His Clockwork Canary

So little rattled Willie anymore and yet these past few days she’d been shaken about like a rag doll and spun like a top. But nothing had shocked her more than Simon’s matrimonial bombshell. Appetite obliterated, she set aside her flatware and palmed the table. She would not, under any circumstance, betray the trembling of her hands. “Perhaps my senses are addled from the catacombs mishap, but was that a proposal?”

“It was not. I proposed twelve years ago. On bended knee, heart in hand, if memory serves. You accepted. I’m merely asking you make good on your promise.”

Willie gaped. Her heart hammered against her ribs as she sought to make sense of the moment. Was she still unconscious? Hallucinating? Was this a dream or some subconscious manifestation of a buried yearning? “Why?”

“I want to gift you with a certain amount of freedom. As my wife you could tell that manipulative sod, Artemis Dawson, to go to hell. As my wife you would not need to ensure your job at the Informer. You would not need to work.”

“Never mind that I want to work. I have a family to support.”

“The family that betrayed you?” He shook his head, held up an apologetic hand. “Not for me to judge. I’m sure they had your best interest at heart.”

Willie was, in fact, unsure of her family’s motivation. Especially Wesley’s. Her father, however . . . She could not imagine that his agenda was anything but well-intentioned. “Let us backtrack. You want to gift me? With marriage? How is that a gift? It would bind me to you, make me accountable to you.”

“A limited perception.”

“An accurate perception.”

“You twist my intent.”

“You assume I need saving.”

“Truly?” Simon narrowed his eyes. “Is it truly an assumption, Willie? Or an obvious conclusion? Your modest and worn wardrobe suggests there is little left over from your salary once you provide for your father. I would wager you live on a shoestring. In addition, in order to maintain your position at the Informer, you are forced to deny your gender and alter your physical appearance. Do you not tire of slathering your beautiful pale skin with that noxious tanning agent? Do you not miss your natural, luxurious red hair? I recall you delighted in fashioning your long tresses into imaginative styles. And I’m quite certain you were keen on pretty gowns.”

Her heart ached, remembering how she’d once looked, how she’d once felt. But that free-spirited innocence, that girlish indulgence, was long gone. “I told you. Mina is dead.”

“Not dead. Hiding.”

Left hand planted on the table for support, Willie pushed out of her chair. Perhaps it was the fortifying meal. Perhaps it was the panicked adrenaline coursing through her veins, but her legs felt strong enough to carry her away from the table. Away from Simon. She leaned against the window sash and gazed through the frosty pane. The chill icing down her spine had nothing to do with the wintry scene and everything to do with the telecoded message she’d received whilst Simon had been out. That infernal device had blipped from her duster pocket and she’d hobbled across the room in a panicked sweat. Had it blipped in the two days she’d been in a state of delirium? Had Simon heard it? Had he deciphered the code? Did he know she was in league with Strangelove, a man intent on seizing Simon’s targeted invention? Mind racing, guilt churning, she had checked the small screen, mentally altering the numbers to letters.

Betray me, Goodenough, and I will crush your family.

She did not need to be reminded of Strangelove’s initial threat, but the message had indeed introduced a sense of urgency to her recuperation. Someway, somehow, she needed to thwart that wicked man. She doubted Strangelove had put all of his eggs in one basket. Surely he had other spies nosing about. And now, because of her, Jefferson Filmore was on the run with an invention that could cause great harm in the wrong hands. What if the Houdinian was careless and fell prey to one of Strangelove’s cohorts? What if Strangelove intended to use the Peace Rebels’ engine for devious means? What if it landed on the black market?

Willie’s stomach churned with a sense of dread. She couldn’t shake the memory, Filmore’s memory, of her mother. In modern times, Michelle Goodenough had been a security specialist. How was it that she’d ended up in league with Filmore, a fanatical peace activist? Why had they conspired to keep the clockwork propulsion engine in deep hiding as opposed to destroying it?

Willie felt the weight of the world, indeed the fate of the world, upon her injured shoulder. In tandem Simon was meddling with her heart. She braced as he moved in behind her, wrapped strong arms around her middle, and held her in a gentle embrace. The scent of faded soap had never been so tantalizing. The feel of his stubbled jaw brushing against her smooth cheek never so seductive.

“Marry me,” he persisted in a low, sensual voice. “We were good together once. It could be so again.”

He said nothing of love, but of course they were very different people now. The love of their youth was but a bittersweet memory. Even so, a fierce longing scraped Willie’s soul. “Marriage is not permitted between Vics and Freaks.”

“Anything can be bought in Skytown,” he said calmly. “Even a marriage certificate.”

Skytowns operated “above the law.” Most flew the flag of the Peace Rebels, welcoming Mods and Freaks to socialize openly on the floating pleasure meccas. The meccas also appealed to adventurous Vics seeking a scandalous good time, as well as assorted corrupt and dubious scoundrels. Oh, aye, anything could be purchased in Skytown, but that did not mean that, once upon the ground, the marriage would be legal.

As if sensing her apprehension, Simon nipped her earlobe, inciting a delicious shiver. “How far did you take the ruse, Willie?”

Her breath caught as she fought off a knee-buckling wave of desire. “What do you mean?”

“In denying your gender, did you also deny yourself the company of men?”

“Intimacy would not have been wise,” she said. And honestly, she had not deemed any man enticing enough to risk her anonymity.

“Ten years is a long time.”

Twelve, she wanted to correct. She had not been with any man since Simon. But she would not admit that, as it would afford him too much power, and she was already bending to his will. She did not resist when he gently turned her in his arms. Nor did she protest when he cradled the side of her face, his fingers threading through her hair. She relished the headiness of the moment, the anticipation of a kiss. Her heart nearly stopped when his lips brushed over hers, then stuttered back to glorious life as his mouth laid claim. This kiss was not meant to comfort, she thought hazily. It was designed to seduce.

Willie gave over, reaching up with her good hand and grasping the back of Simon’s neck. She pulled him closer, opened her mouth, and took the kiss deeper. Oh, aye, she remembered how it was done, what Simon liked. Eyes closed, her mind regressed. At once, she was sixteen and consumed with heart-pounding, stomach- fluttering love for the young rogue who’d stolen her heart. Fearless and curious, eager to please and to be pleasured, she saw no shame in exploring the sexual universe with the man who’d pledged deep affection until his dying day.

Lost in passionate euphoria, Willie pressed against her lover, feeling the evidence of his arousal, which only intensified her fierce and consuming hunger.

Groaning low, Simon unknotted her sash, reached beneath her robe, and palmed her breast through her thin nightshirt.

Blimey.

She could scarcely breathe. Yet she needed more. She straddled his thigh and continued to rock her hips, giving over to the sensual pressure building in her core as the kiss turned wilder, his touch more brazen. It had been so long and never this riotous.

Willie exploded—an earthshaking climax that left her breathless and weak in the knees.

“Good God,” Simon said, holding her close. “Did you—”

“Aye.” She rested her cheek against his chest, entranced by the rapid, heavy thud of his heart. Once she recovered, she was most certain she would be embarrassed by this brazen display, but for now, she simply marveled in the magic. It was as if the years had faded away. Willie’s defenses floundered as did her energy.

Shoulder throbbing and her right arm queerly numb, she did not protest when Simon lifted her into his arms