Georgie didn’t take her eyes away from her cousin, but her words were for the man who strolled forward until he stopped a few feet from her side. “Good evening, Mr. Wylde. Thank you for your assistance, but I have this under control.”

“I can see that,” he said amiably. “I’m just providing a little backup in case this gentleman decides to chance his arm.” He gave Josiah a slight, mocking bow that was a perfect insult. “I don’t believe we’ve met. Benedict Wylde. Late of the Rifles. I’m a sight better with pistols than I am with a sword, but I’m quite willing to use this on you if you don’t back away. Right. Now.”

Josiah curled his lip but did as he was ordered. “We’ll talk again, Cousin,” he promised Georgie darkly, then turned and stalked away.

Georgie noted his limping stride with no small degree of satisfaction. When she was certain he’d gone, she released the tension in her shoulders and let the hand holding the knife fall to her skirts. She turned to Wylde with a slow exhale of relief.

“Well, that was—”

“A stupid bloody thing to do?” he supplied. “What in hell’s name was that?”

He glanced around the shadowed clearing with a frown, as if scanning for further danger. “Good God, woman! Where did you learn a trick like that? And what are you doing, carrying a knife in your boot?”

“Pieter showed me how to handle myself,” she said, secretly amazed that her voice didn’t wobble. Now that the danger was past, her hands were shaking and she felt decidedly nauseous. Relief that Wylde had come to her aid was slowly giving way to embarrassment that he’d seen her in such an awful position, and consternation at how close she’d come to disaster.

Her own blood relative had assaulted her. What had Josiah been thinking? And how foolish was she, to have underestimated the depths of his resentment? She smoothed the front of her skirts and tried to calm the frantic pounding of her heart.

“I think it shows a great deal of common sense. I regularly visit my ships and warehouses at Blackwall. I don’t know if you’re acquainted with the dockside wharves, Mr. Wylde, but they aren’t the most salubrious of neighborhoods. One cannot be too careful.”

Wylde sheathed his sword inside the walking cane with a practiced swish and glared at her. “What are you doing out here? We were supposed to meet at the rotunda.”

“What are you doing?” she countered. “Lurking about in the bushes?”

“I was meeting an informant. Where’s your man Pieter?”

“It’s his day off. He goes to spend it with his sister in Bloomsbury.”

“You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

Georgie tilted her blade. “I’m not exactly defenseless.”