might not know what prowled beside them, but they sensed his danger and his difference.

Even the sheep bleated and shuffled, huddling at the far side of the pens as he passed. A lamp hung outside the wagon he’d shared with Callista, but he dared not stop for the book. He’d return close to dawn. Or perhaps wait for word of his flight to spread and then come back to reclaim his possessions in a day or two. Time for Corey’s men to leave the fairground for the roads and tracks nearby. Time for Callista to hate David for leaving her.

He couldn’t help himself. He paused at the trees’ edge. Opened his mind to the pathing, sending his last farewell upon a ribbon of thought, though it came with the sting of mocking amusement. So much for twenty-four hours.

* * *

Callista lifted her hand to knock at the door to Sam’s wagon. A lamp shone from inside, men’s voices too low to hear over the fair’s nighttime revels.

“. . . three men . . . dead . . . killer . . . should be sixty pounds . . .”

“. . . let him escape . . . girl . . . want them both . . .”

Gorge rising, she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t swallow. She backed away from the wagon, nearly stumbling over Nancy, who’d come up quietly behind her.

“What’s wrong? You’re shaking.”

“You gave me a day. That’s what you said. A day to make my decision.”

“I haven’t given St. Leger away.”

“Then who is Sam talking to? Why has he betrayed us?”

Nancy steered her unresisting away from the wagon. “You’re mistaken. Let me go and find out what’s—”

“No. You mustn’t. They’ll know you warned me. I’ll gather my things and slip away. Now, before they come looking.”

“Sam would never turn you over to Branston. Not for any amount of money.” Nancy followed Callista as she stumbled up the steps into the wagon, shutting the door and bolting it as if a wooden latch might protect her. Mind racketing from thought to thought, she hastily snatched up her few meager possessions and stuffed them into the satchel. She paused, noting the carved box at the bottom of the bag. Someone had gathered her bells. Someone had carefully replaced them. Had it been David? Her mother’s letters were just as she’d left them, but for one, which had slid free of the ribbon. Or had it been taken out on purpose? Had David read it?

“Sam loves you, Cally,” Nancy argued. “You must have heard wrong. He wouldn’t betray you.”

Callista shook her head as she hefted the satchel onto her shoulder. Already she could barely catch her breath and the muscles in her back ached and pulled.

A knock at the door punched the breath from her lungs. “Nancy? Are you in there? Let me in. I need to speak with Cally.”

“You wait and see. There’s bound to be a simple explanation.” Nancy offered what was supposed to be a reassuring smile, though Callista saw the doubts in the woman’s eyes.

“Nan! Open the door,” Sam hissed.

Nancy unlocked the latch and turned the handle. Sam pushed inside, the wagon creaking at the added weight, the air within seeming to grow stuffy and unbearably hot, but perhaps it was only Callista’s fear making her dizzy and slightly nauseated.

Sam looked different. His eyes flickered dark and uncertain in a taut, pale face. His clothes were dirty, a long grimy smear across his coat, neckcloth untied, and dark brown mud edging a sleeve. She peered closer. Not mud . . . blood. But whose? His own? David’s?

“What’s this?” Sam’s eyes widened to see Callista dressed for travel, her bag clutched to her chest. “I expected you to be in bed.”

“I’m fine. Much better.”

His gaze traveled around the wagon as if he thought David might be hiding under a blanket or in a cupboard. “Where’s St. Leger? Did he come here? Have you seen him?”

Nancy and Callista exchanged a look before she replied, “I’ve not seen him for hours.” Though she’d spoken to him. At least, it was speech of a kind. David’s voice had rumbled up in her mind, closer than a whisper, the words clear and sharp and tinged with resentment.

Sam made one more raking look around, obviously stymied at this unexpected hitch in his plans, while his meaty hands opened and closed, showing the same dark brown stain clinging to his palms and caught beneath his fingernails.

“I know what you did,” Callista said, anger trembling her voice. “Did you manage to haggle the price up to sixty pounds?”

“I never—”

Nancy stepped between them. “Tell her she’s wrong, Sam. Tell her it’s a mistake.”

He stared over his sister’s shoulder, bullish and unwavering. “I saved you, Cally. The man was a criminal . . . a fugitive from the law. They’re taking him back to London to answer for his crimes. Hanging’s too good for the likes of him. Drawing and quartering might be better.”

“Is that what they told you? That he was a murderer?”

“Saw it for myself. The savage killed the three who tried to take him. Lucky for me and Sally, I had a pistol to keep him from adding us to his total.”

“Sally? What was she . . . I don’t believe it. You’re lying.”

But the blood didn’t lie. Nor did the drawn and frightened look on Sam’s face. He’d taken David for a London dandy, strong, perhaps, and trained in fighting but easily cowed and swift to surrender if he met with any real resistance. David’s quick cunning and vicious brutality had shocked Sam and perhaps even made him realize what he’d unleashed in his unthinking jealousy.

“You always were a trusting soul, Cally. But this time you placed your trust in a murderous scoundrel.”

“I’ll not go back to Branston. I’d rather die.”

Sam smiled in triumph. “That’s where you wrong me. I never said nothing about you to the blokes what came after St. Leger. When they asked, I said you must have separated on the road between here and the city. That I’d never seen you.”

“Branston won’t believe you. He’ll know I would have stayed with David.”

“I’m not as stupid as I look. Sally backed me up. Told them how she and St. Leger were pillow mates. How he boasted of taking your maidenhead and then abandoning you. The men were angry but convinced. Sally’s a good actress when there’s money to be made.”

“I have to get away before they realize you duped them.”

Sam planted himself in front of the door. “You’ll stay here where it’s safe. And if you’re right and these chaps suspect they’ve been lied to and come nosing about, I’ll send them packing with a few broken ribs for their trouble.”

“Please, Sam! You must—”

“Enough! I’ll take care of you, Cally. And when that St. Leger chap is gone, it’ll be like it was before you left. I’ll make you happy.” He motioned to Nancy. “Come on, Nan. Cally needs her rest.” Nancy offered a quick backward glance just before the door closed behind them.

The scrape of the key turned Callista’s stomach. She was caught like a mouse in a cage. She perched on the narrow bunk as she sought to calm her mind enough to think logically. She needed to escape and she needed to find David. She tried the door, rattling the latch, slamming a shoulder into the jamb, but the wood held, the lock remained unmovable. She sank back down on the bunk. Closed her eyes as she conjured and discarded impossible plans. Where are you, David? I need you. You can’t just leave me here, no matter how much you think it’s for my own good . . .