The young woman shook her head. “He knows only that I’ve made allegations against him. And that I haven’t left London. Yet that is exactly what I intend to do. Leave the city. Perhaps even leave England. I just want to disappear, to bury it all.”

“You’ve spoken of this to your father?” Eva said.

“Papa thinks I’m having tea with a friend today. He’s no idea I’m here, or what I’m asking you to do. But, please,” she said, turning imploring eyes to Eva, “stop pursuing Lord Rockley. No good can come of it.”

Fury the likes of which Eva had never known surged through her. Only the presence of Miss Jones kept her from unleashing a torrent of foul language. She had a strong urge to throw her fist into the wall, just as Jack had done. What she truly wanted to do was beat Rockley into a syrup. Bad enough that he’d ruined Miss Jones, but now he intimidated and threatened her into silence.

He had the blood of at least two people on his hands. Jack’s sister, and now Gilling.

“We cannot stop,” Eva said. “Rockley must be brought down. He’ll just keep hurting more girls, girls just like you.”

“If I demand it?” Miss Jones pressed, her voice quavering.

Frustration and sympathy warred within Eva. Words tried to form, words that would give Miss Jones the necessary strength to continue in their pursuit of Rockley. But the young woman was fragile, and anything Eva could think to say might sound bullying and cause the girl to crumble even more. Judging by the silence from the other members of Nemesis, they were struggling with what to say, as well. None of them wanted to abandon the case.

Jack suddenly grabbed a chair and pulled it near Miss Jones. He turned it around to straddle the chair, bracing his arms on its back. The girl looked startled, almost ready to flee, until he gentled his expression to something verging on kindness.

“Did you have plans for yourself before this business with Rockley?” he asked.

His question caught her off guard. After a moment, she answered, “My parents wanted me to marry. They were hoping to find me a respectable tradesman and see me settled as a wife and mother.”

“And what did you want for yourself?” He asked this softly.

She cast her gaze down to the floor. “I … wanted to be a teacher. It didn’t matter to me if I married or not. But I’d hoped to find some mill town school where I could teach the children of the workers. Give them a chance at life outside of a mill. It doesn’t matter anymore.” She dabbed the corners of her eyes with her sleeve. “No one will hire a ruined girl. And now Lord Rockley threatens not only me, but my family. I’ve lost my dream, but I can’t let my parents suffer for my mistake.”

Eva’s heart contracted, feeling the sharp loss of the girl’s dream and her desire to do good.

“It wasn’t your mistake,” Jack said. “Never say that. This Nemesis lot brought me on board because I’ve got information on Rockley that no one else has.” Fortunately, he made no mention of Nemesis blackmailing him into cooperating. “More than that, I’ve got my own reason for wanting to ruin that bas—that scoundrel. He harmed someone important to me. More than harmed her. He stole her life. Killed my sister with his own hands.”

Miss Jones gasped. “Did you go to the police?”

He smiled bitterly. “The police don’t bother when the victim’s a whore. And Rockley had ’em all in his pocket. They’d never touch a bloke with so much power.”

“What did you do?” the young woman asked.

“Tried to get my own justice. It didn’t work, not the first time, but that don’t mean I won’t stop trying. See, Miss Jones,” he continued, his dark eyes serious, “men like Rockley think they can do whatever they want. Hurt whoever they want. Girls like you and Edith. That’s why we can’t stop going after him.”

Miss Jones’s forehead pleated with concern. “I don’t know,” she said doubtfully.

“His threats now are a storm that’s got to be weathered,” Jack went on. “Ultimately, he won’t be able to do you any more harm. You and your family will be safe. Me, and the others here, we’re fighting for you. For Edith, for all the girls Rockley’s harmed. If we don’t bring him down, he’ll just go on, using and throwing away women. Taking their reputations, their lives.”

He shook his head, raw anguish etched into his features. “I couldn’t save Edith, but there are so many other girls I can help. That you can help. But that’ll only happen if you let us get on with our work.”

Eva, watching all this, felt the hot knife of sorrow in her own chest. She remembered what he’d said last night, about failing to protect his sister. He carried the pain with him always.

Outside in the street a wagon rolled by and two women stopped to converse in brisk, cheerful voices—the noises of everyday life. Within the Nemesis headquarters the fire in the grate popped. Miss Jones stared at Jack, her hands clenching in her lap.

Eva held her breath. So did everyone else in the room.

“All right,” Miss Jones said after a long, long silence. Her shoulders straightened, her back drew up taller, and she lifted her chin. “All right. We’ll go on. We’ll ruin that bastard.” She blushed at her own crudeness, but kept her gaze steady.

Eva didn’t sigh in relief, though she felt like it. Once Nemesis was on a mission, almost nothing kept them from pursuing it to the very end. A villain like Rockley had to pay for his crimes, whether Miss Jones wanted vengeance or no. They wouldn’t have stopped in their quest for justice. But it made their role less difficult when they had their client’s support.

“There’s a lass,” Jack said, patting Miss Jones’s hand.

The girl blushed again. And no wonder. The warm approval in Jack’s gaze was a potent thing.

“You’ve made the right decision, Miss Jones,” Eva said.

The young woman blinked, as if she’d forgotten that Eva, or anyone else besides Jack, was also in the room. His words had held her spellbound.

She rose, and Jack and the other men also stood. Though she still looked pale, a new resolve shone in her face and revealed itself in her upright posture. “I ought to go. Papa will be expecting me soon.”

Eva got to her feet and walked Miss Jones to the door. “We will keep you apprised of any new developments.”

The girl gave a small laugh. “I think it best if I don’t know the details of your methodology.”

Smiling, Eva said, “Probably safer that way.” She opened the door. “Thank you, Miss Jones.”

“It’s I who owe you my thanks.” She looked past Eva to Jack. “You’ve given me a new courage, Mr. Dutton.”

“It was always in you,” he answered. “Just got a little shaken, is all.”

Miss Jones ducked her head, his compliment making her shy. “I’m sorry about your sister.”

“Me, too,” he answered. “But we’ll make it right, you and me.”

The girl gave Jack a tentative smile, then turned and walked down the stairs.

Eva closed the door and leaned against it. She couldn’t take her eyes from Jack. He’d done what she and the other Nemesis operatives hadn’t been able to accomplish—convince Miss Jones to push past her fear. And he’d done so without raising his voice, without frightening or coercing. The strength of his words and conviction alone had done it.

Marco, Simon, and Lazarus looked at him as if he’d just calmed a herd of stampeding horses.

“Commendably done,” she said. “And you’ve a new admirer. She looked at you as if you rode in on a white charger, holding a lance and shield.”

Jack gave an unchivalrous snort. “A knight in rusty armor.”

She wondered if he’d ever see himself as anything more than that.

“That was well done,” Simon allowed. He picked up the discarded newspaper. “But whether or not Miss Jones agreed to continue with the case is irrelevant. We’re still at an impasse with Rockley now that Gilling’s dead; security is even tighter than before and the police are on the lookout for Dalton. So long as Rockley knows Dalton’s out there, we won’t be able to make any progress.”

Jack crossed his arms over his chest. “What was your plan for me when the job against Rockley was finished? Throw me back into Dunmoor?”

“God, no,” she answered, appalled. Although Nemesis hadn’t precisely been forthcoming about their intentions. The way they’d been treating him, he’d expect them to toss him aside like so much rubbish. “We were going to counterfeit your death and give you a new identity.”

Jack appeared to consider this idea. She’d tipped Nemesis’s hand, but there was no choice for it. He needed to know.

“We’re going to lose Rockley,” he said. “He’ll bury himself so deep, we’ll never be able to get anything out of him. Unless…”

“Unless?” Marco prompted.

“We fake my death now,” said Jack.

*   *   *

He didn’t think they’d cheer at the idea. Turned out, he was right. Grim silence met his announcement. Eva, in particular, looked troubled.

It oughtn’t annoy him. She was part of Nemesis, and he was just a pawn in their game. Made sense that she’d fret over the notion. He saw it in her eyes. Once Jack was “dead,” they’d have no more leverage over him. He’d have his liberty, and that was something they didn’t want. He wouldn’t be their leashed dog anymore. From the beginning, he’d made it clear that if he could find a way free of them, he’d take full advantage. Of course she wouldn’t like that.

Still, it riled him to see her uneasy about taking off his collar. For all the hunger he and Eva felt for one another, they didn’t share trust.

“Makes sense,” Simon mused. “If Rockley believes Dalton’s dead, he’ll think the threat against him is gone. The police will back off, and he’ll loosen security, giving us an opportunity to get our hands on the evidence.”

Though Marco and Lazarus nodded, Eva continued to frown. “There must be another way,” she said, “or some different strategy we can use.”

“If you’ve got a suggestion, love,” Jack said bitingly, “don’t keep it to yourself. We’d all like to hear how to keep me on a tether.”

“I…” She glanced away. “I don’t.”

“Settles that, don’t it?” He planted his hands on his hips. “It’s time to kill me.”

*   *   *

He never forgot the smell. Long after he’d left the narrow, grimy streets of the East End, when he’d kept a fine little flat in St. Luke’s, and even when he’d been in prison, where the air smelled of lye and porridge, he’d never quite gotten the scent of Bethnal Green from his memory.

As he and Eva stole through the twisting lanes, darkness hanging over the alleys like a sulk, he was drowning in smell, in memories. Coal smoke, mud, fried fish, human filth, and here and there, the sweet stench of opium.

He knew all of it. And bugger him if it didn’t force a small blade of sorrow between his ribs. It hadn’t changed here. Five years away, and the poor of London still lived like animals, hopelessness a dark slime that coated the uneven streets and ran down the crumbling walls.

This was the place that had been his home, the place that made him. The streets were more his parent than his ma and nameless father had ever been.

He didn’t feel a sense of homecoming, skulking through the lanes and alleys of his old neighborhood. He felt only a cold, distant sense of anger, that anyone should be forced to live ten in a room, with the only water coming from a filthy old pump, and babies crying all night because their bellies were empty.

In a drab wool cloak, Eva kept silent beside him. Weak light from a gin palace spilled across her face. He looked for signs of disgust or shock in her expression.

There were none. He remembered that she’d been raised by missionaries, and had probably spent too many hours in places like Bethnal Green and Whitechapel. She already knew how low people could sink.

Still, her gaze was wary. That showed she was smart.

Two men stumbled out of the gin palace. Jack put out an arm to shield her from the drunkards as the men threw wild punches at each other. Too busy beating each other to notice Jack and Eva, the drunks took their fight down into the gutter. But the brawlers blocked the way.

Jack shoved them aside with his boot heel. They rolled away, still throwing punches.

Someone inside the gin palace laughed, a high, shrill sound.

“Keep moving,” Jack said in a low voice.

Eva hurried on, with Jack right next to her.

“I’ve studied maps of the area,” she said. “I’ve even been here before. But I have no idea where we are.”

“Don’t worry. I do.” He turned down a snaking alley. “The maps you’ve seen, they’ll never show you the real lay of the land. Streets are alive down here. Always twisting, never where you think they’re going to be.”