Ollie was speechless as she stared at this man’s familiar honey-colored eyes, the confirmation that he did not lie. But she’d been on her own since her nurse passed on. Suddenly, she had family? She wasn’t altogether sure what that meant.
“My dear, I know this is a lot to take in, but I was hoping you would consider living here with me.” He gave her hand a quick, warm squeeze. “I’d resigned myself to living the rest of my life alone. But if you’ll consent to stay, we can take care of one another.”
Ollie swallowed the lump in her throat. “Truly? You want me … to stay here, forever?”
Mr. Brownlow laughed softly. “If you so choose. Clothes, food, books, toys … a proper education … I could provide all of those things for you.”
She glanced down at their joined hands, his skin papery and spotted against her small, reddened fingers. Slowly, she raised her eyes to find the man waiting, patient and still. The choice was easy. “Yes. I would like that … very much.”
His arms came around her, enveloping her in the scents of soap and spicy tobacco. She’d never smelled anything so sweet.
When he released her, his face grew serious. “There’s just one more thing. I understand why you pretended to be a boy, but now that you can live as a female, I think a new name is in order. How does Miss Olivia Elizabeth Brownlow sound?”
She repeated the name under her breath several times before answering, “I like it!” She cocked her head to one side. “But do you think you could teach me how to spell it?”
Her uncle’s rich laugh filled the room. “It would be my honor, little one.”
Olivia almost choked on the unexpected emotion clogging her throat. Without thought, her fingers grasped the spot under her dress where the egg-shaped locket rested against her skin. Her reassurance and strength. But there was nothing except a hollow there. The only piece of her mother she’d retained all these years, gone to finance a single physician’s call. And worse, in her rush to help Chip, she’d forgotten to remove the tiny portrait of her mother that her uncle had given her.
God, what have I done?
“Olivia, what is it?” Her uncle’s trembling hand grasped her fingers, his skin warm and thin as paper.
Olivia met his faded gaze and shook her head in silence. Tears filled her eyes. She didn’t resent selling the locket—it was a worthy sacrifice for the health of a child—but she still ached with loss. And fear. Stealing a few trinkets at parties wouldn’t be enough to ensure her boys’ safety this time. She didn’t doubt the thugs who had blackmailed Brit would be back for more. And who was this Monks character terrorizing the Hill? What could she do against a seasoned crime lord?
“Is it Maxwell’s proposal that has you flummoxed? I’m aware you have yet to give him an answer.”
Olivia pushed away her soup, pulled her fingers from her uncle’s grasp, and folded her hands in her lap. Max. She’d all but forgotten he awaited a response. Another situation she’d thoroughly mucked up. A tremor shuddered over her shoulders and down her spine at the memory of that night. Being in Jack’s strong arms, the solid heat of his body, his mouth. Olivia cut the thought short and reached for her water goblet, taking several long swallows.
“Do you have feelings for him, dear?”
Olivia almost jumped out of her chair, water sloshing over her fingers as her gaze swung to her uncle’s wizened face. “Why would you say that?”
“You and Maxwell are friends, are you not?”
Olivia nodded and then turned to stare at the flicker of the candles in the center of the table. Of course her uncle wasn’t referring to Jack. They had never met. Well, except for that long-ago day when he’d accused Dodger of robbing him on the street. The irony tightened Olivia’s throat.
“I see no other reason why you should delay. Maxwell Grimwig is a well-respected gentleman, his family is above reproach, he is kind and … will support you in a manner—” A sharp cough cut him off. He took a gulp of brandy before continuing in a rough tone, “A manner in which I am no longer able.”
Her uncle’s words confirmed every logical reason why she should accept Maxwell’s offer with haste before he changed his mind. But a pair of lethal blue eyes haunted her until she could see no other. Her traitorous heart didn’t care a whit about propriety or material possessions; it longed for passion and adventure.
Flames still dancing in her vision, she turned back to her uncle. His shoulders slumped inside his bottle-green coat, his neck so thin, he looked like an ancient turtle. Her heart ached to see him so diminished, the robust uncle of her youth just a memory. She rose and enfolded him in a quick hug. “Uncle, I’m so sorry. I’ve been a selfish cad.”
Olivia returned to her seat, and dug into the roasted squab and buttered turnips on her plate. Why hadn’t she thought of it before? Maxwell could be the answer to all of her worries. She would accept his proposal and explain about the Hill Orphans. He would have to help them. Wouldn’t he?
“Does this mean you’ll be accepting Grimwig’s offer, dear?”
“Yes,” she answered, her mind consumed with how best to arrange a meeting with Max. She simply couldn’t wait until the Carters’ dinner party, two days hence. Waiting would be torturous. And besides, the boys needed their help now.
“Olivia?”
She had not seen or heard from Max since the night of his proposal. What if he didn’t show to the Carters’ either? The next event was the following week … the Grimwigs’ ball. They would need to make the engagement announcement that evening.
“Olivia Elizabeth Brownlow!”
Olivia jerked, dropping her fork with a clatter. She turned to her uncle, whose white brows were connected over his sharp nose, his mouth a stern slash. She hadn’t seen that particular expression on him since he’d caught her smoking his pipe.
“Sir?”
“Is it too much to ask that you attend the conversation?” His face softened, his mouth turning up in bemusement. “You’ve always been a little dreamer, my girl. But this is important.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why have you hesitated to accept Maxwell’s proposal? Do you have feelings for another?”
“Feelings for another?” she repeated, buying time. She had many feelings for Jack—anger, fascination, resentment, desire—none of which signified a future.
“No, Uncle, my hesitation was not due to anything but my girlish fantasies of romance. I was momentarily … distracted by the attentions of another. But I’ve come to see the futility of that … er … relationship.” She clenched her teeth, clarifying pain radiating through her skull. Wanting and needing were two exceedingly different things. What she wanted was of no consequence. Everyone she loved would benefit from her match with Max. Jack MacCarron was nothing but a liar and a thief.
“Do you not love him?”
“Love?” Olivia blinked at her uncle for several moments before she realized that for the second time that evening she’d been thinking of Jack when he spoke of Max. She cleared her throat and arranged the napkin on her lap. “Max is an honorable man, who I’m sure I can come to love over time. Please do not worry yourself, Uncle.”
“I see.” His narrow shoulders slumped impossibly lower, his chin dipping into his starched cravat. “I find I’m too fatigued to eat.” He rang a tiny bell by his plate, summoning the butler.
Thompson arrived and helped Uncle Brownlow to his feet.
“Please finish your meal, my dear. We can talk more of this on the morrow.”
“Of course.” Olivia nodded. Her uncle seemed to be weaker than usual as he leaned on the butler’s arm and they left the room.
She would not give him any more cause for concern. She would arrange a meeting with Max, and by tomorrow, she would be a happily engaged woman.
“Whiskey, govnah?” A serving girl leaned into Jack’s face, her ample bosom blurring as it threatened to spill out of its laces. His gaze flicked from her chest to her face, and he reared back in his seat. The woman’s pockmarked s
kin and crusted, empty eye socket sobered him in an instant.
“None for me, thanks.”
The girl moved to the next gentleman at the round table, and Jack turned his attention to the pair of tens in his hand. He’d bluffed his way into a small fortune tonight, but it didn’t make up for what he’d lost the night before. Somehow, he couldn’t bring himself to care.
“I’m all in,” the portly man with heavy muttonchops announced as he pushed his little pile of coins and trinkets into the center of the table, and then puffed on a fat cigar.
Jack watched the bloke scratch the side of his meaty nose, his eyes shifting between the center of the table and the cards in his hand. Jack almost smiled. Some people simply shouldn’t attempt to bluff.
Through a thick haze of smoke, Jack watched the man next to him fiddle with his cards. The reddish-brown stains under his fingernails and the vague, rotten stench surrounding him pegged him as a butcher. After several glances between his cards and money, he folded.
Next was the old man. Jack had never traded with him, but judging by his mismatched clothing and the random baubles he wagered, Jack guessed he owned a pawnshop, and not a very successful one. He slapped his cards down. “I’m out too.”
Perfect. Jack pushed his pile into the center of the table. “I’m in. Show yer cards.”
Sweat popped out on the fat man’s forehead as he lowered his quivering hand. A pair of eights. Jack slapped his tens down and raked in his winnings.
“Aw! Ye blasted blighter! Me wife’s gonna kill me.”
“If you didn’t have a wife, you wouldn’t have that problem, now would you?” Jack muttered.
The portly man continued to sputter until a hand yanked him out of his seat by his collar. “You had yer turn,” the newcomer growled as he gave the stout man a push, sending him to his knees.
The new gent was barrel chested, his arms corded with the muscle of a dock worker. His dark, alert eyes darted to each player at the table before he sprawled in the newly vacated seat and pulled out an impressive wad of bills. “Deal me in.”
As the butcher dealt the cards, Jack watched the newcomer. His clothes were of average quality, clean but mended in spots. Incongruous with the roll of money he flaunted. Perhaps he played for a benefactor who didn’t wish to dirty his hands.
After several rounds, Jack was forced to abandon that conclusion. The newcomer played with a recklessness that a sponsor would not appreciate, almost as if money were not the object of this particular gent’s aim. Jack forced himself to focus. A gambler with no interest in money could only mean trouble.
Jack folded and watched the newcomer take the last of the pawnbroker’s earnings. Jack gathered the cards and shuffled the deck. “You out, old man?”
The pawnbroker shook his head and dug through his pockets, presumably searching for something to wager.
The cards distributed, Jack glanced at his hand. He hadn’t been around this much smoke in ages, and it was giving him a raging headache. Or, mayhap, it was his lack of sleep and food. But every time he thought to return home, to his soft feather bed, meals served like clockwork, and his responsibilities to Lois—which would include attending parties at her whim—something deep in his chest ached. It had taken him at least a full day to realize it was his heart. He’d let his blasted guard down with Olivia. He actually felt something for the girl.
He checked his pocket and noted the sad state of his funds. Lifting his free hand to his forehead, he squeezed his temples; but the moment his eyes closed, a honey-gold gaze stared at him in accusation, and the anger inside him sparked fresh. She was the one who had deceived him, not the other way around.
A sudden shift in the energy at the table yanked Jack’s attention back to the game.
The newcomer leaned forward, his body as taut as a fiddle string. The pawnbroker was in the process of setting something in the center of the table. An oval locket, engraved with an intricate filigree design, attached to a long, gold chain.
“Too rich for my blood.” The butcher threw down his cards. “I’m out.”
Jack’s gaze shifted from the necklace to the man across from him, who snatched the locket from the old pawnbroker. “Let me see that.”
Jack sat straighter in his chair as he watched the man click open the locket in his wide palm, his eyes narrowing in satisfaction.
“What’s your price, old man?” the newcomer demanded.
The pawnbroker blinked owlishly. “’Tis a wager.”
“Blast that. I’ll buy it outright. What’s your price?”
Understanding seemed to dawn on the old man’s face, a smile multiplying the wrinkles of his cheeks. “What’ll you pay, chap?”
Jack watched with renewed interest as the big man offered an amount that far outweighed the value of the piece, and demanded to know where the locket had been acquired. But before the pawnbroker could answer, Jack cut in. “I’d like to see the locket.”
The possibility of a bidding war caused the old man’s eyes to glow with triumph. Jack extended his open hand. Waiting. The big man glared, the necklace clutched in his fist, a muscle working in his jaw.
“The necklace was placed as a wager.” Jack leaned forward and met the man’s vulpine gaze, unblinking. “If you plan to take it off the table, I’ll have a look, or you’ll put it back in the pot.”
The man’s attention shifted to a blond gentleman near the bar nursing a mug of ale, and then he turned to Jack, the tension leaving his shoulders with a shrug. He reached across the table and let the necklace drop from his fist by slow degrees, the chain still clasped in his fingers.
Jack grabbed the locket with a swift yank. The big man came out of his seat glaring, and the butcher pushed back from the table so quickly he almost toppled in his chair. With deliberation, Jack leaned back in his seat and flicked out his coat, revealing several knives strapped against his chest. “Relax, gentleman. I’ll have my look.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Jack spied the bloke with the ale moving to stand behind him. His muscles tensed for a fight, but he forced himself to appear relaxed and crossed his ankle over his opposite knee.
He unclasped the locket. It took every ounce of his considerable self-control to hide his reaction to the portrait within. Dark-gold hair, a dimpled smile … Olivia. He blinked. No, not Olivia: the chin was too weak, the jawline less defined. It had to be her mother, the woman in the painting above the fireplace in the Brownlows’ parlor.
Jack quickly calculated the money he had left. It was less than what the big man had bid, but he offered every last pence to the pawnbroker. “However, I do not require the source of the sale. You can maintain the privacy of your clientele.” Jack held his breath as the old man’s eyes darted between him and the locket and then to the man hovering at his shoulder. It was the first time since leaving the Dodger behind that Jack wished for the notoriety he’d lost. A good scare could go a long way in such situations.
Extending a shaking hand, the pawnbroker requested the locket back. Jack handed over the piece and wondered why on earth the big man had such a strong interest in a seemingly benign object. Did he know Olivia? What were his intentions? Blackmail? From what he’d gathered, she and her uncle were close to broke.
“I’ve decided to sell … er …” The old man swallowed and glanced at Jack and then back at the man behind him. The git took a menacing step forward. But it was unnecessary. As usual, greed won out. “To the highest bidder.”
The vile grin that split his opponent’s face caused Jack’s fingers to curl into a fist. He watched the big bludger take the locket and tuck it into his breast pocket, then count out the promised fee. The bills clutched in his fist, he prompted, “And the information?”
Clearly, the source of the locket was of equal importance to the trinket itself. Jack could not allow these goons to sense his personal involvement, so he crossed his arms over his chest and settled back in his seat, even as his every sense strained toward the old man.
The
pawnbroker’s gaze never left the money as he answered, “One of the Hill Orphans brought it in. Dark-haired kid … believe he goes by Brit.”
With a nod, the big man handed over the cash. The harsh plains of his face revealed nothing as he pushed his chair back and left the table. The other man fell in beside him and they made their way to the bar. Jack gathered his winnings, donned his hat, and rose from the table. Pushing his way through the crowded, smoke-filled room, he positioned himself at the corner of the bar. If not in fact her mother, the woman in the locket had to be Olivia’s close relation, so why would a street kid have it? Likely, it had been stolen—just like so many he’d lifted in years past. An accidental trip, a quick yank, and the ladies were none the wiser.
Jack motioned for the bartender and paid his tab, keeping one eye on the men with the locket, who were toasting their boon. The man who’d hovered behind him at the table tipped back his drink and faced Jack full on, and the room gave a sharp tilt. Jack gripped the tacky wood of the bar and stared. Tall, broadly built, and a few years older than Jack. His hay-colored hair pulled into a tail at his neck only accentuated sharp features and close-set eyes.
His old nemesis, Edward Leeford. Ice skittered across Jack’s shoulders and burned through the scar between his ribs. But it couldn’t be. Leeford had died at the hands of a band of coppers who chose to extract their own justice from his evil hide.
But there he stood, laughing and drinking. Very much alive.
Jack inched closer. Did Edward wish Olivia ill? Despite Jack’s jumbled feelings for the girl, he couldn’t abandon her to Leeford’s machinations. Even if getting involved was all kinds of madness. He moved around the packed bar and insinuated himself within hearing of Leeford and his goon.
“Did ye see that bloomin’ prat when I stole the locket from under his nose, Monks?”
Monks? Jack knew that name. As the men ordered a second drink, Jack struggled against the exhaustion clouding his brain, a memory finally surfacing. “That bloomin’ Monks is takin’ over everything. I’ll pledge to you right here, man.” That day in Paul’s shop, Critch had been terrified. Now Jack knew why. Leeford and Monks were one and the same.
Olivia Twist Page 9
