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Julius stared down at her, momentarily at a loss for words. They barely knew one another in truth, but what he had learned of Lily Ridley, he admired with unfeigned sincerity. He drew a slow breath, trying to steady the emotion rattling in his chest. Raising his gaze to Brendan, he licked dry lips, forcing himself to imagine with grim precision what might have happened.

The baroness was so small she could have been lifted like a parcel and spirited away before anyone noticed. It chilled him to consider it. He was grateful beyond measure for her indomitable spirit … and her powerful lungs. Years of unrepentant chattering had turned out to be her greatest asset today.

“This is … this is … this has gone too far!” The words burst from him, voice cracking with fury. Normally, he would have smoothed the raw edge from his tone, adopted a languid slouch in his chair, given the impression of careless amusement.

But it has! His thoughts seethed as he fought to master them. This has gone too far!

Brendan nodded heavily, the lines at the corners of his eyes deepening with weariness. “I agree, but there is little to be done about it. We have to press on.”

Julius let go of the baroness’s small hand and began to pace across the drawing room floor, the thick carpet muffling his footfalls. His mind whirled with frustration. The draped curtains trembled with a faint breeze from the window cracked for air, but the room still felt stiflingly close.

“Our investigations are moving far too slowly! There has to be some method of shaking this loose. We know the killer is watching the house.”

Brendan cocked his head, worry tightening his mouth. “Well … it is more accurate to state that we know his men are watching the house.”

“What of Smythe?” Julius snapped, pausing in mid-stride to glare.

“Abbott is following him. He hopes to learn something soon.”

Julius snorted, though the tension did not ease from his shoulders. Abbott, the baroness’s brother, had since married the young lady he had so thoroughly compromised on the night of the ball, a situation that had resulted in an absurd tutoring session from Julius himself on Abbott’s wedding day.

Their plodding progress had reduced their list of six suspects to four. And now Smythe, of all people, was Abbott’s father-in-law.

“Yet, we still have another three men on the list, and I cannot learn anything new,” Julius said with suppressed fury, resuming his pacing. The sunlight streaming through the windows picked out the gilt embroidery on his waistcoat, gleaming like threads of fire as he moved. “I have gathered information, followed them about Town, and nothing! They attend their meetings, ride in Hyde Park, drink their brandy at Brooks’s, as though nothing has happened. A peer has been killed, his heir accused of murder, his bride attacked … and they go on as if it were of no account!”

He yanked a glove off with his teeth and shoved it impatiently into his pocket before twisting the signet ring on his finger, the metal cool and hard against his skin.

“There must be more that we can do! Something to draw the killer out! We know he lurks about in the shadows! What we must to do is drive him”—he gestured sharply, voice rising—“drive him into making a mistake!”

Julius’s mind flitted to Abbott’s dour expression. He prayed that Smythe was innocent. Otherwise Abbott would be forced to watch his own father-in-law stand trial for murder, a prospect that turned Julius’s stomach. It was part of why he devoted so many hours trying to eliminate the others from suspicion.

Lady Filminster had reseated herself with composure, smoothing her skirts over her knees. She regarded Julius with solemn curiosity, candlelight catching in the soft sheen of her hair.

“How do you propose to do that?”

Julius paused, turning to stare out the high windows beyond her, where the rooftops of London stretched into a pale, hazy afternoon sky. The breath in his lungs felt tight. If anything happened to Brendan, or to the baroness, he would never forgive himself.

“I do not know,” he admitted at last, voice dropping to a growl. “But I shall think of something.”

Brendan cleared his throat, the sound rough with emotion. “Thank you … for all you are doing to assist us.”

Julius nodded curtly, but his eyes remained fixed on the window, brow furrowed in thought. His mind already churned with possibilities, each one more reckless than the last.

“It is nothing.”

He left Ridley House soon after that, a glimmer of an idea beginning to form, but he did not think the others would agree. It was a plan he would need to execute by himself, which was for the best. He worked better alone.

It was early evening, the glow of the setting sun catching on the high-paned windows and flooding the library with pale gold. Audrey sat tucked into a deep leather wing chair, the brass reading lamp casting a warm pool of light onto the page before her.

Flapper, her wounded starling, was on the mend at last. Though that comforted her, it also left her, yet again, with nothing to occupy her restless attentions. She had been attempting to read a fusty old volume on human physiology, its cracked spine exhaling puffs of musty scent each time she turned a page.

She was making notes in her tidy script when a discreet cough interrupted her.

“Miss Gideon?”

Audrey looked up from her notes, startled. The footman stood just inside the door, posture impeccable in his dark livery, his white gloves folded behind his back.

“Yes, Howard?”