Her Dark Curiosity - Megan Shepherd

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War. Kept him alive despite five bullets and a gunpowder explosion. I try to be a modern man, and we have better protective garments these days, but a little sentimental superstition can be healthy, don’t you think?’ He tapped his breastplate good-naturedly.

      I smiled, relieved I’d managed to distract him from my name.

      Lucy slid her arm into mine and said, ‘Juliet’s quite a tragic case, I’m afraid. Both parents dead, left penniless. She even had to work at one point.’

      She started to lead me toward the door, but I pulled away a little too fast. I had errands to run before returning home, errands I had to keep secret.

      ‘Thank you for the offer, but I’ve plans with the professor. It was a pleasure meeting you, Inspector. I’ll see you soon, Lucy.’

      I ducked away from them and found the professor amid the crowd, still engrossed by the rusted mechanics of the greenhouse. He smiled warmly when he saw me.

      ‘I wondered if you’d mind if I had a bite to eat with Lucy,’ I said.

      ‘Well, certainly,’ he said, eyes twinkling. Now he could go home to his books and a thick slice of Mary’s gingerbread cake. I kissed him on the cheek and hurried through the tunnel of palms to the doorway, where I could at last be on my own. I took one last breath of the thick, warm air, before pushing the heavy door open and bracing for the cold.

      A swirling gust of snow ruffled my velvet skirts. The botanical garden’s ice-covered lake spread in front of me, the water sprite fountain in the center now frozen under a waterfall of ice.

      I’d get an earful from Lucy later. She wouldn’t like that I’d left her to fend off John Newcastle’s kisses alone. But just being around the police – even a well-mannered inspector – made me nervous.

      And I had my errands to run.

      I drew my fur-lined coat around my neck and waited behind the frozen skeleton of an azalea for Inspector Newcastle and Lucy to leave. They climbed into the black carriage amid pleasantries I couldn’t make out, save for a single curse from Lucy when her skirt caught on the curb. I smiled at her impropriety as their carriage rolled away over the cobblestone.

      Pulling my coat tighter, I made my way toward Covent Garden. The sun was already heading for the horizon, so I slipped into an alleyway that would cut my walk by half. The alley was quiet, save for a pair of cats chasing each other through abandoned crates.

      Ahead of me a short young man approached from the opposite direction, cap pulled low over his brow so his face was hidden in shadows. As our paths grew closer, he took his time looking me up and down, giving me gooseflesh. He wasn’t wearing gloves, and I noticed that he was missing his middle finger – a difficult detail to ignore. I stiffened. The only reason an otherwise warmly dressed man wouldn’t wear gloves on a day this cold was if he planned on needing his dexterity for something.

      I stepped into the street to pass him with a wide berth, but he spun around and walked alongside me. The hair on the back of my neck rose. I forced myself to keep walking, hoping he’d just doubled back on some forgotten errand, even though I knew it was too late for wishes. I glanced at my boot, where a knife was hidden – a trick I’d learned from Montgomery.

      ‘Spare a coin, miss?’ the man asked, suddenly right at my side, in a voice that seemed unnaturally deep. His bare fingers reached out, the missing middle finger leaving an unnatural vacancy.

      I jerked away. ‘Sorry, no.’

      ‘With those fine buttons? Come on, miss. Just a coin. It isn’t safe out here, alone on the streets. Not safe for a girl at all.’

      I saw his arm twitch a second before he grabbed my coat. I ducked out of his grasp and pulled the knife from my boot, then shoved him against the curb at the right angle for his ankles to catch. It threw him off-balance and he fell. I collapsed on top of him, knee digging into the soft center of his chest, knife at his throat, as I checked the alley to make certain we were alone.

      His cap fell back, and I started as shoulder-length red hair tumbled out around a pretty face. A girl younger than me, disguised as a man, which explained the put-on deep voice. That was good – a girl I could scare off. A man I might have had to inflict some damage upon.

      ‘I know it isn’t safe,’ I hissed. ‘What do you think knives are for?’

      I pressed the knife closer against her neck, watching the flesh wrinkle beneath it. Her eyes went wide.

      ‘I didn’t mean nothing!’ she said, voice substantially higher now. ‘Please, miss, I swear, I just wanted them buttons!’

      I narrowed my eyes at her, digging my knee deeper until I felt a rib, and then gave an extra jab before climbing off her.

      I jerked my chin toward the opposite street. ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘And next time put some lampblack on your chin to look like a beard, and for god’s sakes wear gloves; your bare hands gave you away instantly.’

      She scrambled to her feet, brushing the muck off her clothes, and stumbled away at a run. I sheathed the knife in the boot holster, then wiped a trembling hand over my face, breathing some life back into my cold hands.

      I took off at a brisk walk, still shaken, the afternoon clouds overhead the only witness to the incident I couldn’t forget fast enough, until at last I saw the shining lights of Covent Garden.

      4

      The market was filled at all hours with a vast range of people, and I gladly plunged into the safety of their midst. Ladies in fine dresses shopped for Christmas presents, scullery maids swarmed past the wrinkle-faced vegetable women, tailors and seamstresses haggled in the textile quarter. My fine coat and boots caused no one to give me a second glance, until I slipped into the meat section of the market. Few fine young ladies could stomach these narrow passageways. Eels as long as my arm twitched on hooks above lambs’ glassy dead eyes, and stray cats licked up the salty blood pooling on the floor. By the time I reached Joyce’s Choice Meats, I was getting nothing but strange looks.

      Jack Joyce, however, tipped his hat to me.

      Joyce, an Irish ex-boxer who’d turned to the meat trade in his old age, cracked a broken-toothed grin as I approached. His previous profession had left him not only minus a few teeth but with a permanent squint eye that never seemed to be looking in the same direction as the other. A small black dog with a white spot on his chest and notable only in his ugliness, wagged his tail.

      ‘Hello, Joyce,’ I said, and then knelt to scratch the dog’s bony head. In general, I did my best to stay away from animals. They only reminded me of the dark experimentation Father had done. That was why I limited myself to plants. Roses couldn’t kill, or maim, or betray.

      ‘And hello to you too, boy.’ I picked up the dog, though he was heavy in my arms. ‘He’s put on a pound or two, I believe.’

      ‘Aye. Soon enough he’ll be fatter than a queen’s lapdog, if you keep buying him scraps. And just as lazy.’ Joyce took his knobby old hands away from his fire and dug around behind the counter until he came back with some chicken bones that he tossed to the dog.

      Technically, the dog was mine. He’d started following me around town ever since I’d first come to Joyce’s Meats six months ago. It was the meat in my pocket he smelled, and the only way I could get him to keep from trailing at my heels was to pay Joyce to keep him well-fed on scraps, a task that despite his grumbling, I suspected, the old boxer rather enjoyed.

      ‘Let’s see,’ Joyce said, digging around beneath the counter. He came up with a package wrapped in butcher paper and tied with twine. ‘Here’s your order. Two pancreases, one liver. Couldn’t get my hands on the deer heart you wanted. I should have it next week.’

      ‘That’s fine,’ I said, slipping the package into my pocket. Just being here stirred the bones of my hands from their slumber, made them remember what Father had done to me. I flexed them, hoping to hold

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