Chapter 17

“Nessa? Damn your eyes.” Harry recognized her by the subtle scent of primrose, and the long lithe line of her body pressed tight against his. He instantly released his hand from her mouth, but didn’t let go. “Tell me you’re not up to your pretty neck in this business.”

“Only to my ankles. I followed Cods,” Nessa told him in an urgent whisper.

Her father’s henchman. Harry had let him slip past.

“He’s the one,” she insisted. “He’s the one in charge, making my father and everyone from the fisherfolk to Squire Gannett do his bidding. He signaled to someone offshore from the belfry but we couldn’t see if anyone answered. That’s why I followed him—to see who he meets.”

“We?”

“Tressa and I. I sent her for your friend—Captain Kent.”

“Excellent.” Harry breathed a trifle easier—Kent knew his suspicions and would have put to sea immediately to track whatever ship—or ships—were approaching. Devil take them if there were more than one ship. And damn them all to hell if it were the invasion.

Harry had to do everything in his power to stop them and he had to do it now. He had to destroy the munitions before Coddington and the French could reach them.

But the gunpowder would turn the whole of the cavern into a bomb that would blow out every passage, snuffing out the air, and likely igniting a secondary explosion of the flammable brandy.

Every instinct in his body, every ounce of his experience at war, told him there would be no escape. “Go back now.” He pushed her toward the stair. “Go as fast as you can to the top and get clear of the entrance.” He would wait as long as he could—

“It’s locked at the top—you couldn’t get out.” She wasn’t budging. “But why? What are you planning to do?”

“The place is full to the rafters with munitions—materiel for Napoleon’s army to use when they invade England. I’m going to blow it all up.”

“But how are you going to get out?” she demanded. “The staircase will act like a chimney.”

“I’m certain it connects to Black Cove,” he assured her. It would be a close run thing no matter how he did it, to outrun the explosion with his leg. But he knew his duty and the ramifications of his decisions better than most men—he knew what it was to have the fate of men in his hands, including his own.

He would do what needed to be done, no matter the cost.

“No.” She was newly adamant, all trace of hesitation and awkward, stammering shyness gone. “I won’t leave you to do it alone. I’ll light the fire after you’ve already started for the mouth of the cave. It will be a long run to Black Cove and I’m faster.”

She always had been. This was the girl he had known, the girl who had raced him across the shifting sands. And won.

Her logic was as unassailable as her surety. God, he loved her.

“Bring me a keg of that powder.” He un-shuttered the lantern and pointed the beam at the kegs of gunpowder. “Carefully, while I—”

But she was already streaking across the cave to do his bidding.

Harry shoved the opened gun crate closer to the larger stack, and then broke open a second crate with his cane, gathered up the straw and piled it loosely like tinder. When Nessa returned with the cask, he flung it hard against the floor to bash it open and spread the black powder along the floor to help the flames find their way to the rest of the casks, giving them less time to escape, but assuring the cache’s destruction.

Nessa had already taken up the lantern, all capable understanding. “I’ll light the straw first and make sure it catches, then I’ll come straight away.”

“Aye.” He wanted to give her some further instruction, to provide some greater caution. To prolong the moment as long as possible. But there was nothing left to do and only the briefest of instruction left to say. “Mind your skirts.”

“I will,” she assured him with quiet confidence. “I know what to do.”

“Count to twenty and then light it.” And then he took her face in his hands and kissed her.

Harry kissed her with a hunger that took the breath from her. He kissed her hard, with force and need and that fierce tenderness, as if he wanted to press his will upon her, but knew better.

And then he was gone, moving unevenly for the passage.

Nessa opened the lantern’s shutters and trained the wide beam on the dark tunnel to light his way. Twenty, nineteen, eighteen.

She took a moment to tie up her skirts and petticoats as best she could. Fifteen, fourteen.

She shifted the lantern slightly, tracing the path, making sure the way was clear. Ten.

Her heart was beating in her ears. Nine. Her breath was beginning to pump in and out of her chest. Eight.

She had to take the candle out of the lantern and then put it back before she ran or she wouldn’t be able to see where she was going. Six. The wax spilled on her shaking fingers. Five. Her other hand gripped the lantern ring convulsively. Four.

She crouched down next to the pile and lowered the candle flame. Three, two, one.

The first tongue of flame curled sweetly into the straw and then began to lick the wood of the crates. Nessa shoved the candle back into place, burning her fingertips. The candle stub slotted into its well on the second try and she slammed the glass shut and ran for all she was worth.

Her shoes were slick on the stone floor and she skidded, scraping against the wall as she careered into the passage. She ran so fast she felt as if she would outrun the spill of light from the lantern. She ran so hard her steps echoed down the tunnel so loudly she didn’t hear Harry until she was upon him.

“Go!” he shouted and pushed her in front of him, as if he could somehow shield her with his body. “Go.”

She needed no further encouragement. She clutched his hand in hers, and put her head down to race for the end of the passage, for once thankful of her long legs that ate up the yards.

Behind them, she heard the fire beginning to roar and smelled the smoke billowing down the passage after them. On they ran, with their eyes watering, their lungs burning, and their legs aching.

They ran until the way to Black Cove was barred by an iron gate.

Nessa slammed her hands against it, rattling the lock. “It’s bolted!”

Harry was already beside her, laying his shoulder into it hard. But though it rattled, the lock held. “My stick.” He levered his cane into the small gap and worked it furiously, making the bars creak with strain. “If only I could get at it from the other side and work the hinges—”

These bars were newer and tighter than the gate of the mausoleum above, but Nessa squeezed herself between them, sucking in her breath, angling her head and pressing with all her might, until the pain nearly stopped her. Until Harry laid his hand to her shoulder and unceremoniously shoved her through.

“Go,” he ordered again.

She didn’t even bother to argue. Instead, she pulled his cane through the bars and went for the lock from a different angle.

“There,” he encouraged, never looking behind his back where an eerie orange glow was lighting up the passage. Where at any moment the gunpowder was going to explode. “Lever it upwards.”

She did so, working frantically with little result, until she saw the hinge lift slightly. She repositioned the cane to better force the gate up and off the top hinge. And then she was jumping out of the way as Harry kicked the gate the rest of the way down.

She barely had time to catch her breath before he had taken her hand in a tight, tenacious grip, pulling her after him, running as fast as their legs would carry them down the rows and rows of barrels and wine tuns, toward the mouth of Black Cave. Everything around them was flammable and more likely to fan the flames of the fire than quench them.

She ran like hell was going to ignite behind her.

Until hell was in front of her—Cods blocked the way, standing on the pier-like scaffolding atop the deep tide pool, brandishing a pistol.

Nessa felt her steps falter and her heart give out.

She was going to die. One way or another. She was going to die before she could ever tell Harry that she loved him, that she had always loved him, and that she was his one and only true love.

She knew it by the rending pain in her chest that was her heart well and truly breaking.

And by the hellish blast of the inferno bearing down upon them.

But Harry was perhaps not so prepared to die. For he never stopped, never slowed. He but wrapped his arms tightly around her and sailed her straight past Cod’s gun and plunged them headlong into the dark salt sea.