Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match(11)

“Before I saw your face, it was just . . .” He fell silent, for so long that Angelika peeked out from behind the screen in alarm. But he was just resting, the candlelight shining in his eyes as he thought. “Before you, it was absolute darkness. I wasn’t torn back from heaven. I’m sorry if that upsets you to hear.”

“Not at all. Heaven and hell aren’t very scientific.” She watched as his expression darkened into a scowl. “Is that offensive to you?”

He sighed, and his face smoothed out. “I don’t know what to be offended about. The only thing I know is what you look like. I can’t even remember my own face.”

This brought Angelika out from hiding. “I will fetch you a looking glass later. Trust me when I say you are extremely handsome. I will add more salts to your water. Does it sting?”

“Like you can’t believe,” he replied, eyes on her face, before breaking away to survey her nightdress in one quick slide, shoulders to toes. He was barely submerged now, and he had a relieving pinkish hue to his lips. “It was true. I smelled like death.”

Angelika laughed in surprise, wiping her wet eyelashes, and he mustered his first-ever smile. It was a lovely thing. His teeth were even better than she remembered.

“Choose a name, until you can recall your own,” she encouraged him, pulling her stool nearer his head. “I shall wash your hair.”

“Thank you,” the man said as she began to work suds onto his scalp. “I really don’t know how I’ve gone from the morgue to this moment. My name,” he pondered, eyes drooping closed as she began to massage. “List a few, and maybe I’ll remember mine.”

“George. Charlie. John. David. Francis. Edward. Liam. Ted. Hubert. Howard. Hugh. Horatio.”

“Enough H names, that is not it,” he ordered her gruffly, but telltale smile lines were by his eyes.

Angelika remembered the ring he had worn in the morgue. Was it still on the hand of the nude creation currently howling across the moors? It might hold a clue to his identity.

“More names?” he prompted on a sigh.

“Albert. Lawrence. Edgar. Chester.”

“Chester? Do I look like a Chester?” His mouth still had a faint amused lift, and Angelika’s heart fluttered and resettled in her chest.

“You look like a man who could be anyone he wanted to be.”

Mary returned presently with more water. She was badly exerted by now, wheezing and coughing, her face glowing with sweat. When she put the pails down, she could not restraighten her back. It alarmed both Angelika and her guest.

“Sit down, Mary,” Angelika said, at the same time as he said, “Be easy, please.”

“Pour it in yourself. I’m going back to bed. Remembered your name yet, son?” Mary narrowed her eyes over him. “What about William? That was my husband’s name. He can be Willy, or Will.”

Angelika was surprised. “I didn’t know that you were married once.”

“You never asked, missy.”

Angelika thought back to his body on the slab, to the defiance in him even then. “I think Will would suit him perfectly. He has shown me what a strong will he has. What do you think?”

The man was turning the name over in his mind. “Will. Yes, that will do, until I get my memory back. Thank you, Mary. You’ve saved my life tonight, too.”

“Breakfast is at seven,” Mary replied, but his praise had her smiling. “No funny business in here, understand?” She cast a suspicious look at the man, then, looking to Angelika, she mouthed a familiar phrase: No hesitation, no politeness, run.

It was an old code between them. It hardly looked like this man would attempt to overpower her. “Thank you, Mary, I remember well. Good night,” Angelika croaked at the old woman’s departing form, her face burning with humiliation.

Will’s eyebrow moved. “I’m sure that’s not what you resurrected me for. I would not be so vain as to presume.” Angelika shut him up with an entire bucket of water on his head. Spluttering, he wiped his hair back. “Where are your other staff? It hurts to watch her struggle.”

“It’s only her. We require a great deal of privacy.” At his incredulous look, she amended quickly, “But I will hire more if it pleases you. How do you feel?”

“I think I am all right. Very tired, but the pain is less.”

“I will give you some laudanum and tuck you in, my love.” She went to fetch a towel. Behind her, he stood up out of the water.

“No point in being shy, I suppose,” he said to her back. “You’ve seen it all before. You put a lot of thought into my body.”

He wasn’t being flirtatious. When she turned, he was bent over and admiring the stitch line on his abdomen. The ever-present erection pointed cheerfully in her direction. “Whoever owned this penis was positively mad over you.”

“I hope it wasn’t Victor’s naked friend,” she said, making him laugh. “I didn’t know that the different parts would have different feelings. Maybe they are retaining the memories of their owners.”

“My old body was mangled, you said?”

Victor’s rules on a reanimation to exceed Schneider’s benchmark now seemed like a petty reason to dismember Will’s original slim, tidy frame. But she couldn’t tell his expectant face that. “Try not to think about it.”