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“Dau he needed at present “Miss Trimble, I haven’t time to—”

The wo his ar dreadful has happened to Miss Vale So utterly dreadful” She lowered her voice “I fear someone kidnapped her”

Kidnapped?

Shock rendered him speechless

Sheer terror gripped his insides and squeezed

“She clih from the pained look on her face, I suspect she was ” Miss Trimble could barely catch her breath “I co in the square and followed as far as Drury Lane, but that’s where I lost her”

“Drury Lane?” Clement’s Lane was but one street away Bloody Layton! “Did you see who occupied the vehicle?” How he forued by panic, he would never know

Miss Tri into people’s affairs, but every instinct tellsis terribly amiss”

“When was this?”

The lady glanced at the longcase clock in the lobby “Thirty o I have only just returned”

With no tirabbed Miss Trimble’s hand and placed a kiss on her knuckles “Thank you I think I knohere Miss Vale is,” he said, trying to sound optimistic, “and will send her to see you upon our return”

Without further ado, he dashed back to the hackney and barked instructions to take them to Clement’s Lane

“Cleh frowned “You think Layton or Bradley went there?” Surprise flashed in his eyes when Lawrence slammed the door, and the hackney jerked forward “Where is Miss Vale?” His grave tone echoed Wycliff’s heavy frown and Lawrence’s own crippling trepidation

He recounted his brief conversation with Miss Trimble “I have every reason to believe Layton or Bradley lured her into the carriage” The heavy weight of inadequacy hung in his chest He should never have left her

What good is the useless bastard?