by Bec McMaster
“Yes,” Perry whispered, wrapping her arms around him and using her whole body to clench around him. It wracked her anew, throwing her back into the eye of the storm until she tossed her head back and cried out in pleasure.
The muscles in his throat strained, a vein standing out in his temple. Garrett gasped and then he spilled his seed within her, strain quivering through his body. Perry held on to him with desperate hands. She had to, for fear that she’d fall and never stop falling.
With another shattered gasp he collapsed against her, his breath coming hard against her bare throat and her breasts crushed between them. “Perry.” He stroked fingertips down her throat and over her collarbone. Then his weight came back down and his hand splayed flat over her ribs. “You are so beautiful, do you know that?” A quivering kiss against her jaw. “So wild, so brave…”
She clung to him, her feet rasping over the smooth muscle of his buttocks. Garrett lifted off her after long minutes, shuddering as his cock spilled from her. Rolling onto his side, he drew her into his arms and collapsed onto his back, one arm thrown over his eyes.
Warmth from the fireplace caressed her naked skin and Perry lay still for long minutes, listening to the beat of his heart beneath her ear. She’d never dreamed how much peace she would find in this moment, with his fingers lazily tracing circles on her shoulder.
“Nine years?” Garrett whispered, breaking the silence. “You’ve loved me for that long?”
Only he would dwell on such a thing at a moment like this. Perry curled her arms around him and rested her head against his chest. “For someone who thinks they know women, you never had a bloody clue.”
Twenty-eight
Nine years of living among men had immured Perry to the worst, or so she thought, but she’d never truly realized what a pack of old gossips the Nighthawks were. Doyle was the worst. The moment he’d discovered she was sharing Garrett’s chambers, he’d dug his heels in like a chaperone protecting her nonexistent virtue.
It didn’t help her temper that she’d met with her father that morning. It hurt to see him so tentative and uncertain of his welcome. He’d wanted her to return to the hall with him but Perry had shaken her head. She fully intended to stay with the Nighthawks. This was her home now, not the Echelon or society. Though she wanted, more than anything, to have him visit her each week. She’d missed him.
Stalking toward Garrett’s study, her ears caught a hint of conversation within. Several voices she recognized, and some she couldn’t quite place.
“Come in,” Garrett called when she knocked.
The room was crowded with people and chairs: Barrons, Lynch, Rosalind, Garrett, Lena Carver, her husband and sister, and a stranger who stood behind Honoria’s chair with his palm resting on her shoulder.
Perry shut the door, instantly feeling uncomfortable in the focus of everyone’s gaze.
“Miss Morrow.” Barrons stood, gesturing her to take his chair. “You look better than last we met.”
“Thank you,” she muttered, easing into the seat.
Garrett stole a glance at her, arching a questioning brow. She flashed him a slight smile, letting him know that the meeting with her father had gone well.
“Perry, you know Mrs. Carver and her husband, Will,” Garrett said. She nodded and he gestured to her right, where Honoria sat. “This is Lady Honoria Rachinger and her husband, Sir Henry.”
What were they doing here? Why had this meeting been called?
“Yes, I met Lady Rachinger. How do you do,” Perry replied to the woman’s husband.
She couldn’t quite take her eyes off Sir Henry’s crushed velvet waistcoat. The crimson color was shockingly vibrant in the room, highlighting the stark leather of his coat, and were there…razors at his belt? The kind a barber used? The man’s green eyes watched her examining him, then he gave a crooked smile—a dangerously wicked smile—and held out his hand to her. “Blade,” he said in a thick Cockney accent.
Perry’s eyes widened. “The Devil of Whitechapel?” she blurted. Three years ago the queen had knighted him, but she’d never realized his name was Sir Henry.
“One and the same,” he replied, shaking her hand. “But I prefer Blade.”
Barrons offered her a glass of blud-wein. “You’ll forgive me, but I asked Honoria and Blade to come. There’s been much discussion between myself and Lynch since the exhibition, and…I feel Honoria might be able to shed some light on this situation with the cure the prince consort now owns. She has some interest in this field and has been following all of the latest innovations in the search for a cure.”
Perry exchanged a flushed glance with Garrett, swiftly sipping her blud-wein. It was rather like having a living legend in the room.
“As several of you know, I was able to use the device to lower my CV levels before the prince consort took control of it,” Garrett said, nodding toward Honoria. “I’m happy to relate my experience with it if you desire.”
“You got ’igh CV levels?” Blade asked.
“Relatively,” Garrett replied. “They’re lower now, but I expect them to increase with time.”
Blade circled the room like a creature on the prowl, his hands clasped behind his back. Even Lynch tensed slightly as he passed by. “Let’s cut straight to the point. This ain’t got naught to do with the cure, you’re all fox-in-the-’en’s-’ouse ’bout the prince consort controllin’ it.”
Barrons and Lynch exchanged a glance.
“Some of us are interested in the cure itself,” Perry corrected, meeting and holding Blade’s gaze.
He shot Garrett a look, then nodded. “Fine. Some of us wants a cure. Some of us are concerned about that pasty-faced vulture ownin’ it.”
“I still hold Hague’s key to the device,” Lynch replied. “But the prince consort has his own, as gifted to him by Lady Aramina.”
“He’s getting dangerous,” Barrons said.
“He’s always been dangerous,” Will Carver snorted, crossing his arms over his enormous chest.
“You’re not on the Council,” Barrons retorted. “You don’t see his moods or the swift change in them. In the last three years, the Council has gained several new members. The prince consort no longer controls the way they vote. The device is his way of controlling the situation again.”
Garrett circled behind Perry, his hands sliding over her shoulders. “Everyone will want to use it. If he figures out how it works, then the prince consort’s power is absolute. He’ll own the Echelon.”
She knew what he was thinking. He’d made his thoughts on the prince consort quite clear, every time they saw a child living on the streets or men and women crushed and bloodied after a riot by the brutal hooves of the prince consort’s metal Trojan cavalry. The Nighthawks were the ones who cleaned up the bodies. The ones who knocked on houses and had to break the news to a loved one inside. Perry slid a hand over his and squeezed. The Council of Dukes might be guilty of some matters, but they were the only ones who had the power to stand against the prince consort if they willed it.
Until now.
“Bloody hell.” Lynch rubbed his jaw. “We’d never overthrow him.”
“Unless the cure is widely available to everyone,” Barrons agreed.
“Is that what we’re doing?” Perry asked, looking around the room. “Seeking to overthrow him?”
All of them stared back at her. Rosalind looked grim, her gaze dropping to her lap. Lynch’s fierce gray eyes were intensely focused on Barrons, and Barrons… He looked uncertain. Of the others, the most interesting thing she saw was the look Blade gave Honoria.
“The prince consort has grown increasingly erratic over the last few years,” Barrons finally said. “Offering the Moncrieff a Council seat was clearly a sign that he was trying to control the Council vote again. Moncrieff—and his cure—was the prince consort’s means of shifting power back, and now that the duke is dead…”
“The prince consort is going to start growing desperate again,” Lynch concluded
.
“That wasn’t a yes,” Perry pointed out, looking back and forth between the pair of them.
The moment stretched out, dust motes swirling through the haze of weak sunlight. Then Barrons laughed under his breath. “So it comes. The point where we have to put voice to the thoughts that have been troubling all of us.” He smiled at her. “Yes, my lady. It is becoming conclusively clear that the prince consort needs to be overthrown.”
“Yes,” Lynch murmured.
Rosalind wet her lips and squeezed his arm. “Yes.”
“So we steal the device?” The idea was impossible. It would be heavily guarded, under lock and key in the Ivory Tower, swimming in Coldrush Guards…
“What if there was no need to gain the device?” Honoria asked suddenly. “You all say the device gives him ultimate power, but what if there was another way to control the craving?”
“How?” Lynch murmured, all of the movement in his body vanishing as his knuckles whitened on the armchair’s sides.
Barrons turned away from the window, the light behind him obliterating the distinctive lines of his face and casting him in a halo of sorts. He looked like no angel, however. “Honoria, are you certain?”
“There is another…cure,” Honoria replied. “I discovered it almost four years ago, and both Blade and Barrons have been using it since. That’s why Dr. Hague’s machine interested me so much.”
The words hit Perry like a fist to the chest. “A cure?”
“And you didn’t think to mention this?” Rosalind demanded. “Everyone fears the Fade.” Surreptitiously her gloved hand slid over Lynch’s, though she didn’t look at him. “It would shift the entire power of the Echelon.”
Perry let out a breath, feeling a little dizzy. She didn’t dare glance at Garrett. This couldn’t be true… She could barely allow herself to hope.
“Whoever controls the cure controls the Echelon,” Barrons said grimly. “And whoever discovered that cure is worth more than their weight in gold. The prince consort would lock them away and never let them see the light of day again—or he’d assassinate her so only he knew its secrets. We were protecting her.”
“Perhaps that was wrong of us,” Honoria said. “I didn’t realize so many other people would be affected by withholding such information.” This with an apologetic look at Garrett. “It’s a vaccination my father discovered. It doesn’t affect a blue blood, but if he drinks his blood from a human who has been vaccinated, it slowly decreases his CV levels until he reaches a plateau.”
“If we hold this information, we can regain power on the Council,” Lynch murmured.
“No,” Honoria replied. “I won’t see this information used for the Echelon’s games.”
“If we give it,” Blade said, “then we give it to all. If the information’s free, then can’t nobody use it for their own terms. The prince consort loses all that power.” His smile held a dangerous edge to it, and he winked at Will Carver. “That’s somethin’ I’ll drink to.”
Honoria took a deep breath. “I shall publish all of the information in the scientific journals and the newspapers.”
“That’s still dangerous for you,” her sister Lena murmured.
“If you can live as a verwulfen, then I can reveal my hand.”
“Publish it anonymously,” Perry replied.
“An excellent idea,” Honoria replied with a warm smile. “Or perhaps I shall publish it under my father’s name. Sir Artemus Todd. He discovered it, truly.”
“And then?” Garrett demanded. “You said you mean to overthrow the prince consort, not just counteract him. Are you all insane? He owns the Coldrush Guards and the legions of metaljackets—who outnumber the Nighthawks, might I point out!”
“We’re not without our own allies,” Barrons murmured.
“A handful of Nighthawks, a couple of dukes, and the Humans First Party, I presume?” Garrett asked, glancing toward Rosalind.
“The verwulfen ambassador,” Will Carver added, “and all the verwulfen under me command.”
“Count me in,” Blade muttered. “And me men.”
“There are humanists scattered throughout the city from when I ruled the revolution.” Rosalind’s voice was stronger now. “And…preparations were laid to go to war, if the humanists ever grew strong enough to topple the Echelon. Those preparations are still in place.”
“All we would need,” Barrons said, “are the Nighthawks.”
The world seemed to slow down. Perry felt very small all of a sudden and glanced at Garrett for comfort. The word “war” seemed to hover in the air. She knew what it meant. People would die. Friends and enemies alike. But hope also shimmered in the air between them. No more bloodied bodies and riots.
“Is that your cost?” Garrett asked. “For your cure?”
Surprisingly Blade shook his head. “You’ll ’ave the cure. You’ve me word on it, regardless o’ what you decide.”
Garrett glanced at Lynch.
“It’s your decision,” Lynch replied. “They’re your men now.”
“Aye, and if I don’t agree, I’ll be the one forced to send them after you once the prince consort gets wind of this,” Garrett snapped. A red flush crept up his throat and he turned away, clasping both hands behind his head as he stared at the study wall.
Rosalind shot her a look but Perry ignored it. This was his decision to make, and she refused to see him coerced into it by his friends.
Crossing toward him, she reached out and stroked the hard leather carapace of the back of his body armor to let him know that he wasn’t alone in this.
“What do you think?” Garrett asked.
Perry considered the question. She didn’t particularly like the answer that was forming in her mind, but she couldn’t very well turn her back on the truth. “If it doesn’t happen now, then it will happen eventually. I think it’s inevitable. You only have to look back on the last few years and increasing tensions between humans and the Echelon.
“The prince consort has crushed too many riots, forced martial law down upon the city more than once, and increased blood taxes to a dangerous level. Once he rebuilds the draining factories, he’ll have to put the blood taxes up again to fill them. The working class will rise by themselves, sooner or later, and he will crush them.” Or we’ll be forced to.
“And you?” he murmured. “If I make this decision, then I’m throwing you straight into the heart of this war.”
Perry knew immediately what held him back. She’d nearly died, and he had watched it happen.
“Now or then, Garrett. It will come eventually.”
He stroked her face, gentle fingers brushing against her cheek. “I’m afraid. For you.”
“I know,” she replied, cupping his hand and turning her lips into the palm of it. “Then we fight back to back. The way we’ve always done.”
The doubt slowly faded from his eyes. “I want this,” he admitted, and she knew he was thinking of Mary Reed, forced into prostitution by rising taxes and the Echelon’s greed. Of all those women and children he hadn’t been able to save over the years.
Perry’s lips curled up in a rusty smile. “We survived against the Moncrieff and Hague… We can survive anything, Garrett. With you by my side, I know there’s nothing to fear.”
“Your father is going to have my head. I promised him I’d keep you safe.”
That surprised her. “When did you—?”
“We had a certain type of discussion this morning, while you were sleeping,” he replied.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
A knowing light came into his eyes. “It’s the type of discussion a father has with the man who’s bedding his daughter. Consider it between him and me.” The humor in his eyes faded and he turned back to the room in general. “I don’t entirely like this. I think we need to consider the effects of what we speak of before we commit to such a course.” Garrett met all of their eyes in turn. “But for what it’s worth, it’s done. You have the Nighthawks.”
Both Lynch and Barrons let out a breath of relief.
Garrett, however, wasn’t finished. “But first, there is something else to plan. Perry is going to do me the honor of becoming my consort.”
“I am?” she asked, arching a brow at him.
“You wouldn’t want me to break two promises to your father, would you?” he asked, that devilish little smile she loved so much tickling at his lips.
Acknowledgments
To my agent, Jessica Faust, for always being there on the other end of the email and supporting me wholeheartedly, no matter what.
My heartfelt thanks to Leah Hultenschmidt for acquiring the series and setting my feet on this path; and to my wonderful new editor, Mary Altman, for putting her time and energy into this book. My project editor, Megan, for catching all of the glitches and making me think. Thank you also to the entire team at Sourcebooks who do all of the behind-the-scenes work and helped whip this book into shape!
Special thanks to my amazing support crew, the ELE girls: Nicky Strickland, Dakota Harrison, Kylie Griffin, and Jennie Brumley! Wonderful writers all, who are always there to share the journey and helped me with the beta read. For all of my readers, Facebook fans, and Twitter followers: you make this all truly worth it. I love getting to “ooh” over covers and share book recommendations with you all—it keeps me sane!
To my family and friends, who understand my hermit-like ways and are always pushing me to chase my dreams. To Beryl Raselli, Sarah Holland, Evelyn and the local library ladies, and Chris Day-Plush for helping to spread word of the books in town.
And last, but certainly not least, to my boyfriend, Byron, for getting excited over the little things with me, understanding why I have to work so many hours, being the first to tell me to quit my job so I can write full time, and generally for being my best friend, always. This book is a special one, written just for you.
In case you missed it, here’s an excerpt from the groundbreaking first novel in Bec McMaster’s London Steampunk series