by Jenna Ryan
She took a token stab at pushing him away. She hadn’t intended for it to work. But as if his head had been yanked up by a giant hand, he tore his mouth from hers and stood breathing heavily for several seconds. His dark blue-green eyes bored into hers, impaling her as surely as his kiss had done. He did not look pleased. In fact, he looked downright grim, and that, more than his hasty withdrawal, wounded Victoria’s pride. It also got her moving.
Chin up, shoulders back, she stepped away. But she was trembling, and no directive from her brain could possibly change that. She only prayed that in the gauzy light of the pier, he wouldn’t notice.
“You coming, Torbel?” Oswyn poked his head over the side of the high dock. “That loon could come back anytime.”
“I know.” Gaze steady—though his breathing still was not—Torbel stared her down. His eyes had a glint that Victoria perceived as both dangerous and fascinating. Dangerous because the sensual nature of this man affected her in ways she did not yet fully understand.
What if…? she wondered, then shook herself. No. Absolutely not. She would not let herself become involved with him. Scar or no, sexy mouth notwithstanding, kiss—well, best to forget the kiss. It wouldn’t happen again anyway, or she was no judge of the Rag Man.
Although she wanted as little help as possible climbing, she wasn’t foolish enough to slap his hands away. The broken framework took thirty tedious seconds to navigate.
At the top, she wriggled free. She needed to get out of range quite badly, away from the sight of his face and his beautiful mouth, which reminded her even more disturbingly of his kiss.
No one spoke during the walk back. The notorious East End of London carried on with life as always. Thieves and pickpockets worked their victims, and, no doubt, worse crimes were being contemplated behind several of the closed doors they passed.
Victoria tried to envision Torbel in the same picture. She saw it with frightening clarity. Street kid turned cop, turned—she didn’t know what.
He cared about people, though; he must. He’d saved Oswyn’s life tonight. And hers.
“Go on ahead,” he instructed Oswyn now. They’d stopped outside the entrance to Zoe’s flat. A graphic Irish ballad emanated from the pub, which must be past closing by now. Did Torbel ever go in there and drink himself senseless? she wondered with a covert glance at his profile. Did he let his guard down with anyone? How had he gotten that scar? When had he gotten it? Before or after he worked for Scotland Yard? Had he always been a leader? A loner? Should she kiss him this time?…
A tantalizing idea, but the answer had to be an unequivocal no.
Resisting the temptation to touch his shoulder, she indicated his bloodstained jersey. “Do you want me to look at that? I’ve had first-aid training.”
She thought his lips might have quirked. “So has Grimsby. It’s not that serious.”
Who was Grimsby? She had no intention of leaving until she’d said what needed to be said. “Torbel, I want to…” she began, then took a deep breath and said steadily, “Thank you for what you did tonight. You saved my life more than once. I won’t forget that.” Or the rest of it, either, she reflected silently.
His eyes glittered in the Stepney lamplight. She spied something in his face, desire perhaps. She couldn’t tell, and he wasn’t prepared to explain. With his good arm, he pushed open the door and nodded into the darkness. “Good night, Victoria,” he said with no perceptible expression. “Don’t forget to lock up.”
“ButZoe—”
“Has keys, and tends to be a night owl.”
“Old habits die hard, huh?”
“You could say that.” Again that disconcerting gleam in his eyes. “Sleep well, Victoria.”
She didn’t miss the subtle barb, but neither did she retaliate. Let him think he could frighten her. A former cat burglar was no real problem. A homicidal maniac on a forklift was a different story.
She started across the threshold, then stopped partway and turned her head. “Do you think Lenny Street set us up on the dock tonight?” she asked softly.
Half-lidded, Torbel regarded her. “I doubt it. He’s not stupid. He knows I won’t die easily. And I’m not above revenge.”
Was that supposed to comfort her? “You take a lot for granted, Torbel. Anyone can die easily in the right circumstances. You’re not invincible. No one is. A sorcerer might cheat death for a while, but it’ll catch up with him at some point. You’re not a sorcerer, are you, Torbel?”
She hadn’t expected an answer and so was shocked into silence when, his eyes darkening noticeably, he responded, “A lot of people think that’s exactly what I am. And Augustus Hollyburn tops the list.”
ZOE HAD TO TALK herself across town to Mayfair. The old man shouldn’t be up at 2:00 a.m., but anything was possible. If he thought she might darken his doorstep, he would stay awake all night, with Chivers standing guard and possibly even old Scratch absorbed in a game of chess.
She’d have to sneak in. She knew the way, every step.
Careful not to make a sound, she eased open a small rear window and wriggled through the gap. A long hike through the darkness and there it was, the door she sought.
She didn’t knock, merely eased it open and slipped inside. An even thicker blanket of darkness spread out around her. Clover must be asleep.
Zoe listened to the even breathing that came from the bed, a massive thing with heavy velvet curtains around it. Clover was so macabre, Zoe thought with a shudder of distaste.
As if her thoughts had thrown the switch, a light flared across the room. Clover’s face, a tight-lipped replica of her own, stared at her with a hard measuring look.
“What do you want?”
A clinical question, no surprise—or anger, either, for that matter.
Zoe collected her wits, grinned and strolled closer. “Just wanted to ask you a few questions is all. Is grandfather in bed?”
Clover sat like a statue, rigid and unmoving, hands clasped on the bed covers. “He isn’t your grandfather.”
Zoe sighed. “Call him what you will. Where is he?”
“Downstairs with Scratch, I imagine. Is that all you wanted to know?”
Her hand moved to flip off the light. Only Zoe’s casual “You’re behind it, aren’t you?” stopped her. And stop she did, with her hand halfway to the lamp. Zoe chuckled. “Yeah, I thought that would get your attention.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Clover’s cheeks seemed unnaturally pale. “I’m not behind anything.”
“You didn’t throw a rock through the storehouse window tonight, or heave a mace at Victoria and Torbel earlier? You haven’t threatened their lives, maybe tried to ram a forklift prong through their throats?”
“You’re talking gibberish,” Clover said coldly.
“Tell that to Oswyn. I gather he was full of the story earlier. It’ll be all over the waterfront by morning.”
“Who filled you in?”
“A reliable source.”
“One of your crooked friends?” Clover jeered. “To answer your question, I haven’t been near the waterfront tonight. I got home just after seven, took five aspirins for a blinding headache and went straight to bed.”
“No witnesses?”
Clover’s fists clenched. “I didn’t realize I’d need one. Sleep is usually a private thing.”
“For you, it is,” Zoe said under her breath. The glare from Clover’s teal-colored eyes intensified.
They had their grandfather’s eyes, Zoe reflected distantly. Hollyburn blue, someone had called them once. Robbie used to say that if looks could kill, Hollyburn eyes would be deadly weapons. But in Zoe’s opinion, you needed the icy nature to go with them. She didn’t have it. Neither had her mother. Only Clover had inherited from old Goggy the ability to incite visual frostbite.
Speaking of Goggy—she swiveled. Was that a slippered footstep on the hall carpet? He wasn’t above creeping around, not if he had an inkling she might be about.
/> “You’re a thief, Zoe,” her twin was charging now. “If there’s anything untoward going on at that Rag Man’s storehouse, either you or he or one of your slithering cohorts is behind it.”
Zoe would have responded tartly in kind had she not detected that stealthy footstep again. It must be Goggy. Furtiveness was beneath Chivers, and what would Scratch care if she was here?
She melted into the shadows. Damask draperies covered the window, but it was a large bay, readily unlatched. The moment that door handle turned…
The door burst open and crashed against the paneled wall.
“Where is she?” Augustus bellowed.
From her hiding place, Zoe saw Clover jump. “She—she isn’t here.”
He jabbed a bony finger at her. “Don’t lie to me, girl. I can smell her. She carries the odor of mendacity.”
“Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” Zoe muttered under her breath.
“What’s that?” Old Groggy cupped one ear.
“Nothing, Grandfather.” Climbing from the bed, Clover stuck her feet in her slippers. “You should have your cane,” she said, starting toward him. “The doctor told you—”
“Damn the doctor. You shouldn’t have let her in here. You know she’ll try to corrupt you—she always does.”
He was shaking, Zoe noted. She could see his bony joints rattling in their sockets. Did he really hate her so much?
“Believe me, Grandfather,” Clover said, “I can handle her. She won’t corrupt me.”
She’d reached his side by now and managed to guide him to a chair. Wouldn’t want the old geezer to collapse on her, Zoe thought cynically. He would die, and Clover would weep tears but let him draw his last breath in his own bed. Zoe felt her upper lip curl in disdain at her sister’s uncaring nature.
“I’ll help you to your room,” her twin offered. “Catch your breath, then we’ll go.”
Augustus made a sputtering sound and batted at her hands. “Stop fussing, girl. I’m not totally decrepit. Neither am I daft. I heard her voice. I know you let her in.”
Clover’s hands dropped to her sides. Her fingers, Zoe noticed, twitched as if the nerves in them had been stretched taut. “No one lets Zoe in, Grandfather. She comes all on her own.”
The old man’s lips compressed. “You’re all I’ve got, Clover,” he said tightly. “Robbie’s gone. Your mother, too. And Blanche, dead these past eight years. My beloved Blanche…” His eyes spewed fire. “It’s all that witch Blodwyn’s fault. She caused my sorrow, made my life a living hell. And all for one mistake. One night. One hellish night. A witch, that’s what she was, a whore, like your sister. Oh, poor, dear Blanche. Maybe it’s as well after all that she’s gone.”
It was all Zoe could do not to choke. Grandma Blanche would have. What a whopper. Beloved? Goggy didn’t know the meaning of the word—except where Robbie had been concerned, and even then he hadn’t seen the kid properly at all.
“It’s that Rag Man,” Goggy declared in a righteous tone. “He’s brought bad fortune on our family from the moment he set foot in this country. He’s a curse—that’s what he is, a living, breathing curse, and he’s fallen on me.” Augustus struggled to his feet. “Mark my words, girl,” he grunted. “Stay away from that Rag Man. He’s a pox on our family. He’s wicked and he has a purpose. He went for Robbie because he knew the boy was vulnerable, but it’s me he really wants to get. Has for years.”
Zoe frowned. She hadn’t heard this before. Who was Blodwyn? And why would Torbel want to “get” old Goggy? Unless, in his days as a high-court judge, the old man had done something to him. Now there, Zoe mused, was an intriguing prospect.
She regarded her grandfather’s unforgiving face with its wrinkled skin and eyes like teal bullets. He reminded her of a skeleton with skin stretched over it and a shock of wavy white hair sprouting out around gaunt cheeks. The proper British gentleman on the surface—a snake with legs underneath.
Her sleek muscles bunched. For all this man had done to her, and to Clover, too, for that matter, he deserved to be gotten. And who better to do the honors than the enigmatic and highly dangerous Rag Man.
Smiling, Zoe slid through the window and back into the darkness of the London night.
Chapter Six
Damn, she was going to be late.
Victoria rubbed her damp hair with a towel, pulled on her white silk top and stepped into the navy blue pumps that matched her pin-striped skirt.
This was all Zoe’s fault, she decided crankily. Although that wasn’t strictly true. Zoe had burst in at 3:00 a.m., brimming with a story that, even sleepy eyed and groggy, Victoria had been unable to resist.
“I don’t know what their hatred entails,” Zoe had concluded at four-fifteen, “but it sounds older than Robbie’s murder. There must have been a real cock-up involved, because old Goggy despises Torbel almost as much as he hates me.”
Victoria supposed that Augustus Hollyburn might have had Torbel locked up prior to Robbie’s death, but for what crime? Assault? Theft? Cursing their family? She dismissed the last, fanciful thought. The truth, if indeed there was one, would be in the computer records. Assuming she was able to find a cab, she’d do some checking when she reached her office on Bouverie Street.
Sighing, Victoria regarded her reflection in the wall mirror. If she pinned her hair up en route, that would save time.
She tugged on her jacket, located her soft-sided briefcase, glanced at Zoe’s closed door, then started out. She emerged into the pub from the narrow, low-ceilinged central staircase. Ratz stood behind the bar, cleaning glasses and humming an English ballad. Ten scarred wooden tables dotted the small room. She estimated at least five times that many chairs.
Ratz nodded at her. She nodded back but kept her eyes trained discreetly on the floor. The polished boards sagged in the middle. Not that she blamed them after more than two hundred years of hard wear, but it made walking in heels a tricky feat at best.
“Torbel know you’re going out?” the giant demanded gruffly as she set her hand on the knob.
Victoria swung around. “He’ll figure it out.”
“You should tell him.”
She gave him a perfunctory smile. “Or you could do it for me. I presume you’re one of his watchdogs.”
“I work for him, right enough, but he never told me to watch you. That was my idea.”
Relaxing somewhat, Victoria said, “It’s nice of you to be concerned, Ratz, but I’m only going to work. I’ll be safe enough there.” She recalled Friday night when she’d been followed through the lobby and added an uneasy “In broad daylight anyway.” She thought for a moment, then took the plunge. “Uh, Ratz, do you know anything about the night Robbie Hollyburn was killed? Nothing that would place Torbel’s neck in a noose, just something that didn’t come out.”
Ratz squinted through the glass in his hand. “I know the kid had something gnawing on him that night. He came in here and started rabbiting on about how he needed to see Torbel and there was no sign of him at the storehouse.”
“Maybe he was eager to join up,” Victoria theorized.
“Oh, he was eager, right enough, but he’d been on to Torbel about that for a good month already. This was…different. He was excited. Said he needed to talk to Torbel right away.”
“Did you tell this to the police?”
Ratz snorted. “I told Fox, but he has cloth ears when his mind’s on other things. Doubt he heard much of what any of us said that day. Doris was hanging about, and she’s his—Well, let’s say he likes her best.”
“So no one ever pursued the matter?”
“Wouldn’t have made much difference if they had. The buzzards—er, solicitors—would have gone for Torbel just the same. The kid died—that’s a fact.”
“Do you think Street did it?”
He shrugged. “None of my business, is it?”
“But you must have an opinion.”
Ratz’s black eyes were guarded, but he relented and moved a noncommittal shoulder.
“Lenny’s ma and mine are cousins. That’s all I’ve got to say. Except that Fox and Peacock did a bloody poor job of digging to my mind. They figured it was Torbel and Street, and that was that. No other suspects, they said. They didn’t even question the likes of Tito and Boots.”
Tito she knew. “Who’s Boots?” she asked.
“An odd-jobber. You’d call him a beggar.”
“Does he beg?”
“Most days.”
“Then he’s a beggar. Do Boots and Tito spend a lot of time on the docks?”
“More than some, less than others. They keep their ears to the ground better ‘n most.”
“Not cloth ears, I hope,” Victoria murmured. Louder, she said, “Can you tell me where I might find them?”
“Tito could be anywhere. Boots usually does the route between the butcher shop and the station house.”
Victoria tugged on the door. “Thanks, Ratz.”
“I still think you should—”
Ron’s hushed voice cut in from the far wall. “…going to need ten or more of them if we plan to pull this off under Torbel’s—” The Scotsman halted abruptly when he spied Victoria. His eyes flicked from her to Ratz and back again. “Pub’s closed, isn’t it?” he said gruffly.
“I’m staying with Zoe,” Victoria reminded him, although she doubted there was any need. He’d gone dark red right down his thick neck. “What were you saying about Torbel?”
A woman she hadn’t noticed stepped forward. “We were just gabbling, weren’t we, Ratz?”
“Ron’s a gabbler,” Ratz agreed. He blew a speck of lint from the last glass. “Lazy bugger, too. Takes shortcuts through the shops to get from the storehouse to here. What’s up, then, Ivy?” he asked the petite blond woman who had the look of a pixie. “You on a case?”
“We’re both on a case,” Ron answered. Nudging his companion, he nodded stiffly at Victoria and made for the door like a bull desperate to escape the paddock.
One look at Ratz’s face told Victoria that he was unlikely to explain the bizarre encounter. What had Ron meant? Pull what off under Torbel’s nose? Were Ron and Ivy planning some kind of subterfuge? She pictured Torbel’s satyric features and decided that Ron couldn’t possibly be that stupid. Either that or his life meant nothing to him. As little as she knew of the Rag Man, Victoria had no doubt that he would not take a double cross lying down.
