Prologue
1835
London, England
Doom was sitting heavy on Gabriel Beckford’s shoulders. He’d awoken with it an hour or so earlier on the cot in his club, the Orcus Society. The plaguing feeling wouldn’t go away, and he’d been lying there staring at the shadows dancing on the walls, trying to discern what was causing it. No luck so far. He likely should just get up and go home to his new house and his new wife, but he didn’t move.
He knew why, and it shamed him that he was avoiding Georgette. Though they had been wed six months, it still didn’t feel real. In a sense, it wasn’t. They loved each other, yes, but as friends—the closest of friends. They had the kind of friendship, the kind offamily, that had been forged on the dangerous streets of London as orphans. Gabe had always had his younger sister, Blythe, but Georgette and their other friend, Hawk, had no one else. The four of them had made a blood vow in the dirty, rat-infested basement of the orphanage to be one another’s family.
That vow had seen them all through years of danger. That vow had kept them alive. And now that vow had been destroyed by Hawk. He had obliterated their bond with one unthinkable act.
Gabe swallowed back the disgust that came every time he thought of Hawk forcing himself on Georgette and ravishing her. Gabe had wanted to kill Hawk when Georgette had come to him, crying, shaken, and terrified because she’d discovered a couple of months prior that she was with child. She was starting to show and didn’t know what to do. Hell, he still wanted to kill Hawk, but Georgette had made him promise not to touch the bastard and begged Gabe never to tell a soul that they’d wed for anything but love. She didn’t want anyone to know what Hawk had done because she didn’t want her unborn child to ever know. How could Gabe go against that wish? He couldn’t. Besides, he felt partly responsible for what had happened to Georgette. Hadn’t he known Hawk better than anyone? Gabe should have known, should have protected Georgette.
Finally forcing himself up, Gabe tugged his shirt over his head and searched the dark office for his boots. His mind turned, and the nagging feeling that something terrible was about to happen increased while his thoughts ricocheted from that worry to the recent past. How had he not seen that Hawk was capable of such a thing? Gabe had not seen it because he’d been working during the day and fighting in matches at night to earn money to buy this club. He’d not had time to see it, and that was a failure on his part. Yet another failure to protect someone he’d vowed to take care of. It was the second largest failure of his life. The first had been when he’d failed his mother. She’d died in the dingy room they let because she’d gotten sick from having no heat or food or warm clothing. He’d failed to provide for her, and it didn’t matter that he’d only been eight. That was old enough.
Gabe’s jaw clenched as he shoved on his boots and made his way out of his office and through the quiet halls of his new club. He approached the door to the alley, now guarded at all hours since Hawk had taken to causing trouble for Gabe since he’d wed Georgette. Hawk had sent men to break into Gabe’s club twice, once starting a fire and the other time stealing the cash on hand from the night’s earnings.
Fury filled Gabe’s chest. Hawk wanted to be with Georgette, and somehow the man had conveniently twisted it to be Gabe’s fault that he was not, rather than placing the blame where it belonged: on Hawk’s own base shoulders. Now Hawk spent his time punishing Gabe for “stealing” Georgette from him.
Being infuriated was useless. But it didn’t change the fact that he was just that. Hawk had tipped over some edge of reason, and there didn’t seem to be any coming back from it. Maybe it had been all the hard years on the street. God knew the things they’d endured living hand to mouth as orphans. The begging. The shame. Being looked down upon and, worse, being treated as if they were invisible. Gabe had channeled his anger into boxing, but Hawk didn’t have quick feet or fists. Instead, he had channeled his anger into illegal trading. They made money in two very different ways, but Gabe hadn’t judged Hawk. No, he judged all the people who had turned a blind eye to the problem of children living alone on the streets.
Gabe paused in front of Bear, whom he’d known for years now. “Did you see Blythe home personally?” Gabe asked.
He didn’t truly think Hawk would ever try to harm his sister. For one thing, Hawk didn’t blame Blythe for losing Georgette. He blamed Gabe. For another thing, Blythe had saved Hawk’s life two years earlier, and for everything good within him that Hawk had lost, he still seemed to be upholding the street code of a life debt. Blythe had saved him, so he would never hurt her. Still, Gabe wasn’t willing to risk it.
“Exactly as you asked,” the man said.
Gabe clapped Bear on the shoulder. “Thank you. I’ll be back. I’m going to check on the warehouse.”
He normally was the last person to ensure everything was secured at the warehouse after closing every night, but he’d fallen asleep before doing so tonight. Maybe that’s what was clawing at his mind. The warehouse made him a tidy profit each month and was the first thing he’d bought. He stored excess supplies for not only his club there but many of the clubs in Covent Garden paid him a fee to store theirs, as well.
Bear cocked an eyebrow. “You spend an awful lot of time here and at the warehouse for a newly wedded man.”
Gabe didn’t like lying to everyone, especially his sister, but he’d promised Georgette, so he just shrugged. “Georgette understands.”
Bear didn’t look convinced, but he nodded. “I still can hardly believe you’re wed.” Bear said the same thing daily and gave Gabe that same probing look. The man knew something wasn’t quite right, but he wouldn’t ask. “I never saw that coming.”
Neither had Gabe. “It surprised us both,” he said, offering the same response as always, then turned and headed out the door. He paused in his fast-paced trek to the warehouse and glanced around the quiet back street of Covent Garden, searching for anything out of the ordinary, but all he saw were dark streets and burning oil lamps.
What was bothering him tonight? He thought about the people closest to him. The list no longer included Hawk, so only Blythe and Georgette remained. He considered other men friends, but he only allowed them on the outer edges of his life. None of them knew the truth about who Gabe was. None of them knew that he and Blythe had come to London from Scotland when they were eight and seven, respectively. None of them knew his mother had brought them here to find work after his dad had died, but all she’d found was poverty and then death. None of them knew he’d once eaten thrown-out food when there was nothing else to eat. How he’d huddled with his sister on their cot in the dead of winter in the freezing orphanage with only one blanket, which he’d insisted Blythe use. How the orphanage had lost its funding three years after they’d landed there, and so Blythe, Gabe, Georgette, and Hawk had all taken to living on the streets rather than risk being split up. They’d made an abandoned building their home, and they’d all learned to beg and con, eventually each of them finding something they could do.
Gabe was good with his fists and fast on his feet. Blythe was a genius with numbers. Georgette had the sweet disposition and a face that lured people to Gabe’s fights, and Hawk made sure people knew about the fights. It had been good for a time. When had it gone wrong? A year and a half ago when Gabe had bought the club?
Hawk had wanted in, but his idea for the club and Gabe’s idea for it had not been the same. Gabe wanted to entertain the nobs, and then someday, he could partner with them to open even more doors—respectable doors—that would get his sister out of Covent Garden. Hawk had wanted to take all the nobs’ money and ruin them for the way he’d always felt they looked down on him, on all of them. Gabe knew his worth, though. He didn’t need to destroy people to feel equal to them. It had been the first breach in their friendship.
Gabe squeezed his eyes shut for a minute and inhaled a long deep breath. His lungs burned from the cold as he tried to settle his disquiet, but it wouldn’t hush. He started toward the warehouse again, slowly going through his list of responsibilities. The club was closed for the night. Bear was on guard. Blythe had been seen safely home. Georgette would be home, asleep in her room.
Her room… Hell, that was it! The babe’s cradle. It had been mistakenly delivered to the warehouse, and Georgette had asked him to bring it home tonight. She’d threatened to retrieve it herself yesterday, her anxiety growing with each passing day. Not everything was ready for the babe’s arrival yet, and that arrival was fast approaching.
He eyed the warehouse in the distance, then looked over his shoulder at the club. He considered going back to ask Bear to help him retrieve the giant box prior to doing his evening checks, but he decided against it. Bear needed to stay on guard. It was late, and Gabe could slide the damn thing along if he had to. His house was in spitting distance of the warehouse anyway.
He turned back toward the warehouse and noticed two figures marching toward it.
Two figures with long hair…
He squinted, certain he could not be seeing what he thought he was. But there they were—Georgette with Blythe not ten feet behind her.
“What the devil?” he bellowed, already knowing the answer. Georgette had given up on his doing what she’d asked and had decided to fetch the cradle herself. She apparently had recruited Blythe to aid her, as well.
