Page 93 of What Angels Fear

Lovejoy nodded, the light of a new burst of fireworks winking on the lenses of his eyeglasses. “And if you walk into this trap you say Lord Wilcox has set for you? How will that save her?”

“I have no intention of falling neatly into Wilcox’s trap.”

“Yet you might. If you will simply tell me—”

“Goddamn you!” Sebastian cried, yanking painfully, uselessly, at the ropes that tethered him. “You stupid, bloody-minded, self-congratulating bastard. Every minute you keep me here, you are killing her.”

Sebastian went suddenly still, his chest jerking on a quick intake of cold, smoke-fouled air as he carefully trained his gaze away from the window through which he had seen, briefly, the small, thin arm of a boy who clung to the back of the carriage.

“I understand your frustration,” said Sir Henry with a plodding calm that made Sebastian want to scream. “But the law—” He broke off as the hackney’s near door jerked open and a small, roughly dressed body appeared on the step. “I say—” he began, then broke off again when Tom swung up into the carriage. The flaring glow from an explosion of fireworks gleamed bright and dangerous on the blade he held gripped tightly in one fist.

“Make a sound or move a whisker,” said the boy fiercely, “an’ I’ll slit yer gullet.”

“Heaven preserve us,” said Sir Henry, one hand groping for the strap as the carriage gave a sudden lurch.

“I know I didn’t do what you done told me,” Tom said as he leapt to slice through the ropes at Sebastian’s wrists.

“Thank God for that.” Sebastian flung aside the remnants of the ropes while the boy crouched to cut the bindings at his ankles. Careful to keep one eye on the white-faced magistrate, Sebastian gripped Tom’s shoulder, his hand tightening in a spasm of wordless gratitude as the boy rose to his feet. “But do it now, lad. Quickly. And this time, don’t look back.”

Tom’s head jerked, his face settling into stubborn lines. “I’m coming with you.”

Sebastian urged him toward the door. “No. You have your instructions. I expect you to follow them.”

“But—”

The need for haste welled up within Sebastian, so fierce and white-hot, it burned in his chest as he swallowed down the impulse to scream at the boy. “Something might go wrong,” said Sebastian, struggling to keep his voice calm and steady while every fiber of his being hummed with desperate impatience. “If it does, I’m counting on you to see this bastard brought to justice.” Conscious of the magistrate’s wrathful presence, Sebastian chose his words carefully. “You know what I need you to do. Can you do it? Can you?”

The boy hesitated, his throat working as he swallowed, hard. Then he ducked his head and nodded. “Aye, guv’nor. I’ll do it.” He pressed the handle of his knife into Sebastian’s fist. “’Ere. You might be needin’ this,” he said, and, without looking back, slipped off the step into the crowd.

Sebastian watched the small figure disappear into the surging, cheering press of humanity. Then he tucked the knife away in his boot, and prepared to follow.

“This woman,” said Sir Henry suddenly. “Tell me where she’s being kept.”

Sebastian paused at the open door, one hand tightening on the frame as he glanced back. “I think not,” he said, and dropped off the step to be swallowed up by the night.

Chapter 60

The Prosperity Trading Company’s warehouse fronted one of the basins lying just below Parson’s Stairs and the Hermitage Dock.

Sebastian took a hackney as far as Burr Street, then worked his way on foot toward the river. Crowded by day with seamen and stevedores, the wharves after dark were a dangerous labyrinth patrolled by the river police and private guards hired by ship owners and trading companies desperate to control the swarms of thieves who could empty a warehouse or a ship’s hold in a night, and slit a man’s throat for the coat on his back.

But tonight Sebastian seemed to have the riverfront to himself, moving through fog foul with the stench of salt and river sludge mingling with the odors of the nearby tanneries and soap factories. He could hear the slap of the incoming tide and the occasional muffled boom of distant fireworks from Tower Hill and the Bridge, but the thickness of the fog brought its own special hush to the world, magnifying the sound of his breathing until it grated loud and harsh in his ears.

The warehouse he sought lay midway down a row that loomed before him from out of the gloom. Two stories high and built of rough stone, it butted to the south against another warehouse, while to the left an alley just wide enough for a cart separated it from the next row of buildings, ancient relics of soot-darkened brick.

As he neared the row, Sebastian could see a faint glow of light shining through the Prosperity Trading Company warehouse’s ached, brick-faced windows, but they were set high in the thick stone walls, too high for anyone to look through. In the center of the wall facing the narrow lane, a set of double doors sturdily built of thick planks gave access to the warehouse’s ground floor. The door’s heavy padlock hung dark and undisturbed against the peeling painted wood.

The padlock was both an acknowledgement and a mocking warning, Sebastian thought; it was Wilcox’s way of saying, I know you have no intention of walking blindly into my trap. But make no mistake, I’m ready for you. And whereas I know this warehouse very, very well, you, my friend, do not.

Sebastian knew the price of arrogance. It was his own arrogance, after all—his belief in his ability to catch Rachel’s killer—that had led Kat to this deserted warehouse and the terrors she must now be facing as she waited, live bait in a monster’s trap. But he kept telling himself that however arrogant Wilcox might be, the man was no fool. He would know he needed Kat alive if he were to have any hope of surviving the confrontation to come.

Looking up, Sebastian scanned the windows on the upper floor and found them barred, like those of the ground floor, with stout iron grills. But there would be another set of doors, he knew, on the water side.

Soft footed, trying to control even the rasp of his breathing, he slipped down the side alley, toward the water. As he passed a pile of empty packing crates and broken barrels, a rat scuttled, squealing before him.

He stopped, his ears straining to catch any hint of sound, any indication that Wilcox, waiting within the stone fastness of the warehouse, had heard. A faint breath of air heavy with the scents of the sea lifted off the basin, its heaving black waters all but obscured by the freezing fog that hung low and thick. The high dark hulks and swaying masts of the ships that lay anchored there were mere shadows in the night, quiet and ghostlike.

Treading carefully over the rough weathered planks of the open dock, Sebastian crept toward the waterfront doors. They bore no padlock, but then, they were normally barred from within anyway. Reaching out, he applied just enough pressure against the first panel to tell him what he had already guessed: these doors, too, were locked.

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