The Wayward One (The De Montforte Brothers Book 5) by Danelle Harmon Page B

since she’d gone missing after the demonstration last night.
    He took a long, bracing swallow of his drink.
    “Roddy O’ Devir,” he began, staring down into his glass. “Press-ganged by the Royal Navy back in ’62 from his native home in Connacht.” Christian pursed his lips. Did it matter that he himself had been the young lieutenant who’d led that press gang? “Disappeared in the Service for thirteen years, but managed to jump ship sometime before things got hot in Boston and set himself up as a successful smuggler calling himself the Irish Pirate. Got in tight with Adams, Warren and Hancock, and they had him smuggling arms into the Boston area. He was a local hero. A dangerous complication. I was sent to apprehend him by my brother Elliott, and did so under the command of Sir Geoffrey Lloyd.”
    The duke leveled his inscrutable black stare on him. “So there is good reason to believe he hates the Royal Navy, if not the English.”
    “He was press-ganged. His father was long dead, and that left his sister and mother to fend for themselves. Yes, he most certainly harbored a good deal of resentment toward us and that’s putting it mildly.”
    The duke gave a barely imperceptible nod, his hooded gaze intent. Hard. Penetrating. Christian noticed that he had not touched his drink.
    “He was a thorn in our side. The last thing General Gage in Boston needed was an armed populace, and O’ Devir was supplying them with not only arms, but food, supplies, everything that couldn’t be brought in through the closed port of Boston. He was making a laughingstock out of the Royal Navy. Someone figured I could get the job done.”
    “And did you?”
    “Yes.” But not without cost. “I did.”
    “Why wasn’t he hanged?”
    Christian swirled his drink. He would not disclose the truth, even to the duke. “He escaped. Went back to Ireland with his sister and that was the last I saw of him until he showed up here last week.”
    “Why was he not apprehended then?”
    Christian leveled his own gaze on the duke. “He is my wife’s brother. And I deemed him quite harmless.”
    “He’s still a traitor to his king.”
    Christian just took another sip of his brandy.
    The duke was persistent. “What was he doing in Ireland all this time? And was he even in Ireland?”
    “Damned if I know. He had a cottage near the sea. A small farm. I assume he was tending to it, trying to eke a living out of it. His father was a fisherman. Perhaps he was doing that. Once I went back and claimed Deirdre, I didn’t really know or care what happened to him.”
    “And you haven’t heard from him since?”
    “Not until he showed up here last week saying he wanted to met my son. Colin is his nephew. I didn’t think it all that unusual.” Christian shook his head. “Roddy O’ Devir is many things, Your Grace, but he’s not someone who would ever harm a woman, and I can’t think of a single reason why he’d have an interest in your sister. There’s no motive for him to abduct her. And yet….”
    Blackheath’s penetrating black stare was on him. “What?”
    “I sent him off before your brother demonstrated the explosive. He had no business being there—the explosive was secret, something that the fewer people outside the Navy knew about, the better. Besides, there was a chance, albeit slim, that one of the officers in attendance that night might’ve recognized him and dragged him right back into the Navy or worse, managed to get him hanged. He was a deserter. For his own good and the continuing happiness of my wife, he was best not being there. I asked him to leave, and he did.”
    “And where was my sister during this time?”
    “Lord Andrew was concerned for her well-being in case the explosive proved unstable or fiercer than he expected it to be, so he sent her back into the house.”
    “And O’ Devir was gone by then?”
    “I saw him leave.”
    “And is there anyone here in London whom he might know, anyone with whom he