by Merry Farmer
He fumbled for the pouch on his belt, not bothering with its tight fastenings. He ripped the already damaged cloth with all his strength, spilling the bread and sausage. It wasn’t much—it was a pitiful offering, really—but it felt as though he were offering every ounce of pain in his heart, every shattered dream from his childhood, and every moment he’d wasted in fear to Leo.
“I’m sorry,” he sobbed, seeing too much of himself in the lion. “It wasn’t your fault. It was never your fault. You didn’t deserve this life.”
Leo lifted his head slightly, nostrils flaring. Patrick met the lion’s eyes, wishing there were a better way to tell the beast everything would end happily for him, then threw the sausage to the far end of the pit.
It was like throwing a tiny pebble into the ocean, but it was enough. Leo followed the sausage with his eyes, then leapt after it. It was hardly even a bite for him, but it gave Patrick just enough time to twist toward Everett, grab his hand, and lunge up the side of the pit with all the strength he possessed.
Between his efforts and Everett’s, Patrick made it far enough to hook his leg over the top of the pit. Leo had devoured the sausage by then and saw his last chance slipping away. He roared and lunged forward, swiping his razor-sharp claws at Patrick just as he hoisted his second leg over the pit’s edge. The blow came so close that Patrick felt his trousers ruffle.
As soon as he was out of Leo’s reach, he and Everett crawled frantically backwards, clinging to each other and panting as though they hadn’t drawn breath for days. Every bruise Patrick had earned in the last few, harrowing minutes ached as if he’d just received it. His muscles turned to jelly, and for a moment, he couldn’t hold himself up. He flopped to his back, squeezing his eyes shut and clutching Everett’s arm as though his life depended on it.
Everett wasn’t in any better shape. He groaned as he pressed himself against Patrick’s side, but it was more a groan of relief than of pain. Below them, Leo roared in fury. Continued scraping sounds indicated he was trying to get out of the pit.
“We should….” Everett panted, struggling to sit. “We should fetch one of the rifles and put the poor creature out of its misery.”
“No.” Patrick shook his head hard, wrenching himself to a sitting position. “No, if there’s any way at all to save him and to take him to a better home, he deserves to be saved.”
Everett winced, but he didn’t protest. He nodded, then surged into Patrick, kissing him for all he was worth.
It was a desperate, filthy kiss. Both of them were covered in dirt and blood, but Patrick didn’t mind. He needed to feel Everett against him, to know that they’d made it through the worst of it, and that they would be all right. The only thing that stopped him from pushing Everett to his back in the grass and kissing him like a madman was a commotion from the side of the house.
Patrick pushed himself to stand, though every part of him hurt. He raised a hand to his forehead as he looked to the house, finding Selby waving at them from the office window and shouting. Men in police uniforms surged around the edges of the house. Smoke issued from several windows on that side of the house, but there were no flames.
“He did it.” Patrick let out a heavy breath. “Cristofori managed to send the Leeds police.”
Patrick reached for Everett, helping him to stand as well. Everett leaned heavily against him as they started back to the house.
“Are you well?” he asked, concern rushing in to fill all the places where his fear had lodged just minutes before.
“I will be,” Everett said, managing a smile. “That bastard, Chisolm, cut me before tossing me into the pit. I hit my head when I fell. I didn’t come to until you—” He glanced suddenly around, wincing for a moment, as though the movement were too much. After a short groan, he said, “Where is he? Where is Chisolm? I’ll kill him with my bare hands.”
“He and Castleford fled nearly as soon as I reached the pit.” Disappointment swooped through Patrick’s gut. “We can only hope that Selby or Eastleigh’s driver stopped them from leaving the estate.”
Patrick’s hopes were crushed within ten minutes.
“None of them are anywhere to be found,” Selby informed them once they made it back to the house. “Half the staff has fled with them. At least a dozen small fires had been set throughout the house, but whether through poor planning, haste, or indifference on the part of the staff, they failed to create the sort of conflagration I know my brother would have loved.”
The young, timid maid who had stayed behind and now dabbed at Everett’s face with a wet cloth, attempting to clean his wounds, peeked dolefully up at Patrick. “Lord Castleford knew someone would catch them someday,” she said, her voice barely audible. “He’s had an escape plan in place for years.”
“Do you know what that plan is?” Patrick asked her.
His renewed hopes were dashed when the maid shook her head no. “Only that he planned to burn the whole house down. It’s a bad house to work in, this one,” she said. “Too many secrets.”
She started crying, and nothing anyone could say or do convinced her to stop, even though she kept working diligently on Everett’s face. None of the other servants were willing to speak up either.
“They’re gone, then,” Selby said with a sigh, rubbing a hand over his face. “And it’s all my fault.”
“You didn’t know,” Cristofori—who had returned with the officers from Leeds, as he’d promised—said, attempting to rest a soothing hand on Selby’s shoulder.
Selby shook him off, tensing as though the touch had gone through him like electricity. “It is my fault,” he said, pinched with guilt. “I turned a blind eye for too long. I should have known my brother was the worst sort of—” He pressed his lips shut, shaking his head. “I did nothing. I let everything slide past me without asking questions, without wanting to see it.” He glanced pitifully to Cristofori. “I ignored everything because it was easier for me. I am the worst sort of man imaginable.”
“You’re not—” Cristofori started.
Selby shook his head, holding up a hand as if to ward him off, then turned and ran from the room.
Patrick watched him leave, then shifted his uneasy gaze to Cristofori. Cristofori’s pained look held a lifetime of regret behind it.
As soon as Cristofori noticed Patrick watching him, he let out a defeated breath and shook his head. “I’d go after him, but I don’t think it would do any good. I should head back to Leeds and find a telegraph office to let David and Lionel know what’s happened and that Chisolm, Castleford, and Eastleigh got away.”
“They won’t get very far,” Everett said, in spite of the fact that the color had drained from his face and a knot the size of an egg had appeared on his forehead. Combined with the vicious cut across his face—a cut that would leave a deep scar—it made him look a fright. But as far as Patrick was concerned, he had never looked so appealing.
“There aren’t many places they can go,” Patrick agreed, sinking to sit on the sofa by Everett and the maid’s side. “Besides which, with all the evidence we uncovered here today, everyone across England, and half the continent as well, will be looking for them.”
Everett looked as though he would argue the point for a moment, but he gave up, letting out a breath and taking Patrick’s hand. “In any case,” he said. “Now that this is over, all I want to do is go home.”
Chapter 20
The roar of the crowd that filled the theater to celebrate Everett’s triumphant return to the stage after a fortnight was so deafening that Patrick winced and held a hand to his ear, even though he stood in the wings, out of the direct impact of the applause. Tickets for that evening’s special performance had sold out within minutes of the box office opening. If the rumors were true, resellers were fetching as much as fifty pounds and more for prime seats. All because of a few, whispered rumors that had made their way around London in the past two weeks.
“I wish he’d’ve let me cover up that scar,” Olivia, the
actress who had played opposite Everett in the previous production said as she leaned into Patrick’s side, watching Everett take his bow and blow kisses to his followers. “It’s just so obvious and gruesome under the stage lights.”
Patrick chuckled. “He wants everyone to see it, stitches and all.”
“But he had such a pretty face,” Olivia sighed.
“He still has a pretty face.” Patrick shrugged. More than pretty, in his opinion. Everett was the most gorgeous thing he’d ever seen, scar or no scar. “He’s going to wear that scar as a badge of honor until the day he dies,” he said aloud.
Olivia hummed, grinned, and rested a hand on his arm. “You’re a lucky devil, Patrick Wrexham.” She winked at him before swanning out onto the stage to join Everett in a comedic sketch the two of them had worked out for the return performance.
Old tendrils of anxiety wound their way around Patrick’s stomach, squeezing him until he had a hard time catching his breath. From the moment they had stepped back into the theater after their jaunt to York, Everett had made no secret about what Patrick meant to him. He regaled everyone he could with tales of Patrick’s heroism in saving him from the lion. Patrick could have blushed and stammered his way through that praise without thinking too much about it, but Everett also informed every one of his theater colleagues that Patrick was the love of his life, that he’d moved Patrick into his flat and into his bed, and that he was no longer interested in what he coyly called “private performances”. Patrick had expected hellfire and brimstone to rain down on him at Everett’s careless declaration, but the theater people couldn’t have cared less. Several had congratulated him and sought to bring him into their inner circle by chatting his ear off whenever Everett was otherwise engaged.
It was an odd thing, to have friends. Friends who knew who he was and didn’t care. As Everett and Olivia caused the audience to roar with laughter at the scene they played, Patrick glanced around the backstage area. He knew every stagehand and aspiring actor by name, knew a bit about their lives as well. Rob, the young man with massive forearms who manned the ropes connected to pieces of scenery in the fly space nodded to him with a friendly smile before tugging on a thick rope to change the backdrop. Emma, the costume mistress edged past him with a quick, “Sorry, love,” as she positioned herself for a quick-change Olivia had coming up. The rest of the backstage crew accepted his presence as though he were one of their own.
He was one of them now, ever since returning from York and handing in his resignation to Lord Clerkenwell. He was Officer Wrexham no more. Now he was simply Everett Jewel’s bodyguard to outsiders and Everett Jewel’s lover to those in the know. Best of all, his new position came with living arrangements, enough food for him to never have to worry about going hungry again, and a variety of other benefits that he certainly wasn’t going to discuss with his new friends at the theater, though he suspected most of them knew far more than he did about it.
A smile broke out on his usually stern face at the thought, but it was cut short as the buzz of whispers and soft talking drew his attention to the back of the backstage area. He frowned, sending one last glance out to the action on the stage, then marched away to tell whoever was making the racket to be quiet.
“Did you hear there was another sighting?” Jenny, a young costume woman, asked before Patrick could do more than touch a finger to his lips to get her and the two stagehands gathered around her to settle down.
“Of who?” Patrick asked, his voice a low growl.
“Eastleigh, I think,” Jenny said. “Though it could have been Chisolm. I didn’t have time to stay for the whole story.”
“Where did they spot him?” Harry, one of the stagehands, asked.
“Trying to board a ship in Liverpool,” Jenny said, her eyes wide. Even in the darkness backstage, her features stood out, bright with excitement. “He was trying to escape, to be sure. But they stopped him from going aboard.”
“Did they nab him?” Roger, the other stagehand, asked.
Jenny shook her head. “He got away, yet again.” She blew out a breath. “I tell you what. Those evil nobs certainly are slippery. I think that’s the fourth time in the last fortnight that one or more of them was nearly caught trying to leave the country.”
“I hope all three of them are nabbed, and soon,” Harry said, a growl in his voice. “My bird, Betty’s, cousin’s friend was one of the girls taken by that lot. Right out of the position she had as a maid in some toff’s house in Mayfair.”
“Was she one of the ones they found?” Jenny asked, suddenly full of concern.
“She was, by the grace of God,” Harry said, crossing himself for good measure. “But not before some damage was done.”
Jenny made a sad noise, resting a hand on Harry’s arm for a moment. “At least all the children they’ve rescued are being reunited with their families or moved to a safe place to recover.”
“I heard they found another great lump of them at a factory in Derby,” Roger said. “Two dozen of the poor things, all chained to the machinery.”
Patrick’s gut turned at the revelation, but his flash of misery for those children resolved into relief. It was true. Using the documentation he and Everett—and Selby, though Patrick still had his reservations about the man—had uncovered at Castleford Estate, factories and brothels across England had been discovered and raided by the police. Hundreds of children had been rescued in the past fortnight. Jenny was right about most of them being returned to their families. Stephen Siddel and Max Hillsboro had been instrumental in finding safe homes for the others.
But Stephen and Max’s efforts on behalf of the children had been utterly eclipsed when word got out that Everett had earned his disfiguring scar by working with Scotland Yard to expose and attempt to arrest the three noblemen at the center of the ring. All of London had gone mad with excitement at the idea of dashing, heroic Everett using his charm and talent to wheedle his way into the confidence of Chisolm, Eastleigh, and Castleford to bring them down. The vast majorities of the rumors circulating about how the ring had been broken were false at best and patently absurd at worst, but no one who had truly been involved minded Everett getting all of the attention in the least. And Everett, of course, lapped that attention up like wine.
Another swell of applause drowned out the backstage conversation and indicated the end of the show. Jenny and the boys dashed off to their duties as the actors paraded out to the stage for their curtain calls. Patrick returned to his spot in the wings, watching Everett preen and pose for his audience. He shook his head, heart brimming with affection, as Everett made a ham of himself. That was why Patrick loved him, though. Everett was himself, through and through, and he made no apologies for it.
Patrick had to wait through the rousing applause, through Everett’s traditional curtain call musical number, then through three encores before the audience would let him leave the stage. They continued to roar and demand more even as Everett dashed into the relative darkness where Patrick stood.
“You enjoyed that, didn’t you?” Patrick asked, handing Everett a towel for him to mop his face. He could see from the way Everett winced slightly that his cut was stinging, but that didn’t dampen his spirits in the least.
“Immensely,” Everett replied with almost orgasmic enthusiasm, taking Patrick’s hand with his free hand and leading him through the backstage area to the hall and his dressing room. “The stage is my home. It was agony to be away from it for so long.”
Patrick laughed. “A fortnight is hardly a long time.”
“And how would you feel if the two of us were parted for two weeks?” Everett asked, sending a sassy look over his shoulder as they dodged other performers and stagehands to duck into his room.
“Point taken,” Patrick chuckled.
“Speaking of—” As soon as Everett tugged Patrick into his dressing room and shut the door, he pushed Patrick against the wall and brought his mouth crashing over his.
Patrick gasped in surpr
ise, but that only allowed Everett to kiss him deeper and thrust his tongue against his. Everett’s hands seemed to go everywhere at once, brushing Patrick’s side and reaching for his instantly excited cock. Patrick did his best to keep up and return Everett’s passion. He should have guessed that his arrogant lover would be in a state after receiving so much applause and adoration on stage.
The only thing, Patrick suspected, that kept Everett from tearing off both of their clothes and bending him over the room’s settee for a quick and powerful fuck was the sound of someone clearing their throat from said settee.
Everett jerked straight and whipped around as though he’d been doused by cold water. Patrick tensed hard, glancing past Everett to see Lionel Mercer lounging, catlike, in the settee.
“Don’t stop on my account,” Lionel said, something sharp in his eyes, in spite of the smoothness of his high voice. “I haven’t been a voyeur in ages. I’ve almost forgotten how the whole thing goes.”
“What do you want, Lionel?” Everett snapped, chest heaving as he caught his breath.
Lionel arched one elegant eyebrow. “Is that any way to greet the man who has come to bring you good tidings of great joy?”
Everett laughed. “You’re no angel.”
Lionel shrugged—managing to make the gesture look like the height of elegance—and stood. “I most certainly am. A fallen angel.” He fixed Everett with a coquettish look that would have made Patrick burn with jealousy, if not for the exhaustion rimming Lionel’s eyes and making him seem even more pale and gaunt than usual.
“You have news?” Patrick said, stepping away from the wall and slightly in front of Everett. It was a cheap, defensive gesture, but one the part of him that still couldn’t believe Everett loved him needed to make.
Lionel rolled his shoulders slightly, losing some of his cockiness. “I’m not a threat to you,” he told Patrick quietly. As quixotic as Lionel Mercer was, Patrick knew him absolutely to be a man of his word. He let his defensiveness drop as Lionel went on with, “David thinks he knows where Chisolm has run off to.” He stared hard at Everett.
