Page 62 of The Housebreaker's Assistant
Penny was right. They had to keep moving. But there weren’t many safe ways to do that. Particularly not when Lord Fabian began to writhe and struggle against Greer’s back.
“Let me go,” the delirious young man groaned. “Please. I don’t want to do this anymore.”
Greer swore under his breath as he followed Penny out of the trough of the moat and across to a dune that marked the edge of the beach. As much as he wanted to stay low and keep to the shadows, Lord Fabian’s struggles had him swaying and stumbling with every step he tried to take.
“Calm down,” Greer ordered the lad.
That only made things worse. Lord Fabian cried and thrashed harder, tearing at Greer’s hair.
Greer had no choice but to throw himself face down into the grass, particularly as someone with a torch was coming nearer.
“Get off of me!” Lord Fabian cried feebly. “Let me go.”
“It’s alright, my lord,” Penny did his best to soothe the man, scrambling closer. “I’ve got you.”
“What are you doing?” Greer hissed as he felt the sheets strapping Lord Fabian to him loosen.
“He’s not going to let you carry him anymore,” Penny pointed out.
It was true, but feeling the young man separated from him had Greer’s stomach roiling with panic.
They needed to leave Lord Fabian behind so they could save themselves. The unfortunate man was crazed and desperate. He tried to fight Penny even as Penny worked to free him. With searchers coming ever closer to them, some of them possibly armed, the only way he and Penny would make it out of Cornwall alive was if they abandoned Lord Fabian.
But they couldn’t do that. Greer refused to be that man who left a victim to his fate. If only someone had helped him, helped his mother, when they fled from his violent father, his mother and sister might still be alive today.
He didn’t want to die, but he wouldn’t be the agent of someone else’s death either.
“I’ve got you,” Penny said in a breathless attempt at soothing as Lord Fabian’s weight left Greer’s body entirely. “You’re alright, but we have to run now. Can you stand?”
Greer didn’t hear the man’s answer. He pushed himself to his feet, shoving aside the blanket that had been used to tie Lord Fabian to him. He felt Penny and Lord Fabian rise by his side, and he quickly searched this way and that for their means to escape as the moon finally peeked out from behind its cloud.
“Stop right there!” a young voice called from closer to the castle.
Greer whipped around to find one of Trebarral’s footmen, lantern in hand, staring at them with wide eyes.
“Please,” Lord Fabian wept, leaning heavily against Penny.
Greer didn’t think, he just acted.
“This man has been a prisoner in your tower,” he told the footman. “Look at the condition of him. Did you realize your home has been a jail?”
“I—” The footman gaped at Lord Fabian, then glanced back to Greer, panic in his eyes.
“Dalhurst is an evil man,” Greer went on. “He and his friend. They capture, abuse, and sell young men. If you have any shred of humanity within you, you’ll run for the police and have them tear this whole place down.”
“But how can?—”
“You must let us escape,” Greer cut the man off. “Please. We need to get this man to safety. You must distract Dalhurst while we flee.”
“I cannot?—”
Greer turned away from the man and marched for the dune. Penny had been clever enough to drag Lord Fabian in that direction while he’d been addressing the footman. Once he saw that Greer was following, Penny broke into a run, mounting the crest of the dune, then rushing down the other side.
They were so close. All they had to do was make it to the boat and they could row their way to safety. Even if Dalhurst or the others saw them then, there was still a chance they could make it far enough out to sea that no one would see which way they went in the night. Everything depended on reaching the boat.
Which was why Greer fumbled his way across the sand and stopped dead when he saw Dalhurst already standing beside the boat, a gun in his hand that was pointed at Penny and Lord Fabian, who sagged against him.
“You’re not going anywhere,” Dalhurst said, breathless and spiteful. “I’ll take back what is mine and make you rue the day you tried to cross me.”
