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he’d intended later. “Neither did Redditch,” he said dryly.
    His reply brought a quick smile to her lips. It was gone by the time they returned through the gate. A head taller than the butler and twice as wide, Newberry stood at the library door with Prescott. Mina waved the constable into the garden, pointing him toward the body before turning back to Rhys.
    “That is all, then. I’ll be speaking with the staff, knocking on doors and asking whether any of the neighbors saw anything, trying to track down Percival Foley, then examining the body at headquarters. I don’t know how late I’ll be.”
    “I’ll wait up for you,” he said.
    She smiled. Her inspector’s flat stare dropped away for a moment, her gaze softening as she looked up at him. After a long, searching glance that he felt over every inch of his skin, her eyes unfocused and a frown marred her brow.
    “What is it?” Whatever concerned her was a concern for him, too.
    “Anne.”
    “You’re worried about her reasons for staying over again?” Rhys guessed, and when she nodded, he asked, “Do you want me to stop by your parents’ house and bring her home?”
    “Yes.” She closed her eyes, gave a short laugh. “But I don’t know if we should. I’m not her mother. I don’t . . . I don’t know how much I can tell her to do.”
    He’d never known a mother or father, so Rhys was the last person to advise her on this. But he couldn’t deny he felt the same. He’d grown as possessive and as protective of the girl as she had.
    “And at least she’s not on the streets,” Mina said, then shook her head. “But if she was, would she think that a problem? She’s lived years without us and done perfectly well.”
    Right or wrong, he knew his feelings on this. “She might have got along perfectly well without us, but she’s ours now.”
    “You would say that. I was doing perfectly well, too, until you came along.”
    And made her his. “And now you aren’t?”
    “Now I am even better, and the thought of getting along without you tears me apart.” Her hand found his, her gaze holding his just as tight. “But Anne’s not used to having a family. Perhaps she doesn’t know that because we care, because we worry, we need more than a gram that says she’s not coming home.”
    Rhys wouldn’t have known that either, but he was learning. “So I’ll stop by their house and take her home.”
    “No. I don’t want her to feel she’s done something wrong . We’ll speak with her tomorrow.” Her fingers squeezed his. “I must work now.”
    He knew. But because she had not let go of his hand yet, because only Newberry was out there to see, he bent his head and kissed her on that beautiful, incredible mouth. “Be safe.”
    It was as close to an order as he could give her, but more like a prayer.
    “I will.”
    Her promise had to be enough, because lurking over her would only drive her away. So he forced himself to walk away, past the blushing constable, and leave Mina to her work.

Chapter 3
    No one whom Mina and Newberry spoke with saw anything. The giant wheel rolling out of a rich man’s garden, through an alley, and down a well-lit street might as well have been invisible. Mina was not surprised. Everything in this city might as well have been invisible. Everyone was afraid that, eventually, something they said might come back and harm them—especially if it were about something they didn’t understand to begin with.
    But as she and Newberry walked the neighborhood, and not one claimed to have seen it, Mina began to wonder whether there had been nothing to see. Perhaps the wheel had rolled to a nearby home or into the back of a lorry. If someone had opened the gate for the wheel, it was possible that someone had also been waiting to help it quickly escape.
    Wherever the wheel had gone, they were not making any progress finding it near Portman Square. She’d return in the morning with Newberry and knock on more doors, make another