he used to do to make sure she was home safe. At the gate she stopped. The moisture collecting on the wrought iron wet her fingers while she slowly pulled it open to keep the old hinges from squeaking.
Jane threw Jasper one last look. He touched his hat to her, the faint grey of it just visible in the silver light of the half-obscured moon. She slipped into the garden, past the fragrant flowers and the dew-moistened stepping stones, her regret at having to leave him as strong as the scent of the roses.
* * *
The mist grew thicker and colder the moment Jane disappeared from sight. It wasn’t like the air in Savannah which could drown a man with its heat, but lighter and more mysterious, like Jane. He opened and closed his hand at his side, the warm pressure of Jane’s fingers against his still lingering, along with her concern.
He took hold of the carriage-door handle to keep from chasing after her and changing his mind. It’d been a relief to speak with her instead of trying to hold back his memories, and the truth of his income, as he did with his family. When they’d spoken of Savannah, she hadn’t hugged him in pity like his mother had when he’d first come home, the spaces under his jaws hollowed out, the depths of his suffering hidden like the banknotes tucked inside his trunks. Instead, Jane had merely listened, her presence stopping the spectre of the past from rising up from the shadows to consume him.
He stepped inside the carriage and rapped his knuckles against the top to tell the driver to move on. Each turn of the wheels carrying him away from St Bride’s Lane, and Jane, made him more agitated. So many mornings he rode home from the hell before dawn, yearning for someone to speak with about the night’s challenges or simply to view him in a better light than he viewed himself. With his family, he had to pretend his troubles were not what they really were and allow lies and falsehoods to separate and isolate him from the people who’d welcomed him home.
The carriage made the turn towards the warehouse and rolled past the cluttered windows of the shops locked tight for the evening. Soon, the shops gave way to the square, shapeless buildings lining the river. Weariness began to smother him the closer they drew to the hell. He was exhausted by the deceit and the walls it created around him, except there wasn’t one between him and Jane. Tonight, she’d listened. The concern in her blue eyes calling to him, the hints of yellow near the irises reminding him of the sky during the many sunrises he’d been glad to meet during the awful weeks of the epidemic. The flicker of her pulse against his fingertips had been a potent reminder of how alive and good the world could still be and how he might be a part of it again.
The warehouse came into view and the carriage slowed to a stop. He hopped down, his determination not to marry Jane weakening with each step as he approached the rear door. It would be risky having someone so close, but she might be the one person who could keep him from sliding further into the darkness. He’d seen what years of loneliness and dissipation had done to Uncle Patrick. Uncle Patrick had spent his life surrounded by others, fêted and admired, and in the end all his money couldn’t buy their loyalty or their help when he’d been at his weakest. Jasper didn’t want to become like him. He’d thought to pull himself out of his old life by his own bootstraps. Maybe it was a more feminine hand he needed for the final steps.
He took the key ring out of his pocket and swung it on one finger, imagining the two of them working together and rising in prominence like her brother, or wielding the kind of influence his father enjoyed. It would be like his first few years in Savannah when he used to mingle with influential men or host parties in his Franklin Square house. For a time tonight, with her, he’d been free to be his old self and not have to lie. It was the life he’d imagined when he’d gone to the auction, the one he’d thought he’d lost until Jane had appeared and made him realise it could still be his.
He clutched the keys in his palm, stilling their spinning. It was one thing for Jane to know about his hell, it was another for her to be involved in it. He couldn’t corrupt her the way his uncle had corrupted him or risk leaving her to wrestle with even a small measure of the guilt and blame he endured because of the affair with Mr Robillard. Except it wasn’t a part of the hell she wanted, it was a part of him and his club. He could give her the club, and himself, and keep back the hell and the ugliness of Savannah. She needn’t be involved in the tempting of players, but she could share in the freedom it offered to enjoy the finer aspects of London, the ones denied to her by her current situation. She’d come to him with a proposal for a partnership, to help him build a reputable professional life with the added benefit of more enticing nocturnal pursuits. It was an opportunity he could no longer resist. His time with her had always been an adventure. It would be again.
‘Miss Rathbone, good morning,’ young Chester Stilton greeted Jane as she came downstairs for breakfast. Despite having been up most of the night, she’d awakened at her usual time just after sunrise. Force of habit was stronger than fatigue.
‘Mr Stilton, it’s a pleasure to see you here so early.’ It wasn’t, but she had to be polite to Philip’s clients. After the last day and night, she’d had her fill of young men and was in no mood to entertain any more. All she wanted was to continue on to the dining room and the large pot of coffee sure to be waiting there.
‘I certainly didn’t ask to come at this ungodly hour, but my father insisted.’ Mr Stilton’s thin upper lip pulled back in displeasure, revealing teeth as yellow as a wheel of cheese. Rumour was he rarely rose before noon, long after his industrious, and poorly named, cheesemonger of a father had gone to work to support his family and pay off his wastrel son’s large tailor bill. She wondered how long it would be until Chester Stilton began to seek loans to support his spending habits, assuming he hadn’t already done so to maintain his supply of the gaudily striped waistcoats, white hats and bright blue coats. ‘My father is here to pay off the loan your brother extended him last year. He wanted me to join in the discussion and learn a little something about money, as if I should take lesson like that from a man like your brother.’
Jane stiffened. ‘With all the credit the tailor extends you, one would think you possessed ample experience handling money, and debts. How proud your father must be of your ability to spend his hard-earned money on your clothes.’
‘As proud as your brother must be of paying his spinster sister’s milliner bills. You couldn’t even land staid Milton Charton of all people.’
‘I’m holding out for better prospects than the limited ones before me.’ How dare a man whose waistcoats were of more use to his father than he was pass judgement on her or Philip’s worth. She made a motion to leave, but he stepped in front of her.
‘As much as I don’t care for your brother or his moneylending ilk, for the right price I’d gladly take you off his hands.’ He swept her with a lascivious gaze which would have made a lesser woman blush.
She didn’t so much as twitch, but stared him down the way she would a slug crawling on one of the rose bushes. ‘What an honour to be added to the long list of other wealthy women in the Fleet who’ve spurned you.’
His lip dropped down to cover his yellow teeth. Before he could answer with what she imagined would be a less than witty response, the door to Philip’s office opened and the elder Mr Stilton, sharing his son’s long face and displaced front tooth, emerged smiling from inside. ‘Thankfully the better sort are hungering for my particular brand of cheddar, otherwise I don’t know where we’d be. Thank you again for your assistance, Mr Rathbone.’
Mr Stilton grabbed Philip’s hand and shook it vigorously before coming down the hallway to stand beside his son. ‘Miss Rathbone, how wonderful to see you this morning. I hope my son
