A Wicked Conceit by Anna Huber (best young adult book series txt) 📗

“Please,” I finally squeaked. “Please, don’t leave us down here.”

But even as I begged, the door slammed shut, and a bar dropped into place, locking us inside.

I trembled, perilously close to dissolving into hysterics. It was all I could do simply to breathe and keep my legs beneath me. Especially when I realized the item he had thrown onto the floor was my reticule with my pistol tucked inside.

Tiny spots formed in my vision, and I closed my eyes, telling myself to focus. But they quickly popped open again at the recognition that the lantern would not last forever, and I would be facing the darkness soon enough.

Ignoring my bag, I turned slowly to examine the contents of the room, of which there were few. Nothing but a broken bottle, a few sticks, and a dented horseshoe. The stone was etched with crude drawings, but nothing of help. Perhaps I would be etching my own words into the stone soon—my name and Gage’s, and that of our unborn child.

I grimaced as another contraction swept through me. I hadn’t any concept of time, but they still seemed far enough apart, and the pain was not much greater than a discomfort. However, I no longer denied the truth. I was in labor, and the pain would only get worse. And soon.

I studied the construction of the door, finding it sturdier than I’d hoped. Glancing down at the light flickering inside the lantern, I considered attempting to set the door ablaze. But I worried the wood was too damp to catch fire, or that it might suffocate us before we could ever escape.

The sound of a groan behind me pulled me from my musings, and I hurried over to kneel beside Gage. Lifting his head into my lap again, I did my best to brush aside the dirt and debris that had caught in his blood-matted hair and smeared across his face. When he blinked open his eyes, it was all I could do not to sob in relief. “Sebastian. Darling,” I croaked, gently stroking his face.

He stared up at me as if struggling to focus. “Kiera?”

I nodded, dashing the wetness from my eyes.

He flinched, lifting a hand toward his hair. “My head . . .” He inhaled a sharp breath through his teeth. “What . . . ?” Then his eyes opened wider as he peered around him. “Where are we?”

“The vaults.”

He struggled to sit upright with my assistance, his face blanching in pain.

“McQueen’s men ambushed us outside Heron’s rooms. They hit you over the head and brought us here and locked us in.”

He glanced at the door.

“I’m sorry. They took my pistol and . . .” I pressed a hand to my neck, now devoid of my mother’s pendant, and then shook my head, for it was of no consequence at the moment.

Gage reached into his greatcoat pockets, finding them as empty as I had.

I swallowed, eyeing my reticule like a snake coiled to strike. “Though they’ve since given it back.”

His face registered the meaning of this gesture with the same revulsion and horror I had felt.

“They threatened to harm the baby if I screamed or fought. I didn’t know what to do,” I told him, distress seeping into my voice. “I-I’m sorry.”

“Shhh,” he murmured, pulling me into his arms. “Hush, now. There’s no cause to blame yourself. You were protecting our child, and I was unconscious.” He heaved a sigh, pressing my head to his heart, where I could hear it beating steadily through his linen shirt. “Joe will have alerted someone by now,” Gage told me, displaying faith in our coachman. “They will be looking for us.”

“Yes, but they’ve no idea where we’ve been taken. And we’re so deep inside the vaults. How will they ever find us?”

“They will,” he said with a greater confidence than I felt. “You’ll see.”

I could only cling to him and pray.

•   •   •

Three hours later—a passage of time I could only tell because I’d asked Gage to let me hold his pocket watch—our lantern was running low on oil, and I could no longer pretend my labor wasn’t steadily progressing. While Gage had prowled around the room, searching for some way to contrive our escape, I had been praying. Bargaining with God, really. Begging him to make the labor stop, to calm the child inside me for just a little while longer. But this, it appeared, was denied, and nature would have its way.

That Gage had not yet noticed my discomfort when the contractions struck I credited to his preoccupation with our situation and determination to rescue us from an unescapable situation. Even now he was examining the door for approximately the sixth time, as if its construction and mechanics had somehow changed. Meanwhile, I continued to shift positions—standing, sitting, slouching, walking—trying to find the most comfortable stance in which to endure. I kept taking my pelisse off and then putting it back on, alternating between hot and cold, sweating and shivering.

Eventually, I could remain silent no longer. “Gage.”

When he didn’t turn but continued to examine the door, I tried again.

“Gage, could you come over here?”

“If only we could contrive a lever of some kind,” he ruminated aloud, giving no indication he’d even heard me.

“Sebastian,” I groused, finally capturing his attention as he pivoted to look at me. “Could you please come here?”

He crossed the room, studying my face in the flickering light. His eyes dipped to the lantern before he knelt to examine it. “You’re right. It will be out of oil soon,” he said, answering a question I hadn’t asked.

“I know. But we also have another problem.” I turned his watch toward him, but before I could speak, another contraction swept up through my lower back and around to the front.

This time Gage recognized that I was in pain and reached for me in alarm. “Kiera?”

“It’s a contraction,” I bit out between clenched teeth. “They’re coming faster now . . . and more intense.”

His eyes widened in apparent fear, but then he sank down next to