Lady Sophia's Lover (Bow Street Runners #2)(65)

Pausing, he raked a hand through his thick brown hair, disheveling the gleaming locks. It seemed increasingly difficult for him to speak. “As fate would have it, a fortnight before John’s friend was to be released, there was an outbreak of cholera on the ship. John’s friend took ill, and despite his efforts to care for him, the boy died. Which left John in a rather interesting position. He reasoned that since his friend was already dead, there was no harm in taking his place.”

Sophia was utterly bewildered. “What?” she asked faintly.

He did not look at her. “If John assumed the boy’s identity, he would gain release in a matter of days, rather than staying another year on the prison hulk. And there was no doubt that John would not have lasted that long. So in the night, he switched clothes with the boy’s corpse, and when morning came, he volunteered the body as belonging to John Sydney.”

The carriage rolled to a halt, and the putrid stench of Fleet Ditch began to seep inside. Sophia’s heart beat with terrible force, seeming to drive the air from her lungs. “But that doesn’t make sense,” she said woodenly. “If your story is true, then—” She broke off suddenly, aware of an high-pitched buzzing in her ears.

As Gentry stared at her, the coldness seemed to leave his face, and his chin shook as if he were struggling to master overpowering emotions. He set his jaw and forced out more quiet words. “The name of the dead boy was Nick Gentry.”

Suddenly Sophia burst into violent tears. “No,” she sobbed. “It’s not true. Why are you doing this to me? Take me back to Bow Street!”

Through the hot, watery blur, she saw his face draw closer. “Don’t you know me, Sophia?” came his anguished whisper. He shocked her by sinking to the floor and clutching handfuls of her skirts, his dark head buried against her knees.

She was dumbstruck as she stared at the hands tangled in her skirts. A harsh sob lodged in her throat as she touched the back of his left hand. There was a small, star-shaped scar in the center. It was the same scar that John had gotten in childhood, when he had carelessly brushed it against a fireplace iron still hot from the coals. Tears continued to slip down her cheeks, and she covered the mark with her own hand.

His head lifted, and he stared at her with eyes that she now recognized were exactly like her own. “Please,” he whispered.

“It’s all right,” she said unsteadily. “I believe you, John. I do know you. I should have seen it at once, but you are much changed.”

He responded with a sorrowful growl, struggling to contain his feelings.

Sophia felt her own face contort with a confounding mixture of joy and wretchedness. “Why didn’t you come to me years ago? I’ve been alone for so long. Why have you stayed away and let me grieve for you?”

He scrubbed the sleeve of his coat over his eyes and let out a shuddering breath. “We’ll talk inside.”

The footman opened the carriage door, and Gentry—John—swung down easily and reached for Sophia. She put her hands on his shoulders, felt him grasp her waist, and he lowered her with great care to the ground. However, her knees quivered like jelly, and she was surprised when her legs began to collapse.

Gentry caught her at once, his hands hooking beneath her arms. “Steady. I’ve got you. I’m sorry—you’ve had a shock.”

“I’m all right,” she said, feebly trying to push him away.

Maintaining a supportive arm behind her back, Gentry guided her toward the house. It was a converted building that had once been a tavern. Sophia could not help gaping at her surroundings, which looked like something out of a nightmare. This was an area of London that even the bravest runners would have avoided at all cost. The people who skulked through tortuously twisted streets hardly seemed like humans. They were gray-faced and filthy, almost ghostlike in their tattered clothes.

Vermin scuttled over piles of refuse in the street, while the aromas of cesspools and drains combined with the fumes from a nearby slaughterhouse into a smell so rank that it actually caused her eyes to water. There was noise and tumult everywhere; cries of beggars and urchins, sounds of pigs and chickens, drunken brawls, even the occasional crack of a pistol.

Glancing at her face, Gentry smiled faintly at her reaction to the place. “It’s not exactly Mayfair, is it? Don’t worry, you’ll get used to the smell in no time. I hardly notice it now.”

“Why do you choose to live here?” she asked, nearly gagging on the foul air. “People say you have money. You must be able to afford something better than this.”

“Oh, I have high-kick offices in town,” he assured her, “where I meet with wealthy clients or politicians and such. But this area is where all the flash houses and prisons are, and I need easy access to them.” Seeing her confusion at the Cockney slang, he explained further as he guided her up a flight of rickety stairs. “Flashes are successful thieves. They live in flash houses, where they are somewhat safe from the law and are free to gamble, drink, and make plans.”

“And you are the most successful flash of all?” Sophia asked, accompanying him through an astonishing maze of secret corridors, staircases, and dark recesses.

“Some would say so,” he replied with no trace of shame. “But most of the time I am a thief-taker—and a damned good one, too.”

“You were not meant to live like this,” she murmured, appalled at what had become of her brother.