by Tamara Allen
I led him to the low wall fronting someone’s flower bed. “Sit down. And close your eyes.”
“Close my eyes? Do you intend to conduct a séance?” he asked, half-jokingly.
Squatting in front of him, I patted his arm. “It’ll be all right. I just want you to reach out. Search for a sense of someone in trouble. Or someone bottling up a whole lot of anger,” I added, thinking it would be even better to get a fix on Jack, himself.
Ezra didn’t seem enamored of the idea. “Reach out?”
“Yeah. Try to pinpoint a location, if you can.” I knew it was a hell of a lot to ask of someone who’d spent his life coping with ghosts hounding him day and night. I wrapped my hand around his, intending to be his anchor this time. “Maybe we can find her before he does.”
Amazingly, that confidence in me was still there. He turned his hand in mine and interlaced our fingers. He closed his eyes, and barely a moment later tension reappeared in troubled lines around his mouth. He hunched over and I shifted to my knees to keep an eye on him. Opening himself psychically to all of Whitechapel appeared to be not so much of a hot idea after all. His reaction escalated, physical distress evident in his rapid breathing and even more rapid loss of color.
“Ezra, never mind. Forget it. Let it go.” I grasped his shoulders, and his eyes flew open, dark with horrors only he could see. “Ezra?”
Words seemed beyond him, but not action. He pulled out of my hold and, on his feet, plunged past me. There was no hesitation, no pause to get his bearings. I caught up with him but didn’t stop him, half afraid he would shove me into the gutter if I tried. He’d zeroed in on someone and meant to hunt him down. But I stayed close, determined to grab him before he flew headlong into a killer with a knife.
The scene we came upon in a dim street several blocks from the murder was not what I expected. There were three of them, the oldest not more than twenty, and the woman they held down on the pavement was even younger. The one on top of her had her skirts pushed to her hips and, undeterred by her furious struggles, was trying to pull off the white sheath of underclothes that covered her from waist to calf. Ezra dragged him off and shoved him away, the momentum carrying him into me. I laid him out and went after the other two. Not as stupid as they looked, they both fled.
Their intended victim seemed to regard us as just as dangerous. She scrambled away from Ezra’s offered hand, then took off running as a police whistle pierced the night. I let her go, sick with the thought that Jack had struck again and we were too late to stop him—again. Ezra stared past me into the darkness, and I had a bad feeling he was still channeling all the crimes in progress. His expression reminded me of the victims of violent crime I’d dealt with in the past. The disbelief, the overwhelming shock, it was all there. I laid my hands on his shoulders and got into his face, trying to draw him back to the present. “Ez, I know I told you to do this, but let it go now. Come out of it.”
He blinked and his gaze shifted to mine. “There is pain in every corner of this place,” he whispered.
“Yeah, I know.” I cupped his face in my hands, refusing to relinquish his attention now that I had it back. “It was stupid of me to tell you to open yourself up to it. I’m sorry. I had my sights set on Jack. I didn’t think about all the common criminals that could slip in with him.”
The confusion lingered in Ezra’s face. “He is rather—uncommon.” The distracted tone was still there too, and it worried the hell out of me. I snapped his name with intentional force, trying to pull him free of whatever had a hold on him. He shivered, but then turned his face into my touch, eyes closing.
If he needed a lifeline, he had one. I kissed him. “Focus on that,” I whispered. “Read my mind if it’ll help.”
After a moment, he said in a steadier voice, “Must I? The things that run through your head are surely more disturbing than all of Whitechapel.”
The knot in my gut loosened. “Nice to have you back.” I kissed him again, lightly. “If I come up with any more brilliant experiments, feel free to kick my ass.”
“Some good came of this one, then,” he murmured.
I turned his attention to the guy laid out on the pavement. “A lot of good, actually. But it’s an experiment we won’t be repeating.” The whistle called again, northwest of our current location, I realized automatically. And not far away.
“Jack,” Ezra breathed.
“Yeah. But I don’t think you’re ready for any more of this and I’m not so sure I am either,” I added, flat-out lie though it was.
“I’m all right.” He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders, trying to at least look all right. “Anyway, we must go and see. The area will not have been—contaminated?”
“Ezra—”
“We must,” he said quietly. “If we failed to catch this Ripper the first time, the aid of a federal agent from the future may be just the thing. I cannot sleep with the thought that we might have found him out tonight if we’d only persisted.”
No crowd had gathered yet and only two constables waited near the body in the loneliest corner of a quiet square. The men didn’t prowl the scene in search of evidence, nor go near enough to examine the motionless form; they just waited, for a doctor to arrive and pronounce her dead, I assumed.
Ezra might have agreed to investigate further, but I was intent on making sure he saw nothing else that would ruin his sleep for nights to come. “You all right to stay here for a few minutes?”
“Stay here?” Ezra took in the police, their lanterns revealing nothing from this distance except a limp hand lying on the pavement. He drew me into the darker shadow of a doorway. “Please don’t get into trouble.”
“I’ll be careful.” I felt confident the constables would be chasing me off within minutes. But I was ready with some stalling tactics while I got a cursory look at the scene.
“Be quick,” Ezra entreated and let me creep away, across the square to the corner—also near a gate, I noticed. But this gate was locked and the murder had been committed very much in the open. The guy might be nuts, but he was organized nuts, or he’d have been caught for sure. As for his victim—sweet Jesus. What Jack had done to the poor damned woman probably would have compelled most people to look quickly away. I looked away, myself, after a moment, realizing I wasn’t as jaded as I liked to think. Apart from the Ripper’s signature throat-cutting, the woman had been disemboweled, her intestines strewn near her head. I was glad I’d left Ezra behind. He may have viewed the last scene without flinching, but this one—no.
“Gentlemen.” I nodded in greeting. “Another one, eh?”
“Yes, sir.” They exchanged a dubious look and the other asked, “Who might you be, sir?”
I went for Faulkner’s officious air. It wasn’t endearing but it got the job done. “Morgan Nash of the New York Police. I’ve been called in at Sir Charles’s behest, to help you round this fellow up. Hand me that lantern so I can take a look.”
“Sir Charles?” It was not a tone of respect. The constables exchanged another look, this one disgusted, and I had the feeling I’d chosen the wrong name to throw around. “We ain’t heard nothing of it, sir,” the older constable continued, the brush of fingers over his moustache only partially hiding the rueful twist of his mouth, “but then, we wouldn’t, would we?”
The other constable snorted and shook his head. Resentment shone in his eyes, but it seemed less directed at me than at his bosses. He held out his lantern. “Have a look, then, but don’t touch her. They’ll be calling us down for it, even if it weren’t our fault,” he muttered to his colleague, who nodded glumly.
I didn’t dare say anything else, but took the lantern and nodded my thanks. I had a vague memory of what the police had gone through with the press reports and angry public, but I hadn’t thought much about it. Men and women in law enforcement tolerated that sort of shit all the time, and while I’d experienced their frustration myself, I knew it was part of the job and nothing would change it. We were the ones
who were charged with keeping the world safe, and when we didn’t measure up to what was expected, we took it from all quarters.
And maybe once in a while we did deserve it. But these poor damn guys didn’t. Modern-day agents found it challenging to track down serial killers and we had an array of technology, manpower, and forensics on our side. These fellows were wandering around in the dark in every sense. “Cheer up, guys,” I murmured out of their hearing. “The first serial killer’s always the toughest.”
Settling on the point of entry, I started my walk-through at a snail’s pace. The pavement, still wet with rain, would not give up too many clues in the dark and the scant lantern light didn’t improve visibility. I knew any footprints I ran across would just as likely belong to the constables or anyone else who’d traipsed through just after the woman’s death. At her feet, her murderer had arranged her possessions, among them a couple of small tins. I put a hand in my pocket, feeling around for a baggie. But the constables were watching me, and reviving their suspicion by removing evidence wouldn’t be the brightest move.
I focused on a closer look at the ground around the body while I waited for a better opportunity, which came with the arrival of more constables and two men in plainclothes, one of them carrying a doctor’s bag. I slipped my own little baggie out of my pocket, along with a handkerchief Ezra had given me, and scooped up one of the tins while I had the chance. Whether I could come up with comparison sets to match to any prints was a matter I would work on later. By dawn, there wouldn’t be any other evidence worth collecting.
Concerned that Ezra might be worrying—and even more concerned that the cops might pick him up on suspicion—I left the lantern near the body and slipped into the shadows as the new arrivals appeared in the square. My eyes were still readjusting to the darkness when I realized Ezra was no longer in the doorway where I’d left him.
“Ez,” I hissed, looking around the street. He wouldn’t have gone home without me, no matter how justified it might be. What if he’d spotted Jack still lurking around and had followed him? I might have just changed history in a way I couldn’t live with.
In the smallest hour of the morning, word of the murder still spread like fire. People who were just rising or had never gone to bed had gathered in the street in small groups. I could feel the undercurrents of excitement and fear as I passed.
“Come on, Ezra. Where are you?” Damn rookies, they never listened. I should have taken him home. He’d already gotten a heavy-duty shot of all the negative vibes in Whitechapel, thanks to me. But that wasn’t enough. I had to put him through a breathless run through the cold dark night, to a scene even more horrific than the last one we’d faced. What the hell had I been thinking?
Ready to retrace my steps on the chance he had returned to the crime scene, looking for me, I heard movement in a narrow alley to my left and saw someone hunched over, relieving himself of his last meal. A familiar someone in a worn coat, his brown hair a soft gleam in the trace of light coming from a window two stories above him. I moved in his direction, careful not to startle him. “Ezra?”
There hadn’t been much in his stomach to bring up. He leaned heavily against the building and breathed deeply. “I’m sorry,” he began in a hollow voice. I cut him off right there.
“I’m the one who should be sorry.” I fished his handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it to him. “What happened?”
He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. He was in no shape for conversation and I wasn’t going to push. I wrapped my arms around him and held him while he calmed down. His head drooped to my shoulder, his breathing, not quite as ragged, warm on my neck. I gave him a squeeze. “I was so caught up, I didn’t see you go.”
“Morgan….” His voice was muffled but I could still hear the bewilderment and horror. He tucked his hands under my coat lapels and looked up into my face with disturbing desperation. “How could he do that? Why would he? Dear God.”
He’d seen her. But he hadn’t come anywhere near the body… which meant she had come to him. Regret that I’d left him alone hit me hard. “He does it because he’s sick. Sick in a way your era doesn’t understand. Hell, my era doesn’t entirely understand it either.” I smoothed the damp hair off his forehead and studied his face for signs of returning color. He was still so pale. “Damn, I’m sorry. I’m in over my head. I sure shouldn’t be dragging you into the deep end with me.”
“My own fault. I should have known she might.” He let out a breath. “Not exactly your Dr. Watson, am I?” He met my eyes and mustered a faint smile. “From a story in Beeton’s, about a detective chap.”
“Yeah, I know. And trust me, I’m no Sherlock Holmes. Sully usually did most of the figuring out and I did most of the chasing down. Not that he let me get too lazy with the details. He just knew my strengths. I guess I’m a little at a loss without him.”
Ezra slipped a sympathetic arm under mine. “I know it’s difficult, so far from things familiar. But I think you underestimate yourself.”
“Maybe.” I looked him over. “How are you feeling?”
“Well enough to carry on, I think.”
It struck me just how much guilt still swamped him over what he’d done to me. He was worn out and probably still nauseated and, despite it all, willing to stick with me through further investigation if I wanted him to. I drew him closer and kissed his curly head. “We’re going home. If that’s all right with you.”
“But your investigation. Have you discovered anything?”
I’d discovered that I was one inconsiderate son of a bitch. Other than that…. “Nothing new. I just want to go home and get some sleep.” And even more than that, I wanted him to get some. I knew he was yearning for a warm bed in safe surroundings, and while it wasn’t home to me, it had its appeal after the long miserable night we’d been through.
But sneaking into the house and away up to bed was not in the cards. We walked in the door to find Derry dragging a coat on over his nightshirt. Kathleen was with him, in a robe and a lacy cap that would’ve made me snicker if I hadn’t been so tired. They turned faces drawn with anxiety in our direction and immediately cried aloud in relief. Kathleen composed herself while Derry joyfully pounced on us. “You’re all right? You’re not hurt?” Discerning eyes took me in with a satisfied air, but lingered on Ezra. “Someone’s given you a right fair bruising.” He crooked a finger under Ezra’s chin to examine the discoloration, which, under the gaslight, was all too vivid now. It must have been smarting like hell. Jesus. And I’d dragged him along even after that.
Ezra smiled as if he knew what I was thinking. “You know, we’re rather tired,” he began apologetically to Derry and Kathleen. “And it’s late—”
“It’s very nearly morning, in case the two of you hadn’t noticed.” Kathleen’s eyes flashed. “If I fall asleep at Mass, I shall hold you both responsible.” She looked us over, as Derry had, but I sensed she saw more than he did. “I suppose we will have the tale of it soon enough. Let them go to bed.”
“Do you have any ice?” I asked. “And maybe an ice pack?”
Derry turned to Kathleen, but she’d already vanished down the hall to the kitchen. “There’s a love. She nearly had me after the police.” He shook his head like an exasperated parent. “A pretty tale it must be and I’m not half-afraid to hear it, but Kathleen is right. It will keep till morning. Or noon,” he added with a knowing grin, “for I’ve witnessed your habits and you’re alike as two peas in that, at least.” He waved us toward the stairs, following at our heels. “And the next time you’re wandering home of a Sunday morn, gentlemen, have the grace not to come home sober, will you? Kath will imagine you’re off after that Leather Apron and find no end of worry in it.”
That Kathleen would be less upset if we’d come home drunk I found amusing and oddly touching. When she came upstairs fifteen minutes later with the requested ice and a tray of hot tea and cinnamon rolls, I could’ve kissed her. Ezra was already under the quilt, half-asleep, an
d I was in the process of trying not to freeze to death in the ten seconds between taking off my clothes and pulling on a nightshirt. At Kathleen’s knock, I snatched up Ezra’s robe and wrapped myself in it before opening the door. She brought in the tray without a word and set it at the foot of the bed.
I watched her pour tea into the cups with a fairly steady hand and smiled to myself. “I’m sorry we worried you.”
She sniffed. “It’s my lot to worry over my boarders. They’ve none of them a pennyworth of sense. Here’s your ice.” She had wrapped it in a checked towel. “Ezra, will you need a powder? Derry thought you might.”
He sleepily shook his head. Kathleen transferred the assessing gaze to me. “And you? All of a piece, then?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She knew better than to take the meek reply at face value. “Your world may be ahead of ours in all manner of ways, but you may be sure it’s none wiser. I’ll remind you that you’re flesh and blood and the devil’s blade will do you in as quick.” There was more she wanted to say, but I think she sensed the futility of it. “Not a pennyworth,” she muttered and, reminding us to shut off the light, said a curt good night.
