“So youdolove her!”
Thunderation! The woman could trip up a straight-talking saint. Jackson really ought to install her as the station’s lead interrogator. He upped his pace. “I didn’t say that.”
“You don’t need to, Mr. Baggett,” she hollered after him, once again scurrying to gain his side. “It was written all over your face—and hers—when I stepped into the front room. Had I not intruded, I daresay you’d have kissed her. Wouldn’t have taken much, for you were practically nose to nose.”
He scowled as he shoved a chunk of cheddar into his mouth. Kit Forge was far too canny. Perfect for Jackson—not for him.
“Well?” she persisted. “When are you going to admit it?”
He dodged around an organ-grinder setting up for a performance, the nattering of the man’s monkey as irritating as Kit. “I admit nothing, for you have read the situation entirely wrong. Mrs. Jones tended to my injury and, in doing so, was forced into close proximity, nothing more. Nothing less. And that’s the end of it.”
“But—”
“I said that’s the end,” he growled. “I am out here for your sake, not to discuss my personal matters. Is that clear?”
Her head bowed; even her shoulders sagged. A precious sight, and very uncommon. “I beg your pardon, Mr. Baggett. You are right. I have overstepped a boundary, one that I will not cross again.” She peeked up at him, sunshine casting an angelic glow on her pixie face. “Forgive me?”
And that, right there, was Jackson’s downfall. His as well. It would take a cold, cold heart to ignore such contrition. “Forgiven and forgotten.”
For some time, then, they strode the bustling streets in companionable silence, but the closer they drew to what remained of the Devil’s Acre, the more his curiosity blossomed. “This jaunt we’re on, what’s it about? Who or what are we looking for?”
“A man who’s gone missing.” Kit hiked her skirt as she stepped over a pile of manure, the bane of every London road. “Mr. Harold Coleman’s wife came to me with a tale of woe about him stealing her daughter. Lately, however, I’ve come to suspect he might be in hiding not for nefarious reasons but in fear of his own life and that of his child’s. I could be wrong, though.”
“Kit Forgewrong?” He slapped his hand over his heart. “Say it is not so.”
“I know.” She grinned up at him. “’Tis a rarity, eh?”
He chuckled. “What makes you think this Coleman is holed up in the Devil’s Acre?”
“It’s the one place I haven’t yet looked. Have you been there before?”
He turned onto Old Pye Street, Kit at his side, the stink of what was left of the slum greeting them before they even set foot in it. “I have been here, but not often. Folks in these parts aren’t keen to fess up to anything, so it’s usually a waste of time. Blind, deaf, and dumb, the lot of them, or so they’d lead you to believe.”
He edged ahead of Kit, scanning from one ramshackle building to another. The addition of Victoria Street had cut the heart right out of this rookery. Most residents had scattered like rodents from an upturned nest, settling in St. Giles or Whitechapel. A few though, those with roots too deep to yank out, had merely dug in…which made this stretch of road particularly dangerous. Somehow they could always sniff out a lawman.
“Hold a moment.” Facing a brick wall, he withdrew his pistol from his coat, then dug in his pocket for fresh lead. His fingers met but one bullet. Blast! He’d used far more than he’d credited last night.
Kit laughed behind him. “You won’t have time to pull off a shot.”
He shoved in the bullet, then turned back to her as he tucked the weapon away. “You never know.”
“Actually, I do.” With an arch to her brow, she slid out a knife from her boot and tucked it up her sleeve. “In tight quarters, I’ll take a blade any day.”
He glanced down the lane where shadows skulked in doorways from buildings that practically shook hands over the road, so far did they lean on their crumbling foundations. She was right. He’d take a shiv to the back before he even twitched his trigger finger, which would leave Kit wide open for attack. And if anything happened to her, Jackson would never forgive him. Nor would he forgive himself.
For he’d never yet pardoned his part in that fateful day Edwina Draper had died.
Chapter Ten
Squalor felt like home. A sad fact, that; leastwise that’s what people would say. But people be hanged! Kit tossed back her hair and marched along Old Pye, grateful for the fish bones, the broken glass, and who knew what else littering the pavement. She’d spent her childhood on streets such as these, knew them as well as the mole on the top of her forearm. Want and need had been harsh taskmasters but had taught her well to be thankful for the little things in life.
She scanned from door to door, window to window, never making direct eye contact with the suspicious faces peering back. Such an affront wouldn’t go unmet in this part of town. There had to be a bawdy house in this mix, which would be the best place to start looking for a man. And using a man for bait would render a fat fish much sooner than her gawking about for one.
She turned to Mr. Baggett. “How about you stroll five or six paces ahead of me? Put your hands in your pockets, elbows out, and add a bit of swagger to your step. Oh, and pardon me but—” With deft fingers, she loosened his necktie and pulled his collar apart, showing a bit of skin.
He batted her away. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“We need to attract a loose skirt.”
