Capturing the Devil (Stalking Jack the Ripper #4)(90)
“Tell me something I don’t know about you.” Recalling something he’d said during one of our former adventures when things had gotten a little too serious for his taste, I added, “Make it scandalous, too.”
He grinned against my neck before planting a chaste kiss there. No doubt he was recalling when he’d said that to me—we were tucked behind the fern fronds in his family’s estate in Bucharest. He ran his hand along my spine, soothing and gentle.
“Before I met you, I was convinced love was both a weakness and a hazard.
Only a fool would allow himself to be swept up in someone’s eyes, pen sonnets dedicated to them, and dream of the floral fragrance of their hair.” He paused, but only briefly. “The night we met I’d gotten into a fight with my father. He was livid with me for ruining another potential match.”
His tone was bitter now, and I remembered him telling me earlier their argument had been over Miss Whitehall. He instinctually held me tighter.
“My father called me a monster,” he admitted. “The worst part was I believed him, that I was less than human, unable to feel things as others do. I accepted his appraisal of me, which made me harbor all the more animosity toward love.
Why long for something that would never be mine? If I didn’t believe in it, I could avoid the crushing disappointment that would inevitably follow if I ever did fall. Surely no one would truly want me, the monster. More obsessed with death than living.”
I wanted to twist in my seat, to see his face, but realized because I couldn’t
study him it was easier for him to confess. I sat very still, hoping to not break the spell of the moment.
“You’re not a monster, Thomas. You’re one of the most incredible people I know. If anything, you care too much for those around you. Even strangers.”
He drew in a shaky breath and waited a minute before responding. “Thank you, my love. It’s one thing for someone else to tell you you’re good, but when you don’t believe it yourself…” He shrugged. “For a long while I thought I was a monster. I’d heard the whispers around London. The way people mocked my behavior and accused me of being Jack the Ripper. Sometimes I wondered if they were right, if one day I might wake up and find blood on my hands with no recollection of how it got there.”
My fingers curled into his lapels, gripping them tightly. I remembered those rumors, too. I’d encountered a bit of that animosity during an afternoon tea I’d hosted what felt like ages ago instead of mere months. I’d only just met Thomas
—and couldn’t stand him most of the time—and yet I’d defended him instead of sitting back and quietly agreeing, much to my aunt’s dismay.
I loathed the way the people of so-called noble birth spread rumors of him like a plague. When they’d discovered Miss Eddowes, one of the Ripper victims, had a small tattoo that read TC, they went wild with theories. They were cruel and inaccurate. Thomas could never harm anyone. If they’d only given him a chance, they’d have seen what I did…
“Anyway, that night I made a vow to the heavens. I swore I would only marry science. I refused to surrender my heart or my mind to anyone. No one can think you’re a monster if they don’t know you. And those who already thought it? Why should I care? They didn’t mean anything. I refused to let them.”
He dropped a kiss on my neck, drawing a lovely tingling sensation on my skin there.
“When I walked into your uncle’s laboratory, I’d been so consumed with the surgical procedure we were about to perform. It was the perfect distraction from my black mood. I hadn’t initially noticed you. Then I did.” He breathed in deeply as if preparing to reveal the secret I craved. “You were standing there, scalpel in hand, apron splattered in blood. Of course I noticed your beauty, but that wasn’t what caught me off guard. It was the look in your eyes. The way you held that blade aloft, like you might stick me with it.” He chuckled, the sound rumbling in his chest. “I was so startled at the odd surge of my pulse, I almost fell face-first into the open cadaver. It was a horrifying mental image. I was even
more disturbed when I realized it mattered—what you’d think of that. Of me.”
He gently stroked my hair for a few beats.
“I hadn’t had a physical response to anyone before,” he said, voice shy. “I’d never found myself intrigued by anyone, either. And there you were, within an hour of my declaration against love, as if mocking my resolve. I wanted to shout,
‘I will not become a monster for you!’ Because a foreign piece of me wanted to snatch you away and keep you all to myself forever. It was downright animalistic. I wanted to loathe you but found it impossible.”
I snorted at that. “Yes, you certainly seemed bewitched by me. What with that icy reception. You didn’t even speak to me.”
“Do you know why?” he asked, not expecting an answer. “Because I knew, straightaway, there was only one reason behind my treacherous heartbeat. I thought if I could fight it, pretend the feeling away, freeze it, if necessary, I might win the battle against love.” He shifted behind me, gently turning my face to his. This time, he wished to confess to me. “I knew from the moment I set eyes upon you there could be something special here. I wanted to forget the surgery and don an apron, too. I wanted to cast you under the same spell that you’d cast over me. Of course that wasn’t logical. I needed to remember who I was—the monster, incapable of being loved. My coolness was directed entirely at myself. The more time we spent together, the harder it became to deny the change in my emotions. I couldn’t pretend away my feelings, nor could I blame them on some strange illness.”