Beauty and the Rake

by Erica Monroe

  He brushed a hand through his hair, tugging at the ends in frustration. “Because you know damn well I’m not the type of man who’d propose marriage because he feels guilty.”

  “No, you’ll just settle money on me,” she retorted. “That’s why you wanted to help, isn’t it?”

  “Part of the reason why,” he admitted. “But not the only reason. I wanted to protect you. Because I love you.”

  “You lied once. Any promises you make from here on out are colored by deception.” Her bottom lip trembled. She drew it between her two front teeth to stop the quaking. “When I told you I loved you, you said nothing about this. You allowed me to believe everything was real between us. I lay with you, Michael! Not because of our deal, but because I felt for you.”

  Tears burned the back of her eyes. She’d rather die than let them fall. She wouldn’t allow him to see her pain.

  He reached for her, lowering his hand before he even walked toward her, as if he knew it was now futile. “I hoped you’d understand I was going to spend the rest of my life making amends. I know the cards you’ve been dealt are bad.”

  She wanted to tell him that he knew nothing, but that was a lie too. She’d bared her soul to him, but he hadn’t thought to reward her with the same honesty. He knew everything. Her hopes. Her fears. Her most intimate desires.

  His voice was but a whisper. “And anyone else would have broken under these circumstances, but you didn’t. When I saw you in hospital, you looked so frail, but there was still this fighting spirit to you. I remember leaning down and whispering in your ear that you’d come out the other side stronger than before.”

  “That was you?” She hated the way her voice trembled. The slide of a single tear down her cheek, no matter how hard she clenched her fists or told herself she wouldn’t give in.

  “I went to see you.” He mistook her devastation for relief, crossing the room to her. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you. Knight had said you were hurt badly, but you were making an impressive recovery. You’re a fighter.”

  You’re a fighter. Why hadn’t she recognized his voice? She’d replayed his words so many times in her mind. The sound had lost any semblance of reality, but she still felt reassured when she remembered it.

  The throb of her heartbeat echoed in her ears, so loud she could barely stand it. She was suffocating here. Every lie she’d believed in the past two weeks lined up to crush her, shiny lies designed to delude her.

  She had nothing to hang onto now. The voice—the one kindness she’d known before him—no longer rang true. When she’d wanted to end it all, that voice had shored her. The compassion of a stranger had reminded her that there was still good in this world. She’d asked the nurses who had come to see her, but none of them could remember. Eventually, she’d concluded it was better this way. That one moment had meant so much to her. She hadn’t wanted to take the chance that meeting the visitor would sully her memory.

  But all along, it’d been him. She had nothing of her own now, nothing that wasn’t tainted by his betrayal.

  She couldn’t move from this spot. Couldn’t gather up her things and run from him. She could only shake. Her nails dug into the fabric of her dress, and she cared not if she snagged his expensive linen. Let him pay for the damage she’d done. It was the least he could do.

  The least he could do. How many times had he said that? The memories spun around her like waft threads, waiting to be woven into the saddest tapestry. He’d made a life out of contributing the least amount he could to society and still he’d succeeded. She’d worked hard since she was six years old, and she’d gotten nowhere.

  His voice tore her from her thoughts. Soft, yet with a hint of gruffness, his words reverberated within her. He mollified her even while she strained against the situation. His grip on her was too potent.

  “When I saw you again at Cruikshank’s, it felt like fate,” he murmured. His hands might as well have been on her, for how personal his words were.

  “It wasn’t fate.” Another tear fell down her cheek, so she swiped it away with her battered hand. “It was dumb, stupid luck.”

  “I don’t believe that,” he said. “Abigail, I am not a perfect man. But around you, I become something more. Someone I can look in the mirror and not loathe.”

  She threw her head back, a bitter laugh shaking her shoulders. The sound of that laugh steadied her. Made her feel powerful.

  “How funny, considering when I’m around you, I hate myself.” She’d thought she was finally gaining strength to fight the past, but now she wasn’t even sure whom she was.

  He didn’t deserve to know how he’d built her up. How everything felt empty now, lies piled up on top of lies.

  “You can’t mean that,” he protested, yet his tone gave every indication he believed her claim. Then he knew her little, if he hadn’t marked the change in her this past fortnight.

  It had all been false. She clenched her fists together, finding solace in anger because the urge to burn everything around them was familiar. Ignoring him as he implored her, she fixated on the rage.

  Before her eyes, she saw red. A blinding, consuming red that inflamed everything in its wake. She’d believe in that red, if it meant she might come from this with her integrity intact. She wouldn’t be pitied by any man.

  She went to the wardrobe, her rapid, gangly steps displaying her deformity. One more reminder she’d never have been a good society wife. From the bottom shelf of the wardrobe, she tugged out the dress she’d worn when she first came to his house.

  “Turn around,” she demanded. “You don’t get to see me now.”

  “Is this really necessary?”

  She didn’t dignify that with an answer. This distance was absolutely necessary. She needed it. Without it, she’d break in front of him, and she’d never get that part of herself back.

  She’d given him everything. Her heart. Her virginity. Her very soul.

  He sighed, but he finally turned around. She pulled off the fancy dress she’d worn and put on her old clothes. The worn blue muslin scratched against her brittle skin, grown too used to the finer dresses he’d provided for her.

  She ignored the ache. Reminded herself that this clothing was the last thing she had left of herself, before she’d succumbed to his charms. Before she’d become another one of his ladybirds.

  She started toward the door. He came after her, getting there first, blocking it with his broad frame. Though she railed at him, punched him square in the chest, he wouldn’t move. He crossed his arms over his midsection and looked down at her. At least she’d managed to wipe that smug smirk off his lips.

  “Please don’t leave,” he pleaded. “I meant everything I said. I want you to be my wife.”

  When he reached for her, she didn’t have time to react. She was enveloped by him, back in his arms, her head smashed against his white linen shirt, pine in her nostrils and heat streaming through her body. Despite everything that was wrong, his embrace felt right. She was home.

  The red fury galloped away from her; a wild horse tamed by his saddle. She was tired, so tired. Her head swum with allegations and misconceptions until she could not pick the right reality. No longer was there a possibility in front of her that wouldn’t involve hurt. He held her to him, yet he did not restrain her. She could leave if she desired to do so.

  She stayed. Those tears she’d tried so valiantly to hold back streamed freely down her cheeks, soaking his shirt, leaving an imprint of her failure. She’d believed him, always.

  Abigail knew nothing except that his presence pacified her, defying logic. She leaned against him as a split woman, no longer Beauty, but not quite her former self either. While he murmured apologies and comfort, these warring impulses gripped her. She both longed to be his wife and to bury him in the darkest corner of Whitechapel where no one would find his corpse. He’d neglected to investigate Clowes, and she’d been hurt. He’d lied to her. He’d broken her one source of strength.

  He’d
changed everything, and she didn’t know what to believe.

  Finally, he withdrew. Dipped his head and pressed his lips to hers. For a second—a sweet second—she responded. His kiss tasted of broken promises, of wishes unfulfilled, and the tantalizing lure of what could never be. She broke from him, readjusted the fall of her dress, and pretended she hadn’t been affected when they both knew damn well she had been.

  “Stay,” he bid. “Stay with me, and we’ll work through this.”

  It was a tempting offer. So tempting that she almost agreed. Her world spun before her, full of missed opportunities and choices she’d never have because of that one night in the factory. She couldn’t think of the despair in his eyes. Of how her throat closed at the thought of leaving him. She must remember what had been taken from her.

  “I need time.” She gave a hasty nod because that much she was sure of. “You cannot expect me to sort this all out immediately. Of all the people I know, I didn’t expect that you would have failed me. I need to go home.”

  “You are home,” he replied.

  “To my home,” she corrected. “I need to see Bess and my father.”

  He looked as though he hadn’t thought of them in days. She stiffened. Perhaps all his promises about giving her sister a home were for naught too.

  “I’ll give you a week,” he vowed. “After a week I’m coming for you. I won’t lose you, Abigail.”

  “A week,” she agreed, partly because it was the only way she’d be able to leave without him objecting, and partly because having a date when she’d see him again set in stone calmed the clamor in her head.

  She departed the house without a goodbye to Mrs. O’Neal and Smithers, unable to master the words to thank them for their kindness, and afraid they’d persuade her to remain within these walls. With Clowes off to Ireland, she was secure in returning to Whitechapel. She slipped through the garden and out onto the street, stopping to pluck the frozen remains of a rose from one of the bushes.

  Bess would have her rose.

  22

  Three days passed. Three days in which Abigail did not return to him. He hadn’t received so much as a letter from her. He’d hoped, God he’d hoped, that when she had time to think about their fight, she’d realize they had too much to lose to remain apart.

  He’d been wrong about that, just as he’d been wrong to not tell her immediately of his participation in the case. If he’d been forthright with her, would she still be here? Would he be planning a wedding instead of pouring over these reports on Clowes’s departure to loosen the knot in his gut?

  He didn’t have answers.

  He didn’t have anything without her.

  Pushing his plate away from him, Michael glared at the breakfast dishes piled high upon the buffet. Cook hadn’t adjusted to cooking for one again. He remembered the way Abigail had set upon dinner the first night, the color finally returning to her wan cheeks.

  He’d enlist Smithers to take the remaining food out to Drury Lane for whoever wanted it. When he’d walked to work yesterday, he’d crossed through the rookeries. He’d seen it all anew. During the last few years, he’d wandered these streets numb to the pain of these people, thinking of his job and his problems. He’d seen these people for the trouble they caused him in his prior position of sergeant; then the investigations and paperwork they created for him as an inspector.

  Abigail didn’t see them as lawbreakers. She’d grown up here. She lived in a grouping of tumbling-down tenements he hadn’t visited yet but knew from Knight were on their last legs.

  It had never hit him so completely how different their worlds were until now. While he’d been raised to view Spitalfields as an open sore, festering and infecting the good, hard-working people of nearby Cheapside, Abigail saw this place as home.

  Abigail had trusted him to keep her from harm. He’d forsaken that trust before he ever met her by choosing his career over his duty to protect those who couldn’t defend themselves. Because of men like him, criminals prospered, believing they were invincible.

  The system was broken. No longer could he ignore the corruption in the Met. While Whiting’s treachery had made it palpable, Michael had postulated long before then that the Met was following the same path as the Night Watch before them.

  It didn’t matter that he’d changed, or that the department had overhauled procedures. Abigail was still hurt. He’d still wronged her. Nothing could erase that.

  He took a sip of coffee, wrinkling his nose. Abigail had made him see the world outside of his insularity, but if she wasn’t around, what was the point?

  Most of his life, he’d refused to examine any of his shortcomings. He’d blustered on, believing that if he simply acted confident, he’d be infallible. Now, with all of his iniquities laid out before him, he couldn’t ignore it.

  Shoving the coffee across the table, he glowered at the last report from Hume.

  No signs of Clowes or his top men. Ireland contacts haven’t reported back. Case should remain open until they do.

  –MH

  Signs. For the rest of his life, he’d hate that word, for he’d remember the way Abigail had flung it at him like a lethal threat. And if that was not bad enough, there was Hume’s assumption that he could determine which cases remained active. On a normal day, such presumptuous behavior would have grated on Michael’s nerves.

  Today, he’d gladly punch Hume in the throat.

  Gathering up the reports, Michael pushed his chair back. He’d already sent a letter to Knight to inform him of Clowes’s likely departure. At least Knight’s family would have the freedom to walk about London again.

  Once he located Smithers, and the remains of his breakfast were off to the rookeries, he’d feel somewhat restored. It’d be his way to honor Abigail, even if she’d never know what he’d done.

  As he entered the main hall, he nearly ran smack into Smithers. He slid to a stop in the nick of time, almost tripping over the edge of the oriental rug.

  “Sir,” Smithers gasped out. “Please excuse me.”

  “It’s no matter.” Michael took a closer look at the butler. Smithers’s imperturbable mien was marred by a creased brow and a grimace. “Have you been running? I know you wanted to be prepared in case anything happened with Clowes, but I hardly think sprinting in the house is the right way to go about it.”

  Smithers smoothed his hand over his impeccable attire. “There is a man here to see you.”

  “Ah.” Michael started to follow Smithers toward the parlor but paused halfway there. “People come to see me all the time without it causing you consternation. In fact, visitors usually overjoy you. I think it makes you feel important.”

  Smithers directed a withering glare at Michael. “This man is not like the others. He is…” The butler frowned, at loss for a polite expression. “Sir, he smells as though he bathed in horse urine.”

  Michael wrinkled his nose. “Perhaps you’d better show him out. Can’t have the whole bloody house stinking like piss.”

  “I tried,” Smithers countered. “He claims you ordered him to come here. Even produced your card.”

  The only man Michael had given his card to was Kip Jared, and that had been in case he had news of Clowes.

  “Damnation, why didn’t you say so?” Michael hurried to the parlor, Smithers following at a more sedate pace.

  As soon as Michael entered the room, Jared raised his fingerless-gloved hand to his head in a mock salute. “Mornin’, Inspector. Told ye ’e’d want to see me, old man.” The beggar waved his hand at Smithers. He hadn’t bothered to tie up his arm.

  He must be going to the gin joint after, not pandering on the streets. If Jared expected to receive payment from this visit, then he must have information on Clowes.

  “What news do you have?” Michael sat down on the settee, ignoring the twist of his stomach. Whatever bad tidings the mendicant brought; he’d handle it.

  “What’s the rush, mate?” Jared yawned, sprawling out in the armchair. “
Can’t we stay awhile? Take some tea? My belly’s been rumblin’. It’s ’ard work out there.”

  Smithers snorted. “The only work you’ve ever done—”

  Rolling his eyes, Michael held up a hand to stop Smithers from arguing. The last thing he needed was for Jared to whine for the next hour about ill treatment by the police.

  “One cup of tea. We’ll talk while Smithers brews it.” He gesturing to the door and ignored Smithers’s exaggerated sigh as the butler exited the room.

  “Bit uppity for a servant, ain’t ’e?” Jared crossed one stained leg over the other, his sludge-encrusted boots sinking into the ornate rug.

  Oh, you have no idea.

  Michael tapped his foot impatiently. “If you don’t start talking soon, I’d be delighted to have my ‘uppity servant’ toss you out into the street.”

  “Now, now, we don’t need none of that.” Jared shook his head emphatically. “I ’ear things, remember? And like ye said, I been listenin’ to the men talkin’ at the factory on White Lion.”

  “The old Larker place, yes,” Michael said. Abigail’s sister still worked there. “The new owners are supposedly legitimate.”

  “I ain’t got no idea of that.” Jared shrugged. “But I been watchin’ this one cub, Randal Russell. A real up-and-comer, they say, takin’ over where them Larkers left off. That’s just gibber—there’s always been somebody wantin’ that damn territory—but I ’eard ’im say somethin’ ’bout yer Clowes.”

  Michael leaned forward. “What did he say?”

  Jared cocked his head to the side, stroking his scratchy chin as if trying to remember. “Can’t recall. Maybe a biscuit would unlock me mind. Man gets famished, ye know.”

  Michael clenched his fists to refrain from throttling him. While Jared wasted his time, Clowes could be wreaking havoc upon London. “I swear to God if you don’t tell me, Jared, I’m going to make sure you’re hanged.”

  “Fine, fine, no biscuit,” Jared grumbled. “I remember it now. I was at Ten Bells and I ’ad a wee nip too much, so I ended up back in the alley spewin’ me guts. Young Randy was there too, with a bunch of his mates. They been cast out for bein’ too noisy.”