A Matter of Grave Concern

by Novak, Brenda

  “Now what are you doing?” she asked.

  Suddenly, Max realized that he was doing nothing, except staring at her face in a kind of hungry stupor.

  Clearing his throat, he stepped away. “Just making sure I did a proper job.”

  “Oh. Did you leave the marks you wanted?”

  “Some.” He wondered what she would think when she saw them in the mirror come morning. “I should probably tear your dress as well, but I hesitate to reveal anything that might tempt Big Jack and the others any more than your presence already does.” He feared what the temptation might do to him, too.

  She didn’t say anything.

  “Did your father’s medical journals mention anything about kissing?” he asked.

  Her eyes, wide and honest, never wavered from his. “No, they concentrated mostly on the viscid whitish fluid of the male reproductive tract that consists of spermatozoa suspended in secretions of accessory glands and—”

  “Spermatozoa?” he repeated, incredulous. “I am sure I have never heard a woman use that word before. Or a man, either, for that matter.”

  “It’s the—”

  “I think I can guess what it is.” Tempted to kiss her soundly, he framed her face with his hands. “Are those bloody books of your father’s the only instruction you have had on human intimacy? What of your mother? Didn’t she see that you were properly educated?”

  “Six would have been far too young.”

  “Six?”

  “She died of consumption when I was just a girl.”

  “I see.” He sat on the bed to put some distance between them. The fact that she had lost her mother at such an early age explained a lot about Miss Hale—why she was so unconventional, for a start. “And your father?”

  “My father is a busy man. His work is very important to him.”

  The way she said it indicated Hale’s work was more important to him than she was, and Max feared she was right. That something so integral to his daughter’s development could fall so easily beneath his notice didn’t speak well of Edwin Hale.

  “Was there no one else?” he asked.

  “No one else to do what?” She slid down the wall to sit on the floor and rested her head against the bedpost, her interest in kissing seemingly forgotten.

  Max wished he could forget it as easily. “No one else to raise you, to befriend you.”

  She paused as she considered the question. The lateness of the hour seemed to be taking a toll on her, but after what she had been through, she was holding up remarkably well. Miss Hale may not have been the most disciplined or cautious woman he had ever met, but she had plenty of other attributes. Max couldn’t fault her courage.

  “Well, there was Bransby, of course,” she said. “He’s the porter at the college—and the poor soul you set upon when you stole back the corpse I purchased!”

  “A harmless fellow.”

  “Getting on in years. How could you have frightened him so?”

  “I was more worried about making sure he didn’t sustain serious harm. We left him no worse for the wear. I saw to it.”

  She couldn’t argue that. Bran had been flustered, but that was all. “Anyway, he has worked for us as far back as I can remember. And then there’s Mrs. Fitzgerald, the housekeeper at the college. She came to us when my mother died.”

  Servants? Max was beginning to get the idea. Evidently, Abigail had been left on her own to grow up as best she could, with the aid of some house help and a library of medical journals. No wonder she had led such a sheltered life. He was willing to bet she had never circulated enough to attract many beaux. How else could such a beauty have remained untouched?

  The image of her as the lonely girl she must have been evoked his protective instincts, but he tamped them down. He had his hands full with his missing sister. And once he’d done right by Madeline, he had to return to his usual life with all the responsibilities that entailed.

  Chapter 7

  The minutes passed like hours until Abigail thought morning might never come. Considering the uncertainty she faced, she wasn’t sure she wanted it to. But, if Max Wilder was suffering similar anxiety, it didn’t seem to be bothering him. He looked to be sleeping peacefully.

  Although she had spent plenty of time scowling at his back, she was too stubborn to climb in with him. What kind of woman would that make her?

  Certainly not an admirable one . . .

  But she had to admit that he wasn’t quite as bad as Big Jack. Although Max had stopped her from leaving when he might have let her go, which she highly resented and refused to forget, he could have done so much more than scruff her neck with his beard growth.

  If he were Big Jack he would have.

  And yet . . . Max Wilder couldn’t be classified as a saint. There was something dangerous about him, something bordering on the uncivilized. From what she had seen so far, he dared more than a man should. He flouted whatever rule he chose to flout, and seemed to have no compunction about asserting his will in any given situation, regardless of how it affected others.

  Still, he didn’t make her skin crawl as she thought he should. He was a resurrection man, the very dregs of society. Her father—anyone with good sense, really—would be appalled that she could find anything redeeming about him.

  So why did those few seconds when he touched his lips to hers loom so large in her mind?

  Because it hadn’t been an entirely unpleasant experience, she realized. Just the memory of it made her body grow warm and weak, as if she would lean into his strength if she could. Although she had never reacted to a man like that before, she was fairly confident those were signs of attraction, as shocking and scandalous as it was to acknowledge.

  Her poor mother must be rolling over in her grave . . .

  “Are you done pouting?”

  She stiffened when his voice issued out of the dark. So he wasn’t asleep, after all. She was sort of glad about that—it mitigated her jealousy. But she wanted to shush him at the same time, to tell him to be quiet for fear he would wake Jack or that other terrible man. They hadn’t come to demand that he hand her over, as she feared they might, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t if they had half an inkling Max was finished with her.

  “Don’t pretend you are asleep,” he said when she didn’t respond. “I can hear you shifting around, looking for some way to get comfortable. Are you really going to force yourself to remain on the floor all night?”

  “As opposed to what?” she snapped.

  “As opposed to the more practical solution of coming over and getting some sleep. Tomorrow will arrive before you know it. You would be wise to conserve your strength. Sleep will help you cope—and remain rational, a benefit to both of us, I dare say.”

  She squinted, trying to see him in greater detail. “Rational? How is this for rational? Let me go. Untie me so I can slip into the night. You can tell Big Jack I managed to free myself while you were sleeping.”

  He hesitated as though he was tempted but ultimately refused. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

  “Because . . . ”

  “I have my reasons.”

  “There is a dead woman downstairs!” she whispered.

  “But Jack would never believe your escape was an accident, even if I tried to convince him otherwise. And I can’t arouse more suspicion.”

  “What about the dead woman?”

  “You and I deal in corpses, so don’t pretend to have a case of the vapors.”

  “We don’t deal with them in quite the same way.”

  “What you do is so much better than what I do?”

  “Those at the college are gathering knowledge, and that will improve the quality of medical care in England.”

  “Then so are we. There would be no body snatchers, Little Miss Abigail, if you and others like you hadn’t turned the human co
rpse into a commodity.”

  She’d had this argument before, with any number of people. “Medical colleges need specimens,” she insisted. “We have to get them from somewhere. What good will it do to let every human who dies rot in the ground? When the information to be gleaned from their bodies could save other lives?”

  “Aren’t you conveniently ignoring the religious implications? It doesn’t bother you that so many believe you are hampering the resurrection of their loved ones?”

  She didn’t want to think of that. Her own father eschewed religion, proclaimed himself an atheist, so she’d had little training. But she liked ducking into a chapel now and then. Something about the reverence and solemnity appealed to her. It also made her feel closer to her mother somehow.

  Still, she offered her father’s argument instead of revealing her own lack of clarity on the subject. “Religion can be an enemy to progress.”

  “I won’t argue with you there. But that’s a case you’ll have to make in parliament if you want change—and it’ll take more than one or two lords on your side.”

  “Many anatomists have tried, including my father. If change is coming, it’s not coming fast enough.”

  “Another point on which we can agree.”

  “But that isn’t the issue here,” she said. “We aren’t talking about body snatching.”

  “Then what are we talking about, Miss Hale?” He sounded annoyed.

  “Murder.”

  “I should have governed my tongue earlier,” he grumbled.

  “Perhaps. But you didn’t, and I heard what you said. You suspect Big Jack of more than digging up those who have died. You suspect him of Burking!” William Burke, and his partner, William Hare, were so infamous for their crimes that the practice of murder for the sake of anatomy had taken on Burke’s name, even though he had been executed eighteen months ago—following which his body was publicly dissected at the College of Surgeons. Hare was released and managed to find work, but once his mates figured out who he was, they tossed him in a pit of lime. If what Abby had heard was correct, he was now a blind beggar.

  “The body downstairs was a bit different than our usual, that’s all,” Max explained. “I had some questions, and I voiced them. Jack’s answers were plausible.”

  “Plausible? Really? Then why don’t you believe him?”

  The bed creaked as he shifted. “Miss Hale, it is the middle of the night. I think we should both get some sleep, don’t you?”

  As exhausted as she was, how could she succumb to sleep when she was in such peril? “What will happen to me in the morning?”

  “That, I can’t tell you.”

  “What if . . . what if Big Jack and that other man demand”—she drew a deep breath—“demand that I . . .”

  “I won’t let them force themselves upon you. I will turn you loose first. Satisfied?”

  “But it might be too late by the time you intercede. How will you stop them?”

  “I will have to act smitten enough to be possessive, I suppose.”

  “You already promised to pass me off.”

  “I was holding a weak hand, a hand I wasn’t willing to gamble on.”

  “How will it be any stronger in the future?”

  “Last night Jack would not have understood why I would stop him. After several hours spent enjoying your charms, I will be in a much stronger position to claim you as my own. So we will establish new boundaries tomorrow, when Jack can, hopefully, see past the gin pickling his brain.”

  “Gin or no, if you plan to keep your promise to me, you will have to cross him. I don’t see any other way. And why would you do that?”

  “I may be a body snatcher, but that doesn’t mean I take pleasure in deflowering innocent women. They are two different things.”

  “You were happy enough to rob me at the college.”

  “I was trying to teach you a lesson, if you must know.”

  “And that was?”

  “That you were out of your depth. Had you not ventured into such dangerous territory, none of this would have happened.”

  She feared her father would see it the same way.

  “Sadly, you have compromised us both,” he added.

  How could he blame her? Had they sold her the specimen she needed and gone on their way, like the other resurrectionists she had dealt with before, everything would have been fine.

  “You caused this as much as I did,” she insisted. “I was merely trying to solve a problem no one else seemed willing or capable of solving.”

  “Because they knew better than to risk their good name and their safety! And you, a woman! Jack wanted you the second he saw you. I was hoping to insure there would be no more contact between you.”

  Was that true?

  She sighed as she rubbed her forehead. She supposed it was possible. Max Wilder did seem to have some scruples. “How was I to know how he would react to me?”

  “Look in a mirror, for God’s sake,” he grumbled.

  Did that mean he thought she was pretty? He hardly seemed affected. She had been more excited by the prospect of a kiss, or he would have kissed her in earnest. She had wanted him to, wanted to see what it would feel like to taste a man who looked and smelled like Max Wilder did. He was infuriating and stubborn and domineering—but so alive and daring and remarkable in other ways. And he had saved her from a fate worse than death with Jack Hurtsill. There was no reason he’d had to do that.

  To continue to protect her could cost him a great deal, maybe even his life.

  It was all so confusing. She wasn’t quite sure how to feel about Wilder . . .

  “How long do you plan to keep me here?” she asked.

  “I hope it won’t be more than a few days. I will let you go as soon as I can.”

  “Why can’t you let me go now?”

  “Miss Hale, we both need to rest.” He pulled back the bedding. “Are you coming?”

  Her body ached—and sitting there waiting for her hour of doom was taking a heavy toll on her frame of mind. Would it be so terrible to lie next to him? To take what comfort she could in having a mattress beneath her and the warmth of a few blankets on top?

  She had seen him wash, knew he was clean, which gave her hope that his bed would be, too.

  It had to be cleaner than the floor.

  Grudgingly, she got up, but before she climbed in, he stopped her. “Is there any way you might remove those rags first?”

  “Absolutely not!”

  He let his breath go in an audible sigh. “Fine, if you must,” he grumbled and allowed her to lie down.

  Sure enough, the linens smelled as if they had been washed almost as recently as he had. No wonder he hadn’t wanted her to wear the clothes in which she had been tackled in the dirt. But she didn’t trust him enough to remove them; she was already taking a leap of faith.

  Fortunately, he didn’t touch her. He covered her with a quilt, since her hands were tied and she couldn’t easily use them. Then he slid to the far edge to allow her more space.

  As the temperature in the room dropped, it was she who gravitated toward him. She couldn’t stop shivering, and his body exuded such tremendous heat. She thought, if only she could get warm, she could fall into unconsciousness and at last escape the fatigue, the pain and the worry.

  “That’s it. I won’t bite,” he assured her and pulled her right up against him, once he realized what she was after.

  She would have made sure he understood that only practical concerns caused her to seek him out. That almost-kiss had nothing to do with it. But she was suddenly too tired to move her lips. His words were the last thing she remembered until, jostled awake by movement, she opened her eyes to find him staring at her.

  “Is it morning?” she asked.

  He broke off that steady gaze and raked a hand through his
hair. “I’m afraid so.”

  A crushing depression descended when she realized that her father would soon find her missing, if he hadn’t already. Once dawn broke, Aldersgate turned into a beehive of activity, which was partly why she liked working at the college. There was always something to do, the doing of which made her feel valued.

  “Will you let me go today?”

  He wasn’t pleased to hear the question; she could tell by his expression. “You already know the answer to that.”

  She squeezed her eyes closed as she struggled to deal with the disappointment and was surprised that, when he spoke again, she heard real tenderness in his voice.

  “Don’t be frightened, Abigail. I will take care of you. You just have to trust me—and do everything I say. Do you understand? If you do, we might both survive the coming ordeal.”

  “Trust you?” she echoed. “Not only have you kidnapped me, you have bound me and you want me to trust you? I can’t even feel my hands!”

  Although he winced at the accusation, he seemed no less resolute. “If I could trust you, I wouldn’t have had to bind you. And as for your charge of kidnapping, it isn’t as if I carried you off. You came to me.”

  “I had no choice.”

  “You risked your life over money.”

  “It wasn’t my money to lose. And you took my elephant!”

  “Jack took your elephant.”

  She shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. The moment it went missing, I had no choice.”

  “Why? Why does that damn thing mean so much to you?”

  She wasn’t going to answer. It would be a sacrilege to speak of Elizabeth to such a man.

  But maybe, if he understood, he would be more prone to help her get her figurine back. “It was a gift from my mother.”