Sweet Revenge nu-1

by Zoë Archer

  The growler came to a sudden stop.

  Both Jack and Eva peered out the window. Fine-looking brick houses lined the quiet street. A little ways down the block, Gilling had jumped out of the hansom. He hurried up the walk of one of the houses. Lights shone beneath the drawn curtains, but the house itself looked as decent and well behaved as any of its neighbors. Looks couldn’t be trusted, though.

  “Do you know that place?” Eva asked.

  “It’s Mrs. Arram’s.”

  “Ah,” she said with understanding. Mrs. Arram’s brothel catering to wealthy gentlemen had been on the list of Rockley’s favorite haunts.

  “Perhaps Gilling needs to blow off steam,” Eva suggested, “so to speak.”

  The man knocked on the door to the brothel. The door opened, revealing two huge men. Gilling spoke to them, looking frantic, but it was too far away for Jack to hear what was being said.

  “They’ve got more security than normal,” Jack noted. “Usually it’s just one chap at the front door and another at the back.”

  “One of them might be Rockley’s man,” Eva mused.

  “It’s Wednesday, and not even ten o’clock,” he said, shaking his head. “Rockley never went to Mrs. Arram’s on Wednesday. And he never went to any brothel before midnight. Gilling would know that.”

  “Then why come here? Unless,” she said, thoughtful, “he’s here to check on the evidence.”

  Jack took his gaze away from Gilling, still speaking with the guards, and frowned at Eva. “You think the proof of them skimming on the contract would be at a whorehouse?”

  “It’s a sensible location to store something highly valuable,” she explained. “Secure, as you noted. Most genteel brothels are better guarded than any bank. The men who go there have only one real purpose in mind, and it isn’t searching for incriminating documents. Yet if Rockley ever needed access to those documents, he could have it without attracting any attention. Likely he pays Mrs. Arram a substantial fee to keep the documents at her establishment, but with a strong warning that she isn’t to know or ask about what those papers contain.”

  Damn him, but it made sense. Jack said, “We’d been looking for places where Rockley might’ve added security, but we searched in the wrong places. We didn’t even know if the evidence existed, but it does, and it’s here.” He snorted. A brothel. A sodding brothel.

  “Gilling has to know it,” Eva said. “When you told him you had the evidence, he came straight to Mrs. Arram’s to check on it.” She peered out the window. “It looks as though the guards aren’t going to let him in, however.”

  Gilling, looking more and more upset, was shouting at the men standing watch, trying to shove past them. One of the guards pushed him back. Gilling stumbled backward. Before he could try forcing his way in again, the door slammed in his face. For a few minutes, he pounded on the door, but it stayed shut.

  Finally, Gilling gave up. He sulked down the walkway and flagged another hansom. He got in and drove away.

  “Same story here, my lad,” Jack called up to the hackney driver. “A nice bit of coin for you if we stay on him.”

  “Right you are, sir.”

  This time, as the cab sped through the streets of London, Jack and Eva weren’t silent. As soon as they set off in their pursuit, she said, “Rockley knows you’ve escaped prison. You’re out there. He also knows that you’ll never be able to touch him, not physically, anyway. But his one vulnerability would be the evidence of his embezzlement. So he bulks up security at Mrs. Arram’s to make certain you have no way of getting to that evidence.”

  Jack snorted. “Hell of a rotten bastard.”

  “One of the worst I’ve ever encountered,” she said. “And I’ve encountered quite a lot of rotten bastards.”

  It didn’t surprise Jack when Gilling’s cab came to a stop outside Rockley’s home. However, after Gilling pounded on the front door, he was allowed to go inside.

  “They let him in,” Jack murmured. “But Rockley won’t be there. He’s never home at this time. Doesn’t usually get back until three or four.” That was hours away.

  “Perhaps the butler is allowing Gilling to wait for Rockley’s return,” Eva suggested.

  “Rockley didn’t like having folks in his home when he wasn’t there. But if the butler’s letting him stay, there’s got to be a reason.”

  “More proof that Gilling and Rockley were partners in the scheme to swindle the government,” she said darkly. Her lips tightened. “I don’t particularly fancy the idea of sitting in this hackney for five hours, doing nothing.”

  “Where next?”

  “Home.” After she gave the cabman the direction for Nemesis headquarters and the carriage moved on, she sat back against the squabs, her expression shuttered as it usually was when she was deep in thought. Jack liked watching her think, the tumblers of her mind turning.

  “We did pretty well back there,” he said. “Working Gilling like that.”

  Her smile flashed in the dimness of the cab. “It did go rather nicely.”

  “Sound surprised,” he noted. “Thought you Nemesis lot all partnered together doing these jobs of yours.”

  “We do. I have. Usually I partner with Simon, but I’ve gone into the field with almost everyone else.”

  His mouth curled. “So it’s me you didn’t expect to work out.”

  “All quantities are unknown until tested,” she answered.

  “Guess that means I passed the test,” he said dryly.

  She hesitated before saying, “It’s ongoing.”

  He couldn’t blame her for being chary. Earning someone’s trust—especially someone as cautious as Eva—could take lifetimes. A handful of days wouldn’t change much. He wasn’t sure he could trust her, either. Having spent his life in the company of thieves and good-for-nothings, he’d learned that the only person he could fully have faith in was himself. Always somebody ready to sell him out for their own profit.

  Nemesis had already proved they’d do anything to make sure they saw justice served. They’d throw him under the wagon wheels if they thought it’d help their purpose.

  But he wanted Eva’s trust. He wanted her secrets. He wanted … everything.

  In the darkness and light of the carriage, he saw her sitting opposite him in that golden gown of hers, her shoulders slim but not fragile, the soft shadows between her breasts. Something big and hungry curled in his stomach.

  “How’d you get involved with Nemesis?” he asked. “Missionaries’ daughters don’t seem the sort to throw in with ruthless bastards who dish out vengeance.”

  “When I was helping my parents in the East End, I’d heard rumors someone was grabbing Chinese boys off the streets. I told my father and mother, but they didn’t want to get involved.”

  “But you did.”

  “I made some investigations and crossed paths with Simon. Thought he was one of the kidnappers at first. But when I found out what he was doing, that he was trying to help the boys, too, we worked together. He didn’t think I could handle myself.” She smiled darkly. “I proved otherwise. Simon and I put an end to the trafficking. Then he offered me a place with Nemesis. I didn’t hesitate.”

  Of course she didn’t.

  “How often did you visit brothels with Rockley?” she asked suddenly.

  It took him a moment to realize she’d asked him a question. “Like I said, he had four he usually went to. Kept it interesting, is what he told me. Depending on what fancy struck him, we’d go every other day. Didn’t watch him, though, if that’s what you’re asking. Only kept guard outside.” Jack had gotten far too used to hearing Rockley fucking, to the point where he’d barely noticed it, standing out there in the hallway and thinking of what to eat for supper or whether he’d have time to grab a pint on his way home.

  “And when you were there, did you…” She waved her hand.

  “Sample the merchandise?”

  Her jaw tightened at his mocking tone. “Never mind. I was only curious ab
out the running of a brothel, the logistics involved.” She made a show of picking off a piece of fluff from her skirts. “If Rockley was a regular patron, I thought perhaps it would be a good business strategy to keep the men in his employ happy, as well, but it truly does not—”

  “I didn’t.”

  She stopped fussing and gazed up at him. He wondered if she knew how hopeful she looked. “You can tell me the truth,” she said.

  Anger flickered to life. “I’ve never lied to you. When I say that I didn’t fuck any of the whores, I mean it.”

  She didn’t blink at his crude language. “You must’ve had opportunity.”

  “Plenty. But I don’t pay for sex.” He tore his gaze away from hers, folding his arms over his chest. “When she couldn’t make enough coin from doing sewing and mending, my ma walked the streets. I swore I wouldn’t let the same thing happen to Edith. Tried to keep her from that … life.” He spat the word.

  “Didn’t matter, though,” he continued, glaring out the carriage windows. He didn’t see the fine shopfronts and flats of the West End, but the narrow tumbledown hovels of Bethnal Green and the hollow-faced women who walked its filthy streets. “She became a whore, just like our ma. I told her, Be a shopgirl, go work at a factory. Gave her money. But she wouldn’t leave it. She said, The only way a girl like me’s going to get anywhere is on her back.”

  His words like rusty nails in his throat, he said, “So, no. I didn’t sample the merchandise. Because the damned merchandise was someone’s sister. Someone’s ma.”

  His sodding eyes burned. His goddamn chest ached. He’d spent five years on the rack of his own thoughts, his own condemnation, but it hadn’t been enough. It was never enough.

  He started when Eva’s hand cupped his face. Caught up in his self-blame, he hadn’t noticed that she’d moved to sit beside him. But in an instant, it was all he was aware of.

  The cool reserve surrounding her fell away. Her gaze searched his. It almost killed him, seeing the compassion and sadness in her eyes—he couldn’t stand anyone’s pity. He didn’t want it. Pity was for weakness.

  And yet … she showed him a kindness that went beyond pity into something deeper. A shared understanding.

  “I should’ve tried harder,” he rasped. “Nabbed her off the street and locked her up somewhere, a place far away in the country. But I chose to believe her lie when she said she was happy at the brothel where she worked. It was a fancy place, a place where gentlemen went. The girls there looked healthy and comfortable. So I let her stay. I fucking let her stay,” he growled. “And then she’d been killed. By my own sodding boss. He liked his bedsport rough. Must’ve gotten too rough that night. I didn’t warn her to stay away from him. I may as well have stuck the knife in her.”

  “Rockley killed Edith,” she said quietly. “Save your anger for him, not yourself.”

  “Oh, aye,” he said, bitter. “I’m a goddamn hero.”

  “I never said that.” Her mouth curved into a soft, bittersweet smile. “But maybe you’ll become one.”

  He took up most of the seat, so she squeezed tight next to him. Her hand still cupped his cheek, and though he wished she weren’t wearing gloves, he still soaked up the feeling of her touching him.

  He became, suddenly, conscious of everything. The sensation of her leg pressed against his. How she was warm and cool at the same time, and smelled of flowers and her own satiny skin. The desire for her he’d been feeling as a continuous pulse now thundered through him.

  Though shadows were heavy in the carriage, he was close enough to her to see the widening of her pupils, hear the low, edged catch of her breath.

  The atmosphere between them changed. She’d been offering kindness a moment before. Now, kindness turned to hunger.

  He raised his own hands. Slowly. Cupped the back of her head with one, and curved the other around her neck. She stared up at him, her breath coming fast.

  Then he put his lips on hers.

  He’d watched iron-hulled ships being built in dockyards, and how, when the welders had put torch to metal, sparks had showered everywhere. Liquid light.

  Those same sparks, that same heat and light, poured through him now as he felt and tasted Eva’s mouth for the first time. She was silk and steel, and so delicious he wanted to gulp her down. He traced his tongue across her lips, catching the flavor of champagne. Her lips opened to him, and he sank farther in. Where she was wet and fever-hot.

  He didn’t think she’d resist him—he’d seen the desire in her face—and she didn’t. More than that, she kissed him with the same hard hunger that burned in him. She gripped his shoulders, pulling him closer. He growled. Yes.

  It was everything and not enough. Roughly, he pulled her onto his lap. She moved to wrap her arms around him, but he held her back. Holding her gaze with his, he used his teeth to take off his gloves and tossed them aside. He wrapped one hand around the back of her neck. The other pressed against her chest, just beneath her collarbone. She gasped, and he gave another growl. He urged her down for another kiss.

  Gliding his hand down the span of her chest, feeling the pounding of her heart, he dipped his fingers beneath the neckline of her gown. At his first touch of her breast, his whole body ached with need. And when his fingertips found the hard point of her nipple, she moaned, pressing closer.

  Goddamn him, but he’d never touched or kissed a woman as fine as her, or known this keen fire. She also pulled off her gloves, and they joined his on the floor of the carriage.

  “Eva,” he rumbled, when her own hand slid beneath his evening coat to grip his shoulder through the thin cotton of his shirt, her nails digging into him. “Good bloody Christ.”

  “Blasphemer,” she murmured, then nipped at his mouth.

  He took his lips from hers, running them over the line of her jaw, then down her neck. Her smell made his head spin and his cock ache. He scraped his teeth across her skin, and she made a sound of pleasure as she writhed against him. The carriage swayed as it jolted down the street, the rhythm urging both Jack and Eva on. She rocked her arse into his groin. He pinched her nipple and caught her pleasured cry in his mouth.

  He knew, he knew it would be like this between them. Hot and wild. Not pretty but honest and bare. And he also knew that if he wasn’t inside her, now, he’d lose his damn mind.

  He released his hold on the back of her neck to reach for the hem of her skirts. The carriage shuddered to a stop.

  “Here we are,” the cabman called down.

  Gasping, Eva broke away. She stared at Jack through lowered lids, and color spread across her cheeks. With slow, rigid movements, she moved off his lap to sit on the opposite seat. Her hands shook as they struggled to smooth her hair and skirts.

  Jack also panted as if he’d gone twelve rounds in the ring. He watched her try to tidy herself, and all he wanted was to pull her onto his lap again, have her straddle him. There were other options, too. She could brace her arms on the seat, and he’d lift her skirts, baring her from behind. She could sit, and he’d bury his face between her legs. They’d both get very, very untidy.

  “Change of plans,” Jack called up to the driver. “Take us to Sydney Street.”

  “Right, gov.” The cabman clicked his tongue at his horse, and the carriage began to move.

  “Wait,” Eva exclaimed. “Don’t go anywhere yet, driver.”

  “All right, madam.” The cabman sounded puzzled, but the hackney stopped rolling.

  “I’m not taking you to bed in that place,” Jack growled. “Not where every sodding person can listen in.”

  “You’re not taking me to bed in any place,” she said.

  Disbelieving, he stared at her. “Right. Because some other lady was grinding against me, not you.” He provoked her on purpose, needing some kind of reaction, some response that showed she was as affected as he was.

  She blew out a breath. “It can’t. This cannot go any further.”

  “Because you’re a lady and I’m street trash.
”

  She looked at him scornfully. “Have you ever heard me say that? I don’t think of either of us in those terms.”

  “I want you,” he said, his voice so rough and low he hardly knew himself. He took her hand in his, running his thumb back and forth across her wrist. Her pulse came quick and fast beneath his touch. He wanted to pull her across the narrow space of the carriage and start up where they’d left off, with his hands beginning their journey up her legs and her gasps in his ear. “You want me. Simple.”

  “Not simple,” she countered. “Complicated. I work for Nemesis, and getting involved with you compromises that.”

  “Nobody has to know.” Back and forth went his thumb, learning the softness of her skin.

  “I would know. And it would throw off my judgment. Stop it.” She tugged to free her hand from his grasp. “I can’t think when you do that.”

  “You need to think less.” He wouldn’t release her. “Stay too much in your head, and the rest of you dries up and blows away.”

  A sudden hurt shone in her eyes. “My thoughts and my work are all I have. I can’t give them up.” She gave her hand another tug, and he let her go. A second passed, as if she waited for him to continue arguing or reach for her again.

  He said nothing. There’d be naught to gain this night. He hadn’t known how damn close she kept herself, walled up even more than Dunmoor Prison.

  “We’ll go up,” she said after a few moments. “Tell the others what we’ve learned tonight.”

  Reaching over, he opened the door to the carriage, noting the way she held herself still when he moved nearer. But he didn’t touch her, only waved toward the open door, letting her go. Maybe gentlemen got out of carriages first and helped ladies down. But Jack couldn’t walk comfortably. Not yet. And his will had already been sorely tested. Touching her made him want more.

  She cast him a wary glance before climbing down. As Jack took several calming breaths, willing his body to quiet, she paid the cabman and thanked him for his service.