Wicked Little Secrets (6 page)

Up close, Vivienne’s eyes were large and her eyelids droopy, as if she hadn’t slept. Still, the fatigue lent a beautiful fragility to her face. She had fashioned an Egyptian scarab he had given her long ago into a necklace. It lay on the pale, soft skin above the rise of her breasts. His senses quickened and he wanted to touch her, as if this small distance between them was as big and void as the Dead Sea.

“I-I thought you both might be hungry from so much exercise,” he said, trying to sound casual. He squatted down and put a sandwich on the ground for Garth. The pug smashed his face in it, making strange gurgling and grunting noises. Dashiell ruffled the hound’s wrinkled neck and stood.

“And one for you,” he said to her. He swirled the sandwich under her nose, letting the aroma tempt her. “They’re my favorite: beefsteak and mustard.”

Vivienne giggled, and her tense features relaxed. She took a bite and began to chew, gazing up at him from under her lashes. Dear God, he wanted to kiss that porcelain jaw, trail up to her ear, and get lost in her luscious hair.

Then something in the square attracted her attention and her eyes widened. “Blah hann nnaann koof!” she cried.

“What?”

She made two big chews and swallowed down the sandwich in a big inelegant gulp. “It’s the man in the blue coat,” she said with breathy urgency. “Quick, go back inside.”

She yanked on the leash. Garth, his face still deep in beefsteak, growled as he dug in his paws between the pavers, refusing to leave his sandwich.

“Not now, Garth!” She bodily scooped up the growling hound and dashed into the alley on the side of Dashiell’s house that led to the back gardens and mews.

Dashiell, confused, stood on his step holding the plate of sandwiches, as a tiny man in a bright blue coat sauntered into the square.

Using his thumb and forefinger, Dashiell did something he wouldn’t have done for any other lady; he picked up Garth’s half-eaten, smashed sandwich and slipped into the alley. “What is going on?”

Vivienne grabbed him by his coat lapels and yanked him to her. “Don’t let him see us,” she said in a tense whisper.

“Who?”

“The man in the blue coat.” She peered around Dashiell’s shoulder and bit down on the edge of her thumbnail, her eyes tensed with concentration.

“Is he an unwanted admirer?” Dashiell’s hands balled into fists around the platter of sandwiches. “Do you want me to take care of him?”

“No!” she hissed. “Just stay here!” She put her back against the brick wall and tiptoed down to the mouth of the alley, keeping Garth’s leash clutched so tight her knuckles were white. She turned her head, putting her cheek against the brick, and peered along the walk running before their homes.

Garth pawed Dashiell’s trousers, giving him a pathetic look. Dashiell dropped the dog’s sandwich on the ground with a splat and Garth plunged his wrinkled face into the bread.

“What the hell is going on?” Dashiell demanded.

Her hand sliced through the air, silencing him. She stepped closer to the edge to get a better view. “There, he is leaving now,” she whispered and tugged on Garth’s leash. “Come on.”

The dog lay down on his prized sandwich, refusing to budge.

Vivienne stomped her foot. “Ughh!” She stared at the dog and then at Dashiell. She flashed him a sweet, beguiling smile and held out the leash. “Do keep him. I hope I shan’t be gone long.”

“
Hope
,” he echoed. “Who is this man?”

She didn’t answer, but lowered the brim of her bonnet and set out into the square, making a fast beeline toward the man in the blue coat as he turned the corner out of the square. In his hand, he held a fat envelope he hadn’t had a few minutes before.

Dashiell scooped up Garth with one hand and tucked him under the arm holding the plate of sandwiches, then scrambled after Vivienne.

She turned her head when he caught up with her, her eyes fired with anger. “What on earth are you doing?”

“Funny, I was going to ask you the same question.”

“I’m following the man with the blue coat,” she explained, as if it were completely rational behavior. “Now stay at home, please. This doesn’t concern you.”

“What? You are deranged if you think I’m letting you loose in London by yourself.”

She gave a frustrated snort and flicked her wrist. “Fine then, just get far behind me in case someone recognizes you.” She raised the hem of her gown and ran ahead, leaving him in her wake.

What
is
happening
here?

The tiny man strutted, carefree, shoulders swinging, as if it were the fashionable hour in Hyde Park, unperturbed by the crowds of people crushing against him.

Vivienne tracked him like an excited bloodhound. Behind her flapping hem, Dashiell followed, hatless, holding Garth and a plate of beefsteak sandwiches. The hound’s curled tongue strained for the sandwiches. Dashiell felt as idiotic as he ever had in his life. But he couldn’t leave Vivienne alone, not as men’s gazes boldly raked over her as she passed, too intent was she on the tiny man to notice their smirks of appreciation.

“Keep your damn eyes to yourself,” Dashiell growled as he slammed his shoulder against one gentleman who had the audacity to turn and whistle at her figure.

Vivienne didn’t hear. She veered right, heading for the slums of St. Giles.

Bloody
hell!
He rushed to catch up with her, grabbing her elbow with his free hand. “Enough of this game. You need to turn around. It’s dangerous now.”

“No,” she said, a gritty determination in her eyes a Spartan soldier would have admired. Then she surged ahead and disappeared in the human congestion.

“Damn that lady,” Dashiell spat, turning the corner after her onto a narrow street. The houses were streaked with soot and collapsing on their rotting beams. Clothes fluttered from windows and lines strung between the buildings. The reek of animal waste and sour perspiration assaulted his nose. Mothers clad in stained, faded dresses clustered on the stoops outside their doors, holding their crying babies. Barefoot children whose faces were smudged with dirt chased each other up and down the walk, avoiding the open gutter and the drunks who stumbled about with shiny, vacant eyes. Above the general roar of chatter rose the cries of the muffin and pie vendors singing out their goods.

Garth cowered in Dashiell’s arm, afraid for his little doggy life. Dashiell was beginning to believe the hound had more damn sense than Vivienne.

Vivienne! Where is Vivienne?
In a split second, at least a dozen images of Vivienne hurt, crying, bleeding rushed through his head. Then, in the tangle of people, he spied that damn blue coat stopping before a dirty building and then disappearing inside… and Vivienne not ten seconds behind. She paused at the door, looked about her, then walked on and stopped a few feet away, turning back to study the grim residence.

Dashiell pushed through the inebriates and vendors to where she stood. “I don’t know what you’re doing. But you need to go home,” he ordered. “Right now.”

His words seemed to bounce off her hard head, unheeded. “Wait here,” she said slowly. “I’m going to knock on the door. I need to find out his name.”

He grabbed her arm, causing Garth to yelp. “Now you just stop. You are not safe. I’ll get the house number as we pass and ask around about it.”

“That is far too complicated,” she replied. “I’m simply going to knock on the door and say that I am looking for Mrs. Highgate—she was my former school mistress, the one who tossed me out. A witch of a woman. Anyway, he will say she isn’t there, and I will say something like ‘This was the name and address I was given,’ and hopefully he will tell me his name.”

For a second, he couldn’t respond. Although Vivienne had grown into this ravishing lady, her sense of fear and self-preservation was still clearly that of the twelve-year-old girl in the tree who wanted to run away with him. “I’m beginning to believe you’ve been lying to me all these years. That you actually live in Bedlam and every once in a while they let you out to visit your aunt. Now why is knowing this man’s name worth risking your life?”

“He is, um, a business associate of my father,” Vivienne replied coolly.

Dashiell scrutinized her face with his hot eyes. “You are lying,” he said. “I know when you’re lying.”

Fine, so he guessed her deception, but she was losing her patience. “I told you to stay back at Wickerly Square.”

“What? You are very lucky I followed you. My dear lady, this is St. Giles. You know, sometimes referred to as the most dangerous place in all of England. You’re lucky you haven’t been knocked to the ground and had that little scarab ripped from your neck, or worse. Now why are you risking your life for this man in the blue coat?”

Vivienne studied his face. Angry lines formed around his mouth, and his eyes shone almost black. She couldn’t possibly explain that her aunt was potentially being blackmailed. She swallowed and considered turning back and going home, but she didn’t know if she would get another moment to come back. If this were indeed the most dangerous place in all of England, at least she had Dashiell with her as an unwitting aid.

As she debated, a swarm of pie and trinket vendors descended on them. As Dashiell shouted that in no uncertain terms would he buy a stolen pocket watch or eat meat pies fit for vultures, she nimbly slipped between the vendors’ carts. She just needed a few seconds, that was all! Dashiell might become angry, but she had greater concerns than her neighbor’s wrath.

A pair of dirty doves nesting in the timbers above her looked down with tiny black eyes as she knocked on the wooden door held by rusty hinges. The little man answered the door. Up close, she could see his features for the first time. Ginger-colored freckles dotted his delicate face. He possessed large, thickly lashed blue eyes and a rather feminine pink mouth. His gaze traveled up and down Vivienne’s body and he began shaking like an excited squirrel. “’Ere to see Mrs. Jenkinson, are ya? Come in, come in.”

He took off his hat and violently waved it, beckoning her inside. She hesitated. This wasn’t a very good idea, but who was Mrs. Jenkinson? She looked beyond the man to a tiny entrance hall painted a pale azure with splotches of white, as if to recreate clouds in a sky. A broad young lady came down the stairs, dressed in cascades of pink ruffles. Blond ringlets fell about her plump face and squinting eyes. She didn’t look too frightening, Vivienne thought.

She peeked over her shoulder at Dashiell. His angry face glowered at her from above the shoulders of the muffin and pie men who held him hostage. His lips formed a vicious slew of profanity, probably with her name inserted between obscenities, but she couldn’t hear him from the noise of the crowd.

At least he knew where to find her if she didn’t come out.

“Why, thank ya, dearie,” she said, trying to adopt the brash accent of the peasant women who sold fish in the market in Birmingham. “And wot be your name?”

“Willie,” he said, fingering his hat. “This ’ere is my ma and me’s place.” He jerked his head toward the stairs as if he were proud of the hovel.

Vivienne took a tentative step into the hall, intending to go no further. But Willie closed the door behind her and then clasped her elbow, pulling her into the adjoining room. The pink-ruffled lady now sat on a sagging burgundy sofa beside a bony companion clad in a matching gown. In the corner, another woman wearing the same pink uniform plucked one of the three strings on a harp that looked as if it had fallen off the back of a wagon more than a few times.

The ladies regarded Vivienne with dull eyes and gaping mouths. Was this some sort of strange boarding house for witless ladies?

“Now don’t you pay attention to these old things,” Willie said. “You ain’t like them. These ’ere are just a few weeks away from the streets.”

The
streets?

She gasped as the realization blossomed in her head. This was a brothel! A mixture of shock, fear, and curiosity hit her at once.

She stared at the ladies. Physically, they looked no different than the ladies seen shopping for poultry and thread at the markets. There was no special distinction about them, no overflowing breasts or faces stained with makeup or gaudy clothes. Yet these women lay with several men a night. Well, perhaps, she thought. Vivienne really wasn’t knowledgeable about the specifics of the prostitution trade. There was something about these women that was both repulsive and fascinating at the same time.

Willie let go of her arm to knock on a door along the back wall.

Vivienne began to back up, ready to bolt. “You know, really, I think I have the wrong add—”

“Ma! We ’ave a new girl. You ’ave to see ’er!” Willie shouted. Again he grabbed Vivienne’s arm and pulled her forward, his face beaming as if Vivienne were some wrapped present he was giving his mother.

The doorknob shook as if jiggled by a key. When the door opened, a petite lady with a pert, upturned nose peered out. Her pale blond curls and vivid blue eyes contrasted against her tanned, dry skin. Wrinkles cut deep valleys under her eyes and around her mouth. Ugly brown splotches marred her cheeks. Mrs. Highgate’s words, “A lady always wears a bonnet,” echoed in Vivienne’s mind.

Behind Jenkinson was a miniscule study only big enough to hold a slim, scratched oak desk and a chair. On the desktop sat a lit lamp, a cut-glass decanter of some dark spirits, and a familiar-looking open envelope, but Vivienne couldn’t see its contents because the woman stood in the way.

Jenkinson cocked her head and eyed Vivienne. Her lips were parted, and Vivienne could see her teeth, all black stumps. “Wot are you doin’ ’ere?” she demanded.

Vivienne took a step to her right, trying to see over the woman’s shoulder. “I was given this address.” She could just make out a gold chain peeking out of the envelope when the madam stepped forward and grabbed Vivienne’s chin.

“Who gave ya?” The woman blasted Vivienne with a breath of acrid liquor.

“My… um… former mistress, but I was asked to leave,” Vivienne said, straining to look around the woman’s head.