He was by nature a patient man. He was also a cautious one, but of late he’d grown bored.
Being in the gaming hell when he knew he’d not be welcomed if his purpose was discovered was quite…thrilling.
The hazard tables did not interest him. Nor did the tables where various card games were played. The room that contained the women was boring. And he’d never taken any pleasure from spirits.
But the boys. They were another matter entirely.
No one noticed if a child went missing in the rookeries.
But here they might notice.
Especially if that damned inspector Swindler was nosing around.
The key was to take his time, to determine which was the right boy, and then to make his move.
Olivia knew she needed to get up and begin her day. Instead, she indulged herself and stayed where she was, listening as Jack took his morning bath. In the four days since her illness, she was very much aware of Jack watching her intently, as though trying to judge her readiness to face something. It made her a bit uneasy. Maybe he’d told Swindler about her confession and she was going to find herself carted off to Scotland Yard. Every morning Jack asked after her health, wanted to know how strong she felt, and put her through an inquisition somewhat similar to what she envisioned Graves had endured. She found herself sympathizing with the man. Anxious to determine why Jack was so concerned with her health, yesterday morning she’d answered, “I feel as healthy as I was before I took ill.”
All he’d said was, “Glad to hear it.”
Which made her wonder if she’d opened herself up to his attempts to lure her into his bed. He’d exhibited particularly good behavior since their walk in the garden. They enjoyed dinner together in the evenings. Their relationship had taken a definite turn toward the pleasant, and she was finding it difficult to recall why she’d ever objected to his being guardian.
When all grew quiet in the dressing room, she stayed where she was for a bit longer, trying not to imagine him dressing his enticing body. Of course, the more she tried not to imagine it, the more she did.
A sudden sharp rap on her door startled her. She’d barely sat up before the dressing room door burst open and Jack walked into her room. Gasping, she clutched the covers to her chest. “What are you doing here?”
“I’ve been putting this off until you were recovered enough to join us and the appropriate day rolled around. Henry wants to go to the Great Exhibition.”
“I know he does, but—”
“We’re going today. We’d like you to join us. It’s shilling day, a day designed specifically for the lower classes, so the upper classes—snobs that they are and I forgive them this one instance because it works to our advantage—don’t have to breathe the same air that the lower classes do. The people who will be in attendance today aren’t ones you normally associate with, so you’re not likely to be recognized.” He tossed a bundle onto the bed. “To reassure you further, I brought you those clothes. They’ll ensure that you don’t stand out. We leave in half an hour.”
Before she issued another objection, he closed the door. She reached for the bundle, loosened the knot in the string, and unfolded the scruffy-looking clothes: a jacket, a shirt, trousers, shoes, and a cap. Was he insinuating she should dress as a boy?
Snatching up the trousers, she scrambled out of bed and headed to the door to confront him. It was entirely inappropriate—
But not as inappropriate as kissing him.
Did one bit of bad behavior excuse another? She staggered to a stop and clutched the garment. It was clean, just a bit tattered. Jack, who bathed twice a day and—she’d heard from her laundress—had his clothes washed more often than a normal man should, had provided her with clean clothes. She held the trousers against her waist, letting the legs dangle down to her feet. They were long enough, appeared to be wide enough.
She didn’t want to think about how closely he must have studied her to accurately judge the clothes that would fit her. She didn’t know whether to be unsettled or flattered, to thank him or take him to task. She had little doubt he was expecting the latter, was possibly waiting on the other side of that door, his arguments at the ready.
Weighing her choices, she took a tentative step back. Truth be told, she wanted to see the Great Exhibition as much as Henry. But to dress like a boy…
A bubble of laughter escaped and she slapped her hand over her mouth. Just the thought made her feel carefree and young and adventuresome. Where was the harm? Who would know?
She ran the arguments through her mind. The problem would be her hair. It might work if she braided it tightly, pinned it up, put on the cap, and brought it down low.
“No, I can’t,” she whispered. “I can’t.”
“Why not?” a little voice that didn’t quite sound like hers asked. It was deep inside her mind. Maybe she was going insane. It was bad enough to talk to herself, but then to answer back was total lunacy.
A rap sounded on the door leading into the dressing room. “You ready?” a deep voice asked.
“No.”
“You decent?”
“No.”
“Get decent. I’m coming in.”
“No.”
The blackguard opened the door, peered around it, and studied her. “Come on, Livy, you know you want to.”
Feeling uncharacteristically vulnerable with him in her bedchamber, she put one bare foot on top of the other.
“Who will you hurt if you go?” Jack asked. He stepped out from behind the door, leaned against the wall, and crossed his arms over his chest as though offering her a challenge.
He wasn’t dressed in his usual tailor-made clothes. The brown tweed coat wasn’t fitted to him. It was a little large and made him look common. She’d never realized before how uncommon he appeared. It occurred to her now that if she hadn’t been aware of his background, when he was properly dressed, she might have mistaken him for an aristocrat. He had that air of entitlement about him. It wasn’t very well hidden with his drab clothing. It seemed odd not to see him with his splash of color.
“Who will it hurt if you don’t go?” he asked, as though giving up on her answering his earlier question.
She looked at the clothes strewn on the bed.
“Years from now, Henry’ll be talking about his memories of the Great Exhibition. Don’t you want them to include you?” Jack asked.
“That’s not fair. Besides, what if someone does recognize me?”
“No one looks in the faces of the poor. Wearing those clothes, you’ll look like a pauper.”
“Then how did I obtain coin for admittance?”
He sighed. “No one will ask. Come on, Livy, for once in your life, do something that you shouldn’t.”
She almost reminded him that she’d kissed him, but as he’d not alluded to the encounter once since their walk in the garden, she suspected that he either wanted to forget it or had decided it really meant nothing at all. She tried not to be disappointed with that conclusion.
He tempted her, made it seem so easy to slip off her pedestal of high moral standing. Yet what he was asking of her was not terribly awful. It would be so nice to leave the house and do something with Henry. “I suppose there are worse things I could do.”
“With a man in your bedroom and you in your nightgown”—he winked—“what I’m suggesting isn’t nearly wicked enough.”
Before he’d kissed her, she might have thought he was being offensive, but now she thought he was merely teasing, trying to make her laugh, to see the silliness of her dilemma.
“If I go to hell for this—”
“I’ll be there as well. I’ll dance with you,” he promised.
Something in his tone of voice, his gaze, made her think that this time he wasn’t teasing, and she had an absurd desire to weep. It had to be the lingering effects of her illness, or perhaps it was simply that he recognized she feared being alone.
If she thought too much about what Jack was asking of her, she might take the coward’s way. Instead, she jutted up her chin and waved her hand. “Go on with you now. I have to get ready.”
He gave her a quick flash of a grin before disappearing behind the door and closing it. Oh, she wished he hadn’t done that, given her that beam of pleasure. It brought such an unheralded thrill to her heart. It was a wondrous feeling to bring a man joy, to know he wanted to be with her.
Happiness. She was experiencing happiness beyond anything she’d ever known.
Reaching for the bellpull, she couldn’t recall a single moment in her life when she’d ever been so excited.
The clothes were a mistake, a dreadful mistake, because Jack was forced to admire the lovely shape of her bottom as they stood in line waiting to enter the Crystal Palace. She must have had her maid bind her breasts, because she was as flat as a board in that shirt. Or maybe it was the way the jacket hung over it. The too-short jacket that let him see her trouser-clad bum.
They looked like three mates searching for adventure. Or at least she and Henry looked like lads. Jack looked more like their father. Felt like it too. He felt old and cynical. He’d never before minded his harsh outlook on life, except now it made him feel ancient, while she and Henry were filled with wonder, and they hadn’t even gotten into the building yet.
He’d never seen her eyes filled with such merriment. Every now and then she’d bend down and talk to Henry, while pointing out something. As much as he knew he shouldn’t, Jack wanted her to share it with him, to touch his arm, rise up on her toes, and whisper her delights in his ear.
Even when she was dressed in ill-fitting clothes, she was delectable. But she also still looked like someone from a higher station in life. He could put dirt on her cheeks and mud on the end of her cute little nose and she still wouldn’t look as though she belonged in the quagmire that had been Jack’s life. If someone bumped into her the way he’d just knocked into Jack, she’d either apologize or do that little sniff she did when she was displeased. She wouldn’t shove—
Damnation.
Searching the pocket of his coat, he glanced around quickly. Not a thief in sight. “Bloody hell.”
“’ere now, mate, watch yer language. Got a lady ’ere.”
Jack jerked around to the man who’d spoken. He was considerably older, his wife unattractive—but blast it, he looked like he cared for her, that they really were a couple.
“What’s wrong?” someone croaked.
He slowly turned his head to Olivia.
“What’s wrong?” she repeated in a voice that he guessed she thought mimicked that of a lad, when in truth it didn’t come anywhere close. If it weren’t for the fact they were striving not to be noticed, he might have teased her about it.
“Got my pocket picked.” A hell of a thing to have to confess.
“What was in it?” she asked, concern returning her voice to normal, which earned her an eyebrow raise from both the gent behind them and his lady fair.
“A locket that contained a picture of my mum.”
“Why would you carry something that valuable—”
“I always carry it,” he stated succinctly, not in the mood to have his foolishness pointed out. “I must have had it lifted half a dozen times over the years, but I was always quick enough to catch the blighter who was trying to snatch it.” He wanted to curse again, but didn’t want to get into a fight with the bloke behind him. The man might be older, but he had more bulk to him and a meaty fist that Jack knew could do some damage. If it was only him, he could dart away easily enough, but he had to worry that Olivia or the boy might take a blow intended for him.
“So someone with your skills lifted it,” she said, more than asked.
He almost told her the truth, that skill had nothing to do with it, that he’d been distracted by her, not paying attention, which must have been obvious to whomever had identified him as an easy mark. But he decided that confession would make them both uncomfortable. “It’s of no value to him. He’ll have to fence it. I’ll find it.”
She stepped around Henry, who’d been standing between them, serving as an innocent buffer. She touched Jack’s arm, and even though he was wearing a jacket and a shirt, he felt the warmth of her palm as though nothing separated them. If he didn’t know better, he’d think she was fevered. Or maybe he was. He wanted to jerk away, he wanted to move closer.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly, a whisper of comfort that had the power to penetrate his carefully built wall.
“Not your fault—my foolishness.” His throat felt raw, his voice scratchy. What in the bloody hell had made him think that going on an outing with her was a good idea? Had he completely lost his mind? He wanted her more now than he had the night he’d kissed her. Her innocent lack of awareness regarding his desire for her tormented him.
“Do you have another picture of her?” she asked.
“No. It doesn’t matter. It’s not important.” Although her hand wasn’t moving, he felt as though it was, as though it was stroking his shoulders, his chest. He could imagine it, wanted it with a fierceness that was almost his undoing.
“Why aren’t they opening the doors?” he asked irritably.
Her hand slipped away as she looked toward the glass building. He wanted to snatch it back, hold it tightly, and never release it. He had lost his mind. He no longer had any doubt.
“Looks like perhaps they are,” she said. “I see some movement at the front.”
She looked back at him, held his gaze, and for a horrified moment, he thought she could see the turmoil she caused within him. He suddenly wanted more than he could have—so much more. He wanted to bring her on a day when the elite came. He wanted to wear his tailored clothing and see her in a dress other than black. He wanted her hand on his arm, knowing he would be envied because she was at his side.
“Come on! Come on!” Henry shouted.
Jack realized the line had begun to move and he’d completely missed it. “We’d best start paying attention here.”
She smiled gently as though she understood his struggles. Reaching out, she took Henry’s hand. “Stay close.”
Jack didn’t know if she was speaking to her son or to him, if she recognized that he suddenly wanted to run away. But he stayed near, holding the firm conviction that nothing within that glass and metal building would fascinate him as much as the woman dressed as a boy who now walked beside him.
He became aware of the stares, the attention they were drawing, no doubt because Olivia was talking and acting like a mother, not like a young lad. As though she also became aware of the interest, she glanced around.
She looked at Jack and he could see the panic on her face that people were beginning to notice her, notice that she wasn’t a boy. Before he could reassure her that it was of no consequence, she said, “Bloody hell,” in that deep-throated gargle she seemed to think was the way a young man would talk.
“Bloody hell,” Henry repeated.
Olivia couldn’t have looked more horrified if Jack had lifted her up and planted a kiss on those parted lips. And then she began to giggle, covering her mouth, shaking her head.
“’ere, ’ere, yer language,” the man behind them said.
The eyes of the woman behind them widened considerably. “I don’t think that’s a lad, Jonah. What’s going on ’ere?”
Jack took Olivia’s hand. “Come on.”
She grabbed Henry’s hand. Jack led them away from the line.
“We’re going to lose our place in the line,” Olivia said, but she didn’t sound angry. He could still hear the trace of laughter in her voice.
“We’re going to get a better one,” Jack said, marching them toward the front.
“You’re not thinking of stealing a place.”
“I’ve told you I don’t do that anymore.” He glanced back at her and grinned. “Steal.”
He didn’t want the beginning of the line, because it would be too obvious. But he wanted them closer than they were. He spotted a man, a woman, and a young girl. With Olivia and Henry trailing behind him, Jack approached.
“How many in your group?” Jack asked the man.
“What concern is it of yers?”
“I’ll pay you handsomely for your place here if you’ll take your family to the back of the line,” Jack told him.
“You’re knockers. We’ve been ’ere since five in the morn—”
He looked at the money Jack had shoved into his hand. He lifted his gaze to Jack, then doffed his cap. “See ye, gov’ner.” He turned to the woman and girl. “Let’s go.”
“I’m not—”
“Back of the line, now, love,” he said, pushing the woman away from the crowd, before showing her what he held.
Her eyes widened before she tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and happily walked away.
“I thought we were going to work not to get noticed,” Olivia said as Jack drew them into the line.
“We lost that opportunity when you tried to draw attention away from yourself.”
“What was I supposed to do?”
“Exactly what you did. I should have done this earlier.”
“We’re almost there,” Henry yelled excitedly, tugging on Jack’s hand and jumping.
Yes, they were, and already Jack was wishing this day would never come to an end.
Olivia had never paid much attention to the masses. They weren’t part of her world. Yet, walking among them, she couldn’t help but notice that they didn’t seem so very different. Jack blended in very well, but she knew it was because he was making a point to do so. She’d considered him as coming from the dregs of society, but that wasn’t where he belonged. She thought he belonged exactly where he was.
It was improper for her to be so very much aware of another man and yet it seemed so natural. She knew when Jack would grin—before he grinned—because a bit of the devil would first appear in his eyes and then it would work its way into a slow smile. He didn’t grin often, but when he did, it had the power to steal her breath. When he wasn’t quite certain of himself or was thinking through a problem, he rubbed the underside of his jaw. His voice always sounded confident, but she was beginning to suspect there were times when he wasn’t, and that small mannerism somehow shored up his self-assurance. She wasn’t quite certain why she detected that vulnerability in him, but she did.
She was positively charmed, watching as he explained things to Henry, lifted him up so he could have a more advantageous view, and sat him on his shoulders when he grew tired of walking. She suspected none of that would have happened if they’d come on any other day. Henry would have been expected to behave in a manner befitting his station, his title. Or perhaps there would have been no difference. Jack might have taught him not to care what people thought.
Yes, that was more likely. If she didn’t marry, if she had no husband to usurp Jack’s role as guardian, she had no doubt Henry would grow up with little fear of expressing his opinion. She wasn’t altogether certain that was a bad thing.
Of all the artwork, inventions, and wonders to explore at the Great Exhibition, Henry was most fascinated with the huge locomotive.
“Have you never traveled on the railway, lad?” Jack asked.
With eyes wide, Henry shook his head.
“Many of these folks—that’s how they got here. Traveling on the railway. Before that, it would have taken them days and days to get into London. Imagine what they would have missed.”
“Have you traveled on the railway?” Olivia asked. She kept meaning to speak in a deeper voice, but she’d get entranced by everything surrounding them and forget. People weren’t paying attention to them anyway. Too many marvels drew their interest, and they paid no heed to the oddly dressed trio.
Jack shook his head. “I’ve never been outside London.”
“Never?”
He rolled his shoulders into a careless shrug. “Why would I?”
“The country’s very different. I daresay you’re in for a treat when we travel to the estates.”
He rubbed his jaw. “When we do, sure.”
“You’re not afraid—”
“’Course not,” he interjected, cutting her off. “London suits me just fine. Never had a need to go elsewhere.”
“How can you know if you’ve never been anywhere else?”
“I simply know.”
“I don’t see how you could.”
“How do you know you wouldn’t enjoy a bit of wickedness?” he demanded hotly. At her silence, he arched a brow and that slow smile that started in his eyes eased down to his mouth.
She knew exactly what he was asking with that look. How could she question his judging what he’d never experienced when she was guilty of the same thing? She’d never sinned, and God help her, she was beginning to realize she’d never truly desired her husband. In the beginning, she’d thought of him before she went to sleep, missed him, felt the loneliness of his leaving her bed. She hadn’t anticipated seeing him at breakfast in the morning. She hadn’t thought the afternoons without him were too long and the evenings in his company too short.
She hadn’t thought of him with yearning. She suspected if she wasn’t very, very careful that, when it came to Jack, she could find herself yearning for more than a kiss—
She grabbed Henry’s hand. “I think we’ve dawdled here long enough.”
Henry glanced back. “Can we g-go on the rail-railway?”
“Someday, lad.”
She heard in Jack’s voice the promise.
The sun had disappeared by the time the coach pulled up in front of the residence. Henry—all of them—had eaten at the refreshment area, enjoying a variety of offerings. Olivia didn’t think any of them would be in the mood for dinner, which was a good thing as Henry was already asleep.
With Henry clinging to him like a little monkey—his arms around his neck, his legs around his waist—Jack gracefully exited the coach. As they walked toward the manor, Olivia felt tears prick her eyes at the sight of the tall, strapping man beside her and the small boy who trusted him implicitly. She couldn’t deny that what she was beginning to feel for Jack was wondrous in its scope, frightening in its intensity.
She wanted to be with him in ways she knew she should not. Scandalous ways, sinful ways. She had to shore up her resolve to resist what she knew would only lead to disaster. To abandon her upbringing for a night of passion in the bed of a man to whom she was not wed, a man who had plans to marry her off to another—it was a foolish, foolish woman who would contemplate traveling such a road.
Henry stirred not at all as they entered the house and began their ascent up the stairs. He was well and truly worn out. Olivia certainly understood that feeling. She would welcome a warm bath and an early night.
Ida greeted them in the nursery. “How is the young duke?”
“Dead to the world,” Jack said as he laid Henry on his bed with a gentleness that surprised Olivia. After all this time, she was still astonished that where Henry was concerned, Jack showed such extreme consideration.
“I’ll prepare him for bed,” Ida whispered. “You see to yourselves.”
Leaning down, Olivia kissed Henry’s forehead. “Good night, sweetheart.”
She followed Jack into the hallway. “I haven’t the strength for dinner.”
His eyes held concern when he looked at her. “Was today too much?”
“It was perfect. I’m just tired. If you don’t mind, I’ll use the dressing room first.”
“I have to go out, and where I’m going my present appearance will serve me well.”
“Where are you going?”
“I want to find my locket.”
“Do you think you’ll have any luck?”
“I know where it’s likely to be pawned. I’ll find it.”
He had such confidence. Confidence in everything.
She placed her hand on his arm. “Thank you so much for today.”
He splayed his fingers beneath her chin and they curled around her neck. Her breath hitched with thoughts of him drawing her near and giving her a scalding kiss before marching off to attend to his business.
His gaze took a leisurely journey from her toes back to her eyes. “I have to confess that I’d not expected you to look so delectable in trousers.”
She felt a spurt of giddiness.
“Damn, if you don’t make me wish I was a man who’d settle for only a kiss.”
“I suppose I could forbid you.”
Only one corner of his mouth lifted, as though he were faintly amused by her shameful wantonness.
“For now, where’s the harm?” he asked in that smoky voice that did strange things to her insides. “It’ll just add to your debt.”
She didn’t bother to correct him, to inform him that she’d never pay what he presumed she owed. She’d not go to his bed. As much as the notion was beginning to appeal to her, she would hold onto the moral high ground even as he lowered his mouth to hers, even as she rose up on her toes to meet it.
It was, after all, only a kiss.
But it felt like so much more. From the moment his lips touched hers, she became lost in the sensations of his mouth playing over hers. She sensed that he tempered his hunger, that he held himself in check as though he feared he’d not have the power this time to settle for anything less than having her beneath him.
But this kiss was as marvelous as the first. A distant part of her was aware of her boy’s cap leaving her head. As she skimmed her hands up over his shoulders, she felt his arms come around her, holding her nearer, and then her hair tumbled around her. He was a man of nimble fingers and talented mouth. He could distract her so easily until all she cared about was him.
His bedroom was so near. If he was to lift her into his arms, she didn’t know if she’d have the strength to resist. She might simply lean down and open the door for him.
No, no, she had to be stronger than that. She had to take this kiss that stirred her desire and be content with it. They both had to be content with it.
Suddenly changing the angle of his mouth, he deepened the kiss, his tongue leisurely exploring, enticing her to do the same. As he drew her nearer, held her close, she was not hampered by layers of petticoats or skirts. Quite frankly, there was little more than a few pieces of fabric separating her skin from his. His body responded with a fierceness that she needed no imagination to envision. She knew exactly what he looked like, images of him in the dressing room bombarding her, igniting a fire low in her belly.
She heard a harsh plea and feared it came from her.
Breathing heavily, he tore his mouth from hers. Only then did she realize she’d fairly wound herself around him. She immediately dropped her arms, stepped back.
“You do bewitch me,” he rasped. “Fair warning, Duchess, I fear this is the last time I can settle for only a kiss.”
With that, he spun on his heel and headed toward the stairs. Closing her eyes, she sank against the wall.
His warning wasn’t at all fair. All it did was make her anticipate their next meeting.
Climbing out of his brougham, Jack inhaled the foul stench that had surrounded him for much of his youth. He didn’t return to the rookeries often, but when he did, it was always with a sense of coming home.
What sort of sad commentary was that on his life when this filth was where he felt most comfortable? He snatched the burlap sack out of the carriage and slung it over his shoulder. He knew there’d be nothing left of his carriage if it remained. “Drive off, return here in an hour,” he ordered the driver.
“Yes, sir.”
Jack could see the clear relief on the driver’s face right before he set the horses into motion. No one wanted to be here, not even those who lived in the dilapidated buildings. It was late evening, yet children were still scurrying around. When they got too curious, too close, he reached in his pocket and tossed a few coins into the dirt and filth to send them scrambling away from him.
He reached the dwelling he wanted. The door was a challenge to open because it wasn’t secured to all its hinges. Inside was dark and dreary, the stench of decay even thicker. He started up the stairs, knowing which steps were broken, which squeaked, which to avoid. Nothing improved in this area of London. He discovered a new hole had formed in one of the steps when his foot went through it. Cursing, he worked his boot free and continued on up, albeit a bit more carefully. At the top of the stairs, he turned down the blackened hallway, treading carefully over what he couldn’t see but knew was garbage.
Once he left this place, he’d burn the clothes he wore. It was the only way to ensure he brought back with him no disease or infestations. Lice, fleas, crawling things. He’d always hated the feel of tiny bugs.
When he reached the door at the end, he tapped three times, waited a second, tapped two times, waited, tapped thrice. He heard a shuffling movement on the other side of the door. It slowly creaked open. A grimy, wrinkled face appeared. What had once been vibrant hair, as red as Frannie’s, was now pale, almost white. The long, scraggly beard was white as well. Rotting teeth formed a smile framed by cracked and bleeding lips.
“Well, if it’s not me dodger.” With bent and gnarled fingers, he urged Jack inside. “Come on in, boy. Let’s see wot ye got for ol’ Feagan.”
Jack stepped into the squalor and he was transported back to a time when he’d slept on the floor like a dog, spooning around whoever slept beside him, offering and receiving warmth. He’d seldom gone to bed hungry. Feagan had always been good about feeding his crew. A sickly child wasn’t of much use to him.
“Wot ye got? Wot ye got?” Feagan asked, making his way to the rickety chair at the scarred table where a single burning candle standing upright in the mouth of a brown bottle provided the only light in the room.
Jack could see the milky-white film that now hampered Feagan’s vision. He moved the sack off his shoulder, set it on the table, and unveiled four bottles: two each of whiskey and rum.
Feagan cackled again. “Oh, me dodger. Ye was always good to Feagan.”
Jack’s mentor had always been in the habit of referring to himself as though he were another person in the room. It was one of the reasons Jack had never been convinced Feagan was his real name—it was as though he was always having to remind himself, remind others who he was. It wasn’t unusual for people in the rookeries—after they’d been arrested—to move to another section of London and change their names. Only once had Feagan reminisced about his past, and it was a story Jack intended to take to the grave.
Jack opened a bottle of whiskey and poured it into the dented tin cup Feagan extended with a shaking hand, a hand that had taught so many how to slip into tight places without being detected. “You should let me move you into a flat at Dodger’s.”
Feagan took a gulp, then his tongue darted around his lips, determined not to let any drops go to waste. “Wot good would that do Feagan, I ask ye?”
Jack took the chair across from him. “You’d have food, warmth, company. I’d even give you a gambling allowance.”
“Ye was always kinder than anybody give ye credit fer.”
“Kindness has nothing to do with it. I don’t like trudging through the filth to get to you when I need you.”
“Yer the only one wot comes to see me.” He leaned forward. “’ow’s me darlin’ Frannie?”
“Doing well.”
“Married?”
“No.”
He shook his head sadly. “I shoulda taken better care of ’er.”
“We all should have.” She’d been forced into the white slave trade at the age of twelve. Luke had taken it upon himself to kill the man responsible. Olivia might consider him a murderer; Jack didn’t. Some dogs needed to be put down.
“But she ain’t the reason yer ’ere.”
“No.” He sighed heavily. “I had my locket picked.”
Feagan guffawed, coughed, sounded like he was choking with merriment. “Ye? Ye was me sharpest.”
“I was distracted.”
Feagan gave him a crafty look. “That’s not like ye. She must be a fancy piece.”
Jack wasn’t going to comment on Olivia. She was too fine a lady for him to even have thoughts of while he was in this cesspool. “I know you’re not running boys anymore, but you know who is, and I suspect you still have your finger on the fence trade. I’ll pay you a hundred pounds if you locate it for me.”
It was an ungodly amount, but the locket was Jack’s most precious possession, perhaps the only thing that mattered more to him than coins.
Feagan rubbed his hand over his mouth. “That’s a lot of gin. I’ll put the word out.” He narrowed his eyes. “Anyone else I’d ask fer half up front.”
Jack tapped a bottle. “I brought you something you value more.”
“That ye did.”
Shoving back his chair, Jack stood. “I’ll be seeing you.”
“That ye will, me dodger, that ye will.”
Jack took one last look around the squalor, remembering a time when his goal in life had been to be a more successful kidsman than Feagan. It irked him not to know who his anonymous benefactor was. If not for him, even with the teachings of Luke’s grandfather, Jack knew he would have returned to this foulness and lived a life only marginally better than Feagan’s.