Zoë Archer - Sweet Revenge

When they left the museum, a cold evening drizzle blurred the streets. They took a cab back to headquarters, and found it empty. Silently, she and Jack ascended the stairs and went into his room. They helped each other out of their clothes and got into bed. With his arms warm and solid around her, his heartbeat beneath her ear, she fell asleep and dreamt of kingdoms disappearing beneath oceans of sand.

When she woke, cold sunlight filled the empty room. She was alone. She had a memory from earlier that morning of Jack getting out of bed, saying he was heading downstairs to use the privy. She must have dozed after that. But the space beside her was still empty.

His minimal possessions were likewise absent. She threw on her clothing, forgoing her corset, shoved her feet into her boots and hurried downstairs.

Simon sat at the parlor table. Newspapers and documents were spread out, and he lifted his head from studying them as she clattered into the room.

“He left,” Simon said.

She glanced at the clock. “It’s only eleven-thirty. The train leaves in an hour.”

“Think he was determined not to miss it. I offered to take him to the station, but he wanted to go on his own. Left this for you.” He dug into the pocket of his waistcoat, then held something out to her.

A tiny, sparkling bead. Picking it up between her fingers, she examined it. A moment later, she realized where it came from. Her gown. The one she’d worn to the ball she and Jack had attended. At some point in the evening, the bead must have come off her dress—most likely when she and Jack had kissed in the carriage—and he’d kept it. As if it were something precious.

But he’d given it back. The only thing he left behind.

She sank down into a crouch, her head in her hands.

Distantly, she heard Simon push back his chair and walk to her. Everything came from a great distance now, including his voice when he said, “Come with me.”

Numbness stiffened her limbs as she rose. She followed him up the stairs, down the hallway, through another door, and up a narrow set of steps. Then they were on the roof, with the neighborhood spread around them and the bustle of quotidian life. Everything resembled a child’s set of toys, as consequential as dolls.

“I never really come up to this place.” Simon turned, taking in the view from all directions. “Shame, that. Gives one perspective.” He gazed at her. “What are you doing here?”

“You brought me up here,” she answered. Pushing words out of her mouth took tremendous effort. Far easier to simply collapse into silence, never to speak again.

“Not on the roof,” he said. “Why aren’t you with Dalton? He asked you to go with him, and you declined.”

Of course Simon had heard every word. All of Nemesis had to have listened to the conversation between her and Jack. Yet instead of feeling the burn of shame because her colleagues knew about her private life, all she could muster was a cold emptiness.

“I couldn’t do that,” she finally answered Simon.

“Why?”

She stared at him. “My life’s work is here . I have a job, responsibilities. I can’t dedicate years of my life to helping right wrongs and then simply toss that aside for a man. I was the one who ensured that button factory with the appalling conditions was closed down, and the children working there were properly fed and clothed. I helped break the ring trafficking in Chinese boys. I can’t leave Nemesis.”

“You’re one of our most valuable operatives,” Simon agreed.

“Then you see how I can’t chuck everything away,” she countered, “just because … because…” She swallowed the words that wanted to come.

“Because you love him,” Simon filled in.

She forgot how to breathe. Or think. Or do anything at all except stare, aghast, at Simon. There it was. The hidden self she’d kept carefully locked away—even from herself. Now it was out in the open, in the bitter chill of a London morning, naked and shivering.

“Yes,” she said at last. “I do. I do love him.” The words newly spoken stunned her with their truth. She thought she’d reject the idea, find some way to dismiss it. Jack and she hadn’t known each other for very long. And yet … it was exactly right.

But it didn’t matter.

She said, “There are sacrifices that have to be made—”

“Oh, bollocks,” Simon answered. “Naught gets in your way when you’re doing a job for Nemesis. Dalton’s the one that you want, you should let nothing stop you.”

“So speaks the man with a different paramour every fortnight.”

Simon’s expression shuttered. “I don’t play an instrument, but I know when a melody’s out of tune.” He stepped closer to her. “It isn’t your dedication to Nemesis that’s keeping you and Dalton apart.”

She planted her hands on her hips. “Oh, it isn’t?”

“You fear the unknown.”

“I was in a pitched gun battle not two days ago. Didn’t scream, didn’t faint. Not even when Rockley had a spike digging into my jugular.” She glared at him. “I think that proves that I’m not afraid.”

“Of bullets and bullies, no.” Softly, he asked, “What of your heart?”

He may as well have stabbed her, for she felt his words pierce her. God, did he speak the truth?

Images flooded her mind. An endless succession of days—colorless, flat. Fighting battles, escaping danger, but forever anesthetized. Dining continually upon the bitter ashes of self-made heartbreak. Jack had roared into her life, an unstoppable force, and helped break her from the prison she’d constructed. And now he was gone.

She’d pushed him away. She thought it was because her work demanded that she remain in England. But Simon was right. She had been frightened. Protecting herself came at a devastating cost—the only man she’d ever loved.

“How can you claim to fight for anyone else,” Simon said, “when you refuse to stand up for yourself?”

The unknown beckoned. And she would willingly embrace it.

Eva rushed toward the door leading back down to the house.

Simon was right behind her. When they reached the parlor, he said, “Wait.”

“There isn’t time.” It was almost noon. Only thirty minutes until Jack’s train left.

He took her hand and pressed a coin into it. “Cab fare.”

She was on the street and waving down a hansom seconds later. The driver looked dubious as she climbed into the cab—a respectable woman on her own in broad daylight would never take a hansom—but he was more than amenable when she waved money at him.

“Euston Station,” she commanded. “Fast as you can.”

With a snap of the ribbons, the cab pulled out. The driver kept to her instructions, speeding the hansom around pedestrians and slower-moving vehicles. People cursed after them as they raced through the streets. She braced her hand on the cab’s front panel. Her heart pounded, but not from the speed. The timepiece in her pocket revealed the hour to be twenty minutes past twelve. Passengers were likely boarding the train.

The cab lurched to a stop, then crawled forward as traffic around the station thickened. Everywhere were carriages, coaches, wagons, people.

“There has to be a way around,” she called up to the driver.

“Sorry, miss,” he answered. “It gets like this round the height of the day. Nothing to do for it but wait it out.”

She banged her fist against the side of the cab in frustration. There wasn’t much time.

“I’ll walk the rest of the way.” She threw Simon’s coin at the driver, then jumped down from the cab. Weaving her way quickly through the traffic, she saw the soaring Doric columns that marked the entrance of Euston Station up ahead. The moment she could, she broke from the snarl of people and vehicles and ran full-out toward the station.