A Study in Darkness (62 page)

The instinct to survive sprang up, as if it had been asleep but now was on the attack. If she didn’t rouse herself and accept the struggle to find water and sustenance, she would never be strong enough to keep herself safe. Tears welled up
under her closed lids, leaking down her cheek into that soft, soft pillow. Somehow she knew she’d lost that fight already.

“Hey.” A hand touched her cheek, brushing away the tears. “Evelina.”

The voice was soft and husky and as familiar as comfortable shoes. She tried to open her eyes, but they felt so heavy. Light seeped in—brightness striped with the bars of her eyelashes—and disappeared. She tried again, and this time she got them open, wincing at the blurry brilliance of the room. Somehow, she got a hand to her face and rubbed her eyes into focus.

She was lying on her side in a bed with yellow curtains. There was striped wallpaper and white furniture, and she had no idea where she was. She’d never seen this place before.

Nick sat beside the bed, dressed in an old shirt with loose, billowing sleeves. It looked like something from his circus days. And it looked like he hadn’t slept well for a very long time. He reached out, smoothing her hair back from her face. The gentle pressure of his fingers made her sink a little deeper into her pillow as tension left her body.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, his dark gaze searching her face. His eyes weren’t true black, but a brown so dark they looked that way. It was only in light like this one could see the mahogany lights in them, like an exotic gem held up to the sun.

“Thirsty.” The word came out as a whisper.

He turned, and poured water from a pitcher into a glass. Evelina saw that his hands were shaking slightly. He swallowed hard, the lean muscles of his throat working, but he kept his voice perfectly steady. “You’re going to have to sit up.”

He set the glass down again and reached to help her. Evelina tried to roll onto her back. Pain leaped up her body and she gasped, collapsing back onto the bed.
Bloody hell, what happened to me?
Fear came flooding back, along with a feeling of violation.

“Slowly,” Nick said. “You were badly hurt. Your muscles have healed but they’re bound to still be sore.”

Evelina concentrated on breathing, moving very, very gradually this time. She felt his left arm slip behind her, the other beneath her knees, and he slid her back against a nest of pillows. She sagged back against them, feeling dizzy, but the pain was only gnawing now instead of splitting her like an ax. Nick helped her drink, and she downed the whole glass. She felt instantly better.

“Where am I?” she asked, her voice thick and rough.

A glint of mischief flickered over his face. “You’re in a brothel.”

“What?”

“You’ve taken a bed in Miss Hyacinth’s house of pleasure.” He grinned, teeth white in his swarthy face. “I’ve been praying for weeks that I’d get to say that to you.”

“Weeks? What are you talking about? Is this a prank?” She’d barely said it when she saw there was an edge of panic to his smile. They’d known each other too long for him to hide it. She’d rarely seen Nick truly shaken, but he was off balance now. “Tell me.”

“It’s November now,” he said quietly, the grin melting away. “You’ve been unconscious for more than a month.”

“What?” Evelina looked out the window of the room. The tree outside was bare of leaves, the sky an iron gray. Shock numbed her, cold and cutting as ice, as her sense of violation returned threefold. Someone had hurt her and stolen weeks from her life. She began to shake. “How? What happened to me?”

Nick took the glass away, setting it back on the dressing table nearby, and then wrapped her in a soft knitted blanket, bundling her up like a child. “Don’t you remember?” His brows drew together. “Gareth found you on the street. He said you’d been out that night, looking for someone in a panic. Something seemed off and he couldn’t put it from his mind, so he decided to find out what was going on. When he found you, you’d been badly cut up.”

Her hand went to her stomach. Memory flickered. The knife sliding into her, the pain. A dark street. Falling. A voice yelling—maybe Gareth’s. Dizziness took her, as if the memories were a drink too potent for her weakened body.

“He saw someone standing over you, but the figure fled when he saw Gareth coming.” Nick gripped her hand just a little too hard. “Two other women died that night. The boy saved your life.”

No more images came. A black cloud had settled over the event, and all she had were the emotions. There had been a desperate need to find someone, but why? “I can’t remember.”

Nick gave a slight shake of the head. “That doesn’t matter right now. You’ve been surviving on nothing but whatever broth we could spoon into you. The physician didn’t think you were going to live, you’d lost so much blood. It’s a miracle that you healed.”

“I want to remember,” she said, her voice rising to a shrill pitch. Some instinct said that it was very, very important that she recall what she had been doing that night. Her life depended on it. “Someone tried to kill me!”

“Hush,” Nick said. “Your memories will come back. I’ve seen it happen before. Your body needs all your energy to heal right now. The rest will come after.”

“I’m afraid,” she whispered. “I’m afraid of what I don’t know.”

He stroked her hair. “It will pass. It’s best if you don’t think about it right now.”

“I want to know who did this to me!”

He looked grim. “Figuring that out isn’t your job. Not today, anyhow.”

His words were kindly meant, but they came as a blow. She had lost control of everything. “I’ve always stood on my own feet. I’ve faced everything.”

“You don’t have to face this,” Nick said with another caress.

That wasn’t the point. She suddenly wasn’t sure she had the courage. The memory of that knife in her flesh had cut away the girl who walked into Whitechapel and left a pathetic creature huddling in a strange bed. And then suddenly a terrible thought came to her. “Have you news of Uncle Sherlock?”

“Yes,” Nick said. “Holmes is being watched closely by
Keating’s men. I couldn’t get word to him that you were here, but he’s safe.”

She felt her muscles ease like a fist going limp, and sank deeper into the pillows. “Thank God.”

“Do you want me to send for him?” Nick asked. “I could try again to reach him.”

“That would put you in danger.”

“I could go,” he said, though his grasp of her hand grew tighter.

“Don’t leave me. I want to be wherever you are,” she said before she knew she would say it. It was fear, but it was also a confession of much more.

“And I want you there, but on a pirate ship?” He frowned. “It’s a dangerous place. After this, I don’t know if I could stand putting you at so much risk.”

Risk
. Everything, even her protestations of love, were tainted by it. She pressed her hands to her face a moment, then dropped them with a sigh. “No place is safe.” She tried to erase the desperation from her voice and make it sound light. “Besides, I’d look fetching with a cutlass.”

The corners of his mouth twitched downward, as if he didn’t know whether or not to smile. He tugged at one of her wavy, dark locks, his expression a mix of love and consternation. “I nearly went mad looking for you. What were you doing wandering the streets?”

Evelina blinked, her brain swimming. “I don’t know.” Images and phrases lay scattered in her mind, as if someone had dumped out a drawer. She couldn’t put things in order.

Nick’s hand was on hers again, holding her steady. “Did it have anything to do with Magnus and his magic? I could feel it on you, Evie. You were electric with power when I first found you. It faded away over time, but somehow it must have helped you heal. A surgeon stitched you up, but he held out no hope. He said you should never have lived.”

And the memory of the workhouse fire and the sweet taste of those lives filled her. Remorse welled up, thick and bitter. Evelina squeezed her eyes shut, too weak to hold back more tears. A shuddering sob tore through her.

A sudden pain made her catch her breath, but when she
reached for the place that had hurt, there was not even a bandage. It had simply been the complaint of healing muscles.
I shouldn’t have lived
. Even the beat of her heart bore witness to the fact she’d dabbled in something foul. Guilty tears spilled down her face.

“Evie?”

The urge to confess was too much. “I don’t remember exactly what happened. But Magnus had books and he knows so much and he would let tidbits drop. I gobbled them up like a fool. He showed me a healing spell. It was the kind of knowledge I always wanted. But it was so, so dark.”

“And yet somehow, you couldn’t stop from wanting to know one morsel more,” Nick finished for her.

She nodded, not able to bring herself to say another word. She couldn’t even open her eyes to look at him. He knew her too well. And, she remembered what Magnus had said. Someday she would betray Nick just to learn more.

“Other girls have affairs with men, or cards, or opium. Only you would have one with black magic.”

Evelina gave a gulping sob.
No, I will never go back to Magnus. It won’t happen—and it will never be at the cost of anyone else
.

He leaned close, wiping away her tears with his fingertips. “You know as well as I do where that dark road leads. And yet I could kiss the sorcerer’s feet for giving you the means to survive.”

“I’m done with him,” she said resolutely, but inside she was hollow.
Gareth found me. Did I really try to strip him of his life? Or is that a terrible hallucination? Please, please let it be nothing more than a bad dream!

“Agreed.” Nick gave a slow nod. “But remember I’m a thief. I can’t throw stones.”

“Oh, Nick.” She closed her eyes. She didn’t deserve his forgiveness, but she was damned grateful for it. She was teetering on the edge of despair and only the look in his eyes was keeping her from plunging over. “There are moments I wonder if Magnus will let me go.”

“Magnus is gone. His theater is empty.”

That startled her. “He’s gone? Everything there? All those books?”

Nick pointed to somewhere at the foot of the bed she couldn’t quite see. “Gareth found your carpetbag and tools. It was the only thing left behind.”

Evelina sank back against the pillows, not sure if the news made her feel better or worse. All of a sudden, she had no energy left. Her mood plummeted. “I don’t know what to think.”

“He’s up to something … but then when isn’t he?”

She lifted her hand in a gesture of surrender. Nick captured it in his. The shadow of his beard had grown in, making him look even more the ruffian. “You’ve been bullied and stripped of everything familiar and then brutally attacked,” he said quietly. “It’s natural to feel as if the world is crumbling around you. But don’t you worry, Evie. We’ve always looked after each other, and we always will.”

“We will.” And that’s what kept them bound together. Nick was always there for her. More than anything in the world, she wanted to do the same for him.

Some of the awfulness inside her eased. She reached up, touching his face. If her journey—from a girlhood in the circus to a sickbed in a Whitechapel brothel—had been long and winding, his had been every bit as spectacular. And it was their individual voyages that had given this moment meaning, because they had come back together. They were home.

He took her hand in his, kissing her fingers. His expression was uncharacteristically vulnerable, and Evelina would have given her soul to keep that look there. A fierce, possessive warmth filled her chest.

“You should rest,” he said. “Or eat something. I’ve been talking too much.”

She was tired, but not so tired that she was willing to let Nick go. “Stay. I
want
to hear you talk.”

It was hard to say if she pulled him down to her, or he drew her closer. Their lips brushed, the heat of his breath fanning her skin. A small noise of pleasure escaped him, somewhere between a moan and a growl. It roused heat
deep in her belly, kindling a fire that pushed back the fear and doubt that had followed her from the depths of her healing sleep.

I’m alive
. Even if that had been bought with dark magic, she was glad of it.

She slid her hand into his hair, glorying in its thickness and in the strength of the muscles under his sun-darkened skin. And then one hand wasn’t enough, and she was winding both her arms around his neck. The bed sank with his added weight as he joined her there, and that felt right, too. They belonged side by side.

Slowly, because she still ached with stiffness, she rolled until she was leaning on his chest, pushing away the covers that tangled between them. With a flush of inconvenient modesty, Evelina noticed that she was wearing someone’s tissue-thin chemise, and it provided as much coverage as window glass. From the look on Nick’s face, he didn’t mind at all. He reached up, cupping her breast in his palm. Her nipple hardened under his touch.

And her magic leaped for his. The silvery light that suddenly engulfed them was hard to see in the cool November light, but it was there, a glowing fur of power that enrobed their skin.
Oh, please, no
, she thought, afraid of the rush of destruction that was sure to follow. She grabbed at her magic, ready to haul it back under her control, but it slithered through her mental grasp as if coated in butter.

Nick never gave her the chance to worry about it. His hand slid inside the frail fabric of the chemise, sliding his thumb over the peak of her breast. Evelina’s thoughts scattered as his mouth found hers again and hot desire rushed through her. The silvery light swirled around them, bright as liquid metal pouring into a new mold.

Devas began winking into sight, circling around like hummingbirds around syrup. They were tiny motes of blue, gold, and green, called by the surging energy and hungry to taste it. They were beautiful, swirling in clusters of twos and threes, like colorful stars spiraling above them.

Evelina gasped at the canopy of lights, thick as the blossoms
on a tree.
If there are no devas in the East End, how far did they come?
How loudly was their passion broadcasting into the aether? The notion made her blanch.