by Riley Cole
Edison gripped her arms, stilling her. “I’ve never lost a client yet. We’ll find him, but I can’t do two things at once. I want you and Nelly to go back to our offices. We have a telegraph there. She can contact Detective Burke.”
“But—”
“You’ll be of more help there. We’ll find the boy. You have my word.” He tried to smile. “I’ll pick up your things while we’re at it.” His lips curved up in a small smile, as if he were trying to coax her out of her fears. “Unless you prefer onions and cabbage to French perfume?”
Ada stared down at her dirty apron. “I do look a fright.”
“Your perfume doesn’t impress, but that outfit has its possibilities.”
Edison was staring down at her. With the top buttons on her old dress long gone, the valley between her breasts was perfectly open to view.
Despite her agitation, Ada flushed.
“That’s better.” Edison took her chin in his hand, raising her head until their eyes met. “I’m quite good at this sort of thing. We’ll find the lad, then we’ll find whoever did this.”
Ada nodded. Of that she had no doubt.
Edison rushed off with his companions. Arms folded across her chest, she hugged herself tight as he disappeared across the street.
Seduction, passion, and now murder. All in less than twenty four hours.
Damned if this entire escapade hadn’t gone spinning out of control.
She was out of her depth now, farther out to sea than she would’ve imagined possible.
Chapter 16
Night didn’t so much as fall as sneak through the streets on the heels of a choking, tea-colored fog. Edison watched the vile mist grow from the ground up until it obscured even the few stars bold enough to outshine the city lights.
It was shaping up to be a foul evening.
He folded his arms across his chest and stretched out his legs, taking up more than his share of the limited legroom in the brougham.
The boy in question sat on the seat opposite, sullen-faced, but with a wariness in his light eyes.
Once they’d cornered him in the library of White’s mansion, he’d come along more or less willingly. Though the boy had readily admitted taking Ada’s things and selling her cards, his helpfulness did nothing to reassure Edison that the boy would be safe.
On the contrary, the lad had known the woman. They had to assume the killer now had a name—and a good description—to follow.
Which meant he now had one more person to guard.
Edison sank down in his seat and rubbed a hand over his face. Damned if this case hadn’t gotten to him more than any other.
Of course, he’d never bedded a client before.
He winced. Not the most prudent move, but he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. On the contrary, he was very much looking forward to doing it again.
“I’m hungry,” the boy announced.
“So am I.” Edison crossed his legs and slouched down in his seat, letting his eyelids droop until he imagined he looked like he was napping.
Briar kicked him in the ankle.
“We’ll be at our destination soon,” she said to the boy. “Plenty to eat once we get there.”
“I won’t go to jail,” the lad muttered.
“It’s a good thing that’s not where we’re going, then, isn’t it?” Edison responded.
The lad opened his mouth just as Crane pulled the carriage to a stop.
As Briar and Meena stepped out of the carriage, Edison gave their charge the full force of his stare. “I’m faster than I look, and those ladies are quicker still. If you want to sleep with a full belly tonight, don’t make us chase you down.”
The boy’s eyes widened in fear, but he managed a disdainful sneer. Edison liked the show of spirit. He grinned as he waved the lad out into the street.
The main office was warm and smelled faintly of tea. Which made his own stomach rumble.
Briar and Meena waited outside the door, careful to stay on each side of the boy. Though she held it casually, Meena kept her umbrella sword at her side. His sister would have a throwing knife or two tucked up her sleeves. Should their young charge make a run for it, she’d pin his sleeves to the wall before he could turn the doorknob.
Not that the boy was going anywhere. Like most who spent any time living by their wits, he obviously relied on his instincts, instincts that told him they were trustworthy… at least for the moment.
Edison eyed the ragged youth. He was taller than he’d imagined. Cleaner, too. Thick black hair, tangled and unkempt, fell to his shoulders, obscuring light gray eyes that sparkled with intelligence.
The boy’s head seemed to be on a swivel as he took in his surroundings. The haunted fear that froze his features when they’d cornered him was gone, but Edison knew better than to believe he’d dropped his guard.
Edison pointed at the empty desk across from Nelly’s type writing machine. “Sit.”
“Cor, this’s strange enough, then.” The boy eyed the machine, then he gave a start. Like some gleaming brass study in anatomy, the arm of Edison’s automatic butler lay on the next table over.
The lad squinted at the wires splayed out above the riveted elbow joint. “What kind o’ business you sort running here?”
“We help folks.” Nelly plopped down in front of her typing machine. “Folks as need restitution.”
“Resti-what?”
Nelly rolled her eyes. “Re-sti-tu-tion. We set things to right after the likes o’you do something bad.”
Edison ducked his head to hide a smile. Their little office girl was sensitive about being taken seriously. “Where’s Ada?” he asked.
Her gaze never leaving the boy, Nelly cocked her head toward the back offices. “In your workshop.”
He moved toward his laboratory. Before heading down the hallway, he pointed at the dark-haired boy. “Don’t steal anything.”
Nelly sniffed. “As if I’d let ’im.”
The boy crossed his arms over his chest, a look of disdain narrowing his eyes. “As if a snip of a thing like you could stop me.”
Edison chuckled. “She’s fiercer than she looks.”
“Hmmm.” The lad didn’t sound convinced. A cheeky grin creased his face as he eyed Briar in her frilly green gown. “Bleeding hell. I hope that one’s fiercer than she looks.”
Edison bit his lip, trying not to laugh. Between Briar’s cutting glare and Nelly’s disdain, it was a wonder the young idiot wasn’t burned to a pile of ash.
Thank God Meena and Crane were there to referee.
He headed off after Ada. Light spilled into the hallway from the doorway to his shop. It looked as if she’d made herself at home.
He cringed, thinking of her well-ordered, well-supplied laboratory. His jumble of unfinished projects must seem the height of amateurish tinkering to an accomplished scientist like her.
The minute he saw her slender back as she sat at his workbench, all thoughts of actual working evaporated.
He’d never entertained a woman in his workshop. Of course, he’d never met a woman who wanted to be in his workshop.
And now there was a woman—a passionate tiger of a woman—in his domain.
Voluntarily.
It was enough to make his head spin. More than enough to make him hard.
Ada looked up eagerly. “You found him? Is he all right?”
“He’s fine,” Edison moved closer. “Gave us a bit of a run for it.” He propped his hip against the thick edge of the workbench. “The lad’s lucky Meena hooked him with her parasol before Briar had time to pin him with one of her throwing stars.”
Ada sagged against the bench. “Thank you.”
Edison shrugged. “It’s what we do.”
She nodded and held an object up to the light. “Smoke bomb?”
“It is now.” He scrubbed a hand over the stubble on his chin. “I was trying to fashion a disodorizer. Clears out unpleasant scents. The odd fish odor and the like.”
&
nbsp; Ada held the thing up, turning it about in the light and examining it from every angle. “Extraordinary.”
“Not really.” He took it from her. “Doesn’t actually work. Too much smoke.”
Ada leaned forward, sniffing at the tiny grates cut into each end. “Too much ammonium nitrate. You might try adding a few grains of iodine. It’ll slow the reaction.”
Edison blinked. That would do it. Damnation, the woman was brilliant.
And beautiful. Sinfully beautiful. Even in cabbage-scented rags, he wanted her.
Edison flexed his fingers. He wanted to do was toss her across his workbench and tear off that silly costume, wanted to pillage her mouth, then kiss his way down her chest and take her taut pink nipples between his lips and—
A burst of laughter from the front office doused his passion like a bucket of freezing water to the face.
He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet, trying to ease the ache of his arousal.
Ada was not unaffected, he was pleased to note. Her chest rose and fell as if she were taking long, deep breaths. Her mouth was slightly parted, her pupils dilated.
He recognized the signs. She wanted him as badly as he wanted her.
Though gratifying, the thought only made it harder for him to back away.
Pressed back into a far corner, his automatic butler gleamed in the flickering gaslight, its one good arm hanging at its side, its shiny brass face a blank mask of disapproval.
Edison glared back. He was no stranger to lust, but Lucifer’s eyebrows, it had been years since he’d felt this kind of uncontrollable urge.
There was something highly potent in his coupling with Ada. An energy more powerful than mere passion had sunk its claws into him.
He rolled his shoulders back. The thought made him cringe. Getting leg-shackled wasn’t high on his list of life accomplishments.
Not that he’d have to concern himself. At the end of the day, he might have awoken Ada’s passion, but he wouldn’t be the one to keep it stoked.
With her quick mind and her social station, Ada Templeton was as far out of his realm as a dukedom.
Which was as it should be. A woman as kind and sensitive as Ada deserved better than his hollowed out hulk.
It was only a matter of time before she came to the same realization.
“We should go,” he announced.
“Go where?”
“Our house in Pimlico. It’s easily defended. We could all use a hot meal and a good night’s sleep.”
Ada’s gaze moved to the open door. “What about the boy?”
“We’ll take him. Meena’ll find something to keep him busy until we have this business done.” Edison strove to present a brisk, businesslike demeanor.
Ada nodded.
Edison thought he might have seen a flicker of hurt cross her face. Or maybe it had been a hunger pang. He sighed. He could spot a prevaricator a mile off, but the secrets of the female heart were a complete mystery.
“After you,” he said, and ushered her toward the door.
When they exited into the main office, he had the distinct sense that the others were staring.
They were. Every one of them was staring, the new boy included.
Edison rubbed the back of his neck. “What?” he growled. “Shouldn’t we get back to the house and eat?”
“I imagine Mrs. Templeton would like to change first,” Meena pointed out.
Edison glanced back at Ada in her charwoman’s rags. “Right.”
Meena held up Ada’s dark gray dress. “I thought you might want something less… odiferous. The rest of your things are in the carriage.”
Ada smiled. “I’m sure you’d all appreciate it as well.”
Briar laughed. “I couldn’t wait to get out of those gin-soaked things. Cabbage isn’t nearly as bad.”
“I’ll help you change.” Meena gestured for Ada to precede her up the stairs to the apartment above.
Shoulders slumped, Ada followed his cousin without sparing him the slightest glance.
He winced. She had to be tired. Tired and hungry and sick of his bullock-brained self.
The boy was leaning back in his chair, feet on the desk. He crossed his arms behind his head. “You’re not the best spoken of the lot, are ye?”
Crane coughed, bringing a hand up to cover his mouth. Nelly and Briar tried to hide their grins behind their hands.
Edison frowned up at the landing as Meena and Ada glided off down the hallway above.
Of all the times for his charm to desert him.
They were coming down to it. He and his league would catch the villain, and Mrs. Ada Templeton would go on to the fame and fortune she deserved.
He’d been hoping for a few more intimate encounters first.
Extraordinary woman like Ada didn’t grow on trees. If she gave him the least opportunity, he’d take it.
Not that he was doing anything to help his case.
* * *
Songbirds chirped outside the window of her borrowed bedroom. Their cheerful commotion only aggravated Ada’s dark mood. The sunlight did help, either. It forced its way through a chink in the drapes, shining merrily, suggesting last night’s fog had burned away.
Ada sighed. Stifling gloom better suited her thoughts.
She gripped the open doors of the wardrobe and glared at the pitiful collection of gowns.
The blue satin called to her.
She ached to feel that sensual power again, wanted to flaunt her bare skin, to force Edison to recall the passion, the raw lust, they’d shared just yesterday.
Sensual matters were far out of her sphere of existence, but even with her lack of experience, she knew he’d felt it too.
Why, then, had he been so distant last night? Was that simply the way of men, to slake their thirst and move on?
She couldn’t believe that. Not when every caress, every sigh, every moan remained so fresh in her own mind.
Ada tapped her thumb against the door of the wardrobe. The blue satin mocked her. What if all that passion, all that daring and boldness was generated by a bolt of cloth and some silk undergarments?
And now, like an actress leaving the stage, it was time to shed her alter ego and return to boring old Ada Templeton, too scientifically minded to be a desirable woman.
Ada wrenched her perfectly serviceable, perfectly comfortable, perfectly dull gray dress off of its hanger and held it up to the morning light.
Ugly. Ugly, ugly, ugly.
She tossed it on the bed and eyed the three other gowns hanging in the wardrobe.
Except for the borrowed satin, the rest were even duller than the gray.
Ada glared down at the offending dress. If only they’d all catch fire. Then Cherise’s gown would be the only choice.
But there was an alternative.
Ada rushed over to the chest of drawers next to the wardrobe. The underthings. No reason she couldn’t sport the silk stockings, the whisper-thin chemise and the delicious satin corset.
She unwrapped her dressing gown and stepped into the luxurious underthings. The same way the thick steel case of her battery hid a riotous soup of chemical energy, her outer shell might suggest calm and decorum, but her inner layer would channel the bold, sensual woman she’d played for those few brief hours.
The woman she wasn’t ready to abandon.
Once the mirror showed that she was buttoned from one end to the other, without a stray hair out of place, she girded herself for the breakfast table.
Whether the prickly inventor downstairs chose to repeat their mutual performance or not, she could strive to retain the essence of that wild woman.
Dress in order, Ada stalked off down the stairs to face tea and toast and Edison’s boisterous family.
When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she saw Nelly and the boy standing outside the dining room, deep in conversation.
The boy gripped the doorframe as if braced against a strong wind determined to blow him inside.
; “He won’t hurt you,” Nelly insisted.
“‘E’s a crusher. I can’t go in there.”
“He’s one of us.” She raked him with a look. “Besides, you’re nothing but small change to a detective like Inspector Burke. You ain’t done nothing big enough for him to bother gettin’ out his handcuffs.”
“Have too.”
Nelly snorted. “Says you.” She raised her hands in a gesture of frustration. “Do whatcha want, but I’m hungry.” She flounced through the doorway.
Ada watched as the boy struggled to decide between certain incarceration and coddled eggs.
As she would have guessed, sustenance won out.
The Sweets and Detective Burke were already tucking into a fine looking breakfast when she entered. The boy had squeezed himself in between Edison and Spencer, as far away from the dreaded detective as he could sit.
The only open seat was at Edison’s right.
He rose with the other men as she glided through the doorway. He nodded in greeting and went back to buttering his toast.
A simple nod.
No mischievous smile, no clandestine, heat-filled glance. No bloom in his cheeks or fire in his eye.
Ada wilted inside her wrinkled gown. It was only to be expected. All that seductive power she’d wielded hung, unused, in the wardrobe upstairs. Plain, sensible Ada Templeton, chemical scientist, held no allure for a man like him.
The smell of toast and bacon suddenly put her off as her stomach sank down to her feet.
Ada slipped into her seat. Before she could protest, Edison grabbed her plate and loaded it with food from the serving dishes in the center of the table.
He slid it in front of her without a word, his attention on the discussion at hand.
The pile of golden eggs and glistening bacon mocked her. Was he trying to tell her something? Would he have done that for any guest?
Ada blinked down at the innocent-looking food. If there was a secret message to be decoded, she was at a loss.
“That’s it?” Meena was frowning at the detective. “All those ruffians can recall is an average-sized man of average age and average looks?” She let her half-eaten toast drop back onto her plate. “That’s less than helpful.”