What was there to say?I knew you had ties to criminals for your job, but those two men have me trembling through three layers of linen.He’d mentioned ‘foreign agents,’ which meant her suspicions about the Home Office were spot on. Dealing with unsavory characters must have been a hazard of the job, but no one should grow familiar with those icy stares and committed threats.
Danny had a most irrational desire to wrap Percy in her arms like a child and hold him until he remembered what it was to feel safe.
“The smaller man didn’t like you much.” Nor the big, for that matter.
Percy winced. “Syd doesn’t like anybody. Can’t afford to when you run the best gang in the rookeries.”
Danny didn’t hide her surprise. “Syd is the leader? He’s so slight.” When the two had passed, Danny had been shocked to realize she was a solid three inches taller.
“Never go by appearances, Daniella.” There was no teasing in Percy’s voice. “Underestimate the smallest man and you will die.”
Danny wouldn’t make light, not when the spark in his eyes had gone out. “I’ll remember.”
“Good.”
He offered her his arm and they kept pace on the left side of the sidewalk, passing costermongers and piemen selling everything from fruits and vegetables to mutton and eel.
The reality of danger, not two alleys over, had Danny itching beneath her skin, but she wouldn’t give in to fear, nor let it claim her optimism. Today’s outing and conversation would not tarnish under the light of realization.
What had transpired between her and Percy had been carnal, inevitable, like two strikes of lightning clashing in the dark. She wouldn’t hope that he’d see past her demons, not when he struggled with his own so viscerally. All she could do was express how little that mattered to her now.
The shame still clawed at her, tearing at her mind to drag her into a dark mental space too horrifying to return to reality. But Percy hadn’t run away. He’d stayed, held her while she’d fallen into that bottomless pit, and then pulled her back into the light.
She’d come to care for him. The man who teased her and laughed at the prim and proper. The man who taunted her body into the most delirious sensations of eroticism. And the manwho fought enemies in the dark to protect her from harm, even when she could see how much the violence ate at him.
The world could be ugly, people more so, but in the end, everyone was surviving the only way they knew how.
He was one of them, and she was too.
As far as commonalities went, she prayed it would be enough.
*
Percy’s body relaxedas they moved farther away from the slums, though the hard set to his jaw remained.
He was lamentable. He should never have brought Danny within spitting distance of the rookeries. Syd had been right, the savage bastard. They were both far too well dressed to remain unnoticed, and even dirt smeared and wearing a sack, no one could mistake Danny’s rigid spine and fine speech as anything but elite.
If he’d been thinking at all, he would never have agreed to a friendship between them. But the woman’s presence ripped all rational thought to shreds. Not that their friendship would remain intact. Silent and gaze distant, she was probably concentrating all her fierce will on keeping from hysterics.
He’d been a fool all along thinking he could rescue her in the Crystal Palace from two-faced ladies and all past regressions would be wiped away. And that look of worthlessness on her face after the two thugs had been disarmed, he knew the feeling well.
“So . . .”
Percy admonished himself for how he held on to her one word with bated breath. When she said nothing else, he prompted, “Yes?”
She cocked her head, her lips tilted in unfathomable humor. “Vengeance? Butcher? How many names have you had in your career?”
Percy’s shocked laugh was a release he needed, and a painful reminder setting expectations for Lady Daniella made him that much more a fool.
“I gained a new name every time I reinvented myself. First, to sound tough as a child, then as a man of rank in the army, and much later, as an evil shadow in the dark.” He winked. “I told you I was famous.”
His good humor vanished, remembering how close she’d come to harm. Gaze zeroing in on the wound on her arm, his chest tightened past the point of pain and went straight to unbearable. “Your arm needs bandaging.”
She covered the cut with her hand. “The bleeding stopped. I’ll be fine.” Her small smile squeezed the heart in his chest. “Good thing your talents include disarming thugs.” At his continued silence, she said, “Iamfine, Percy.”
Behewasn’t!
This was what he got for thinking he could keep something so innocent and beautiful close. Had he really been so naive as to think a monster like him could keep her safe?
