Sebastian took a slow sip of his drink. “Have you noticed anyone else interested in solving these murders?”
“Women are murdered on the streets of London all the time, Sebastian.”
“Not like this.”
Gibson was silent for another moment. Then he said, “It’s because of Jarvis, isn’t it? It’s a way of sticking your finger in his eye.”
A slow smile curved Sebastian’s lips. “That’s part of it, yes.”
“Does Miss Jarvis know that your motives aren’t entirely chivalrous?”
“Oh, she knows, all right. In fact, she’s counting on it.”
Gibson shifted his weight, seeking a more comfortable position for his mangled leg. “I saw Miss Boleyn today, when I was in Covent Garden. She stopped her carriage and spoke to me.”
Sebastian took a long, slow swallow of his drink and said nothing.
“She asked about you,” said Gibson. “She wanted to know how you are doing.”
“What did you say?”
“I lied. I told her you’re fine.”
Sebastian took another drink. “She isn’t Miss Boleyn anymore.”
“She still uses it as a stage name, does she not?”
She did, of course. But Sebastian was careful never to let himself think of her in that way.
“I told her you’d involved yourself in another murder,” said Gibson.
She wouldn’t like that, Sebastian thought. In the past, she’d always fretted about what his involvement in the pursuit of murderers cost him. Then again, perhaps she no longer cared. Or cared in a different way . . . as a sister, rather than as the lover she’d once been.
To Sebastian’s relief, Gibson changed the subject again. He said, “You think the brothel owner, this Kane, could be behind the killings?”
Sebastian blew out a long breath. He hadn’t even realized he’d been holding it. “I think he’s more than capable of it. The problem is, I’m not sure why he would do it.”
“Rose Fletcher ran away from him, didn’t she? She sounds as if she was a valuable commodity.”
“Valuable, yes. But not exactly rare. This town is full of women ready to sell themselves to stay alive. And while Kane might have kept her in debt, you can be sure he never let the debt become excessively large.”
“She could have been killed as an example to others,” said Gibson.
“She could have been,” Sebastian agreed. “But to kill seven women just to get to one?” He shook his head. “No, I think whoever did this was desperate.”
“Or very angry,” said Gibson. “How do you intend to find this man O’Brian?”
Sebastian drained his brandy. “I’ll set Tom on it tomorrow.”
Gibson lurched to his feet and reached for his friend’s empty glass. “A girl like that—educated, wellborn—how could she have come to such an end?”
“Someone betrayed her,” said Sebastian, “and I’m not talking about whoever killed her. She was betrayed before that, by those whose duty it was to love her and care for her.”
“I wonder if her family even know she’s dead.”
Sebastian raised his gaze to the pig fetus on the mantelpiece. “I’d say that depends on whether or not they’re the ones who killed her.”
Chapter 15
WEDNESDAY, 6 MAY 1812
Sebastian stood beside his bedroom window, his gaze on the still-sleeping city streets below, on the gleam of dew on the cobbles and the pigeons fluttering on the ridge of a nearby roofline. In the pale blush of early dawn, the chimneys of London loomed thick and dark, the spires of the city’s churches thrusting up against a slowly lightening sky. It was that hour between night and day when time seemed suspended and a man could get lost in the past, if he let himself.
Grasping the sash, he thrust up the window and let the frigid air of the dying night bite his naked flesh. He’d been driven here from his bed by the dreams that still crept upon him far too often in the undefended hours of sleep. During the day, he could control his thoughts, even control the yearnings that still came upon him. But sleep made him vulnerable. Which is why he avoided it as much as possible.
Some men could spend a lifetime in a soft, brandy-tinged blur, squinting through a smoky haze at cards that meant nothing. Win or lose, the deadness inside remained. But it was all an illusion, Sebastian had decided—both the sensation of inner deadness and the comfort of the blur. A trick a man played on himself.
No one else was fooled.
