"I do not know anything. I only know that I love my sister and she is the most brave and daring woman!" Lizzie flung her hands up into the air, tears trickling down her cheeks. Adam rushed to her side, slipping his arm around her. "She never said a word to me about meeting someone, or falling in love. There was a time when she was trying very hard to convince herself that Harold was right for her, but a few days ago she gave that up. She was terrified of marrying him-of marrying anyone, truthfully. She did not want to wed!"

"Annabel did not want to marry," Melissa agreed. "Not ever."

"Well. This is quite interesting. A very unusual woman, hmm?" Thompson had pulled out his notebook and made a short, decisive note. He slipped it back into an interior breast pocket. "Miss Boothe. Was your sister capable of falling in love with a complete stranger and running away with him?"

Lizzie stared. Her hand slipped into Adam's.

"Miss Boothe? I am not asking you if she did such a thing. I am asking you if she was capable of such recklessness."

Lizzie remained mute. She glanced fearfully at Adam. "You need not answer," he said, but his own expression was strained.

"Oh, pshaw," Melissa said, waving one slim hand and standing. Her pale, cream-colored chiffon gown fell in rippling folds about her. "Not only does everyone in this room know that Annabel was indeed capable of just that, so do all our friends. Her character, such as it is, is hardly a secret!"

Thompson looked around him, taking in everyone's expression, and he nodded. He folded his thick arms across his chest. "Well."

Boothe rubbed his temples, standing. "If Annabel was seduced by Braxton, it is not her fault. I was seduced by him, by God. The man is charming and clever. I truly believed him to be who and what he said he was." He flushed again. "I want him behind bars!"

"He is a professional, that is obvious, and I am certain that in no time we will have a dozen or two possible makes on him. We have already sent a telegram to Scotland Yard. Have no fear, Mr. Boothe. Even if your daughter was an accomplice to this crime, a crime has been committed, and it is my duty to solve it and apprehend the perpetrators. And I shall do just that." Boothe nodded with satisfaction. "I shall notify you the moment they are found. And in the interim, do not be surprised if I return to ask further questions."

"Wait." Boothe stopped him just before he could walk out of the library door. "I wish to offer a reward for the return of my daughter. Post it immediately. Fifty thousand dollars."

Thompson's eyes widened. "Very well. I will post it- but for her return alive, Mr. Boothe. I am sure you would not want it any other way."

A small cry sounded. Both men turned to watch Lucinda slumping into a faint, her two daughters and sons-in-law rushing to her.

"There's a patrol up ahead."

Annabel sat on the front seat of the carriage beside Braxton, and she had just seen the mounted policeman herself. She froze, her hands gripping the leather seat, her heart sinking like a stone. But Braxton did not stop the carriage. He continued to drive forward at the same steady pace. It was a pace that precisely matched his previous, matter-of-fact tone.

They had been traveling north for about twenty minutes, through the wooded, suburban countryside surrounding Manhattan. Every now and then they had passed a farm or an orchard. Otherwise, homes were interspersed in the wooded countryside. She wasn't quite sure where they were, exactly, but she knew they were all about to be captured. "What are you doing?" she whispered, gripping his arm.

"Relax, Charles," Braxton said with a smile.

She stared at him. When they had left the barn, he bad made her put some dirt on her face and Louie's cap on her head, her long blond hair twisted up beneath it, but she did not think she was going to pass muster as a young man. And what about Braxton? A change of clothes was hardly a disguise! His description, which was hardly average, had to be everywhere and his very upper-crust British accent was a dead giveaway.

He halted the carriage as two policemen came forward on big bay horses. He was smiling at them. Annabel thought her own cheeks were red. She was afraid to breathe.

"I'm going to have to ask you to step out of the carriage, sir," one mounted officer with a big mustache said.

"Afternoon. What's this about, officers?" Braxton asked-in a clipped and nasal Yankee twang.

Annabel realized she was gaping and she shut her mouth.

"Please step down."

"Glad to obey, got all the time in the world," Braxton said, sounding as if he were a native Brahmin of Boston. He stepped lithely out of the carriage.

" Boston, eh?" the officer said, dismounting. His tone had changed, becoming less firm, softer.

"Born and raised, just like my father and his father before him." Braxton was cheerful.

The officer nodded, then glanced at Annabel and Louie. "Who are they?"

"Charlie is a distant cousin. He's an orphan-his grandmother just died. I'm concluding a bit of business in town, stocks, you know, and am bringing him home with me."

"An orphan, eh?" the officer said. He was chewing tobacco now and eyeing Annabel closely.

Annabel was afraid he could see through her absurd disguise, or that he was going to ask her a question directly, and she felt herself turning redder still, but then he looked at Louie. She almost swooned with relief.

Louie, meanwhile, appeared to have fallen asleep in the back seat. Annabel closed her eyes. "My groom," Braxton said.

Annabel jerked, thinking of Harold, certain the thief, damn him, was doing this to her on purpose.

The officer nodded and turned away, mounting. "Sorry to bother you folks. But we're looking for a very clever Englishman and a young woman he has abducted." He tipped his hat. "Seems he also made off with a small fortune in jewels."

Braxton stepped up into the carriage. "Criminals these days," he said with a shake of his head. Annabel felt like killing him. "The nerve! Thank God we have men like you serving citizens like us. Astute and perceptive officers of the law, capable of protecting the innocent and apprehending the guilty."

Annabel looked at him with murder in her eyes.

The policeman smiled. "Have a good day, sir," he said.

Braxton smiled back, lifted the reins, and drove the bay gelding past the barricade. Annabel sat staring stiffly ahead. Her heart continued to beat with frantic insistence. Clop clop clop. The gelding trotted along, taking them farther and farther away from the policemen and the road block. She wanted to look back over her shoulder to see if the two officers had realized their mistake and were now charging after them.

"Do not look back," he said in his usual, aristocratic British accent.

She looked at him. He was smiling. Unruffled, unperturbed-as if this kind of hair-raising narrow escape was an everyday occurrence. "You are not even sweating!" she accused.

" 'E don't sweat," Louie said from the back seat. He glanced at her briefly. "Aren't you supposed to say 'perspiring'?" "You are laughing!"

"You, my dear, are the one perspiring."

Annabel took a deep breath and collapsed against the seat. "I admit to being afraid."

"Why? You had nothing to lose-unlike Louie and myself."

Their gazes had locked. "I told you, I cannot go back. Not yet."

"Yes," he said softly, still holding her regard with his. "You most certainly did."

Annabel felt herself stiffening. She thought about being in his arms, about receiving his kiss. Then she shook herself free of the thought. What was wrong with her? Tonight she would explain everything, and there was not going to be either an embrace or a kiss or, dear God, anything else. But her reputation would be ruined and she could return home, a free woman at last.