Authors: Sherry Thomas

The Luckiest Lady In London (26 page)

Miss Chase listened with wide eyes. Benedict Atwood abandoned his lunch entirely. Dr. Rigby was discomfited by Mrs. Chase’s enthusiasm in the telling. Mrs. Reynolds looked outright troubled—so Catherine was not the only one to suspect that there might have been a sexual liaison involved.

Lin’s appearance during the storm had been a shock. But Da-ren had warned her before she departed that news of the jade panes had reached ears other than his own. The Dowager Empress herself wanted the treasure; she would dispatch an agent of her own.

Mrs. Chase was now vividly re-creating the night of the storm off the coast of Portugal. The Atlantic that had the ship in its hungry maw. The hapless vessel, pitching and bobbing like a piece of refuse at high tide. The intruder in her cabin, subduing her, hauling her outside to set her on the railing
above the roiling black waters, tormenting her with visions of her own death.

She ended with a coy, “Then I knew no more.”

“But what happened?” Miss Chase and Benedict Atwood cried in unison.

“Miss Blade saved us,” said Mrs. Reynolds quietly. “I couldn’t. But she ventured out into the storm and brought back my sister. And when the man almost beat down the door, Miss Blade saved us once again.”

“Was the man brought to justice?” asked Benedict Atwood.

All eyes were now on Catherine. She shook her head. “He fell overboard.”

“That’s justice enough for me,” said Mrs. Reynolds.

“Hear, hear,” said Benedict Atwood.

“And were
you
all right, Miss Blade?” asked Miss Chase. She had one hand over her heart, the other laid over Leighton Atwood’s sleeve.

He had been gazing into his goblet, but he looked at Catherine now. Pain suffused her, pain complicated with a twist of pleasure, like a drop of blood whirling and expanding in a glass of water.

“I was fine. Mrs. Reynolds was the one who suffered injuries.”

When Mrs. Reynolds had satisfied everyone that despite the bandages under her turban, she was quite all right, Benedict Atwood turned to Catherine. “But to single-handedly fight off a villain, Miss Blade, how did you manage it?”

“I had the advantage of surprise on my side,” Catherine replied modestly, “a great deal of luck, and the experience of taking a pot to a miscreant’s head once in a while.”

“My goodness, Miss Blade,” Benedict Atwood laughed. “Do remind me to remain in your good grace at all cost.”

Leighton Atwood’s lips curled in an ironic smile. “Yes, indeed. Do remind us.”