They’d grown up working on and around coffee plantations, and therefore tea was apparently not allowed in their household. They’d arrived in London to improve their situation, and now Sarah’s father was the owner of an import company that did a respectable business bringing goods, including coffee, in from the Caribbean. But since Sarah’s parents were speaking to Sarah as little as Della’s parents were speaking to Della, there was no possibility of obtaining coffee.

Like Della, Sarah had found an unsuitable man to fall in love with. Unlike Della, she had married him, at which time her family had disowned her.

Della nodded. “Fair point. I’m delighted that you are feeling well enough to argue national beverages with me. Stay here with the girls, and I will go hunt down the griffin viscount and see what he might know about Mr. Wattings.”

“Thank you,” Sarah replied. She stretched her hand out to touch Della’s arm. “Thank you,” she repeated in a more emotional tone.

Della’s throat tightened, and she nodded and rose, smoothing her skirts. She paused at the door, looking back at Sarah, who was watching her go. A pang of hope skewered her heart, and she felt her chest constrict. If she could discover Mr. Wattings’s fate—no matter what it was—Sarah would rest easier. Her friend had suffered so much from not knowing what had happened to her beloved husband. And Della, even though she was a scandalous disgrace, was still a duke’s daughter who could get answers where a woman of Caribbean descent, like Sarah, could not.

She just had to be able to ask questions.

Chapter 2

“I know he is here. I demand you bring him out and release him.”

Griffith opened his eyes slowly, staring up at the ceiling of his cell as he figured out where he was.

Swirls of dirt above him, a small filthy window too high for anybody who wasn’t Griffith’s size to see through, and marks on the wall.

Right. Naval prison, with charges still to be specified. He wondered if Clark had woken up and wondered where he’d gone. Or just assumed he’d wandered off in search of other pleasures to be found on land.

“He is the Viscount Stanbury. You cannot hold him.”

Griffith frowned, swinging his legs over to the floor as he sat up on the bed. The bed was surprisingly comfortable, but that could be because he’d been sleeping in a hammock recently. Other ship captains demanded the captain’s berth—hence its name after all—but some of the men had come down with dysentery, and Griffith had insisted the sickest one rest in his cabin.

“Viscount what?” a disgruntled voice replied. “He didn’t mention any of that when we brought him in last night. Are you sure it’s the same one?”

“Captain Griffith Davies, correct?” the first voice said.