Downtime Read online

  I didn't intend to feel sorry for him. Jack the Ripper in my lifetime had become a symbol of the worst evil in mankind. When it came to serial killers, people generally looked for the monster in the man without ever expecting to see a sign of humanity in the monster. The flash of humanity I'd seen in Sid made me sick at heart. Maybe we didn't create all our monsters, but we pushed a damned lot of them past the point of saving.

  I picked up Sid's cigarette case and stuffed it into his coat pocket. "Don't worry about the police, Sid. Getting their hands on you will cheer them up no end." I gave a subdued George a glance and considered hauling him in, too. But despite everything he'd done to us, I had a feeling Ezra would veto that for Charlotte's sake. "Get out of here, Blanchard, before you contaminate any more evidence."

  I steered Sid toward the door. Ezra stepped out of the way as we passed and Sid leaned toward him and smirked. "Tell the whores Saucy Jack sends his love."

  Ezra handed me back my gun and looked at Sid as if he wanted to understand, but simply couldn't. "You may tell them yourself. They're waiting for you."

  Sid's brows lifted. "Are they? Just outside the house, then?"

  "Just outside your life, if you like." Ezra wasn't joking. I saw it and I had a feeling Sid did, too. He hesitated before stepping out into the night and remained silent on the walk to Leman Street. Only upon his introduction to Inspector Pimblett did he slip back into the familiar persona of the ever-jovial, lascivious Sid. I gave Pimblett a statement and explained the likelihood of matching Sid's fingerprint to the one I found. To his credit, Pimblett listened, while a sergeant took down everything I said. I'd half-expected him to lock me up too, for disregarding his order to stay out of Whitechapel. But he was entirely polite and cooperative, so much so I wondered who'd been on his ass for not bringing the Ripper in after the last two murders.

  Whether or not he believed we had our killer in Sid, he sent men with me first thing Sunday morning to Sid's house to go over it from top to bottom in search of additional evidence. We found a goldmine. He'd taken a personal possession from every victim, items he'd stored in a wooden box under his bed, along with every newspaper report on the murders and a small tin filled with shiny pennies. I had a feeling we'd find fourpence in every grave, if we exhumed the caskets. It wasn't going to be necessary. By the time we returned to the station, Pimblett had a confession. He told us that much, then advised us to leave any further investigation to Scotland Yard.

  I felt oddly shut out, but I knew it wasn't personal. For better or worse, I'd changed history. The wisest thing to do now was slip into the shadows while Pimblett and his men took the credit and accepted the adulation of a grateful public. A handful of people would know the truth. One of them, George Blanchard, would take it to the grave with him. At least he wouldn't be spreading any more dirt about Ezra after his little escapade. It depressed me to think about the damage an ignorant and fearful society could do to a vulnerable human psyche. I suspected George's days would end as violently as Sid's were destined to. I didn't hold out a lot of hope for Jem, either. Ezra, on the other hand...

  I looked at him across Kathleen's crisp white tablecloth as he listened, smiling, to Derry's exuberant toast. We'd gotten home too late last night for anything but a sleepy scolding from Kathleen as she came out to lock the door and we'd left too early this morning to tell anyone the news. But after Pimblett sent us home, I related our capture of Sid to a spellbound group in the parlor and the excitement hadn't died down since. In Ezra's eyes, I saw a certain pleasure at having used his gift with such tangible success. Maybe he felt a little more sure that those things that made him different weren't indicators of madness, but were actually strengths worth valuing. The world was his oyster. Once he got over missing me, nothing could stop him.

  As for getting over missing him, that was a stretch of time I wasn't looking forward to. That I knew when the doorbell chimed and Hannah came in with a somber face and a small envelope bearing Ezra's name. Ezra took it with an apprehensive glance at me and opened it. He didn't read it aloud but he didn't need to. Everyone at the table seemed to know.

  "They've found it?"

  Ezra nodded. "Corinna says we may come fetch it when we like."

  I felt torn between elation and a sudden onslaught of homesickness for the world--and the people--I'd be saying good-bye to. Derry set his glass down and cast bright eyes in my direction. "And when will you go, Morgan?"

  Breaks that were clean and quick were always the best in the long run. "I think..." I looked at Ezra, but he was staring down at Corinna's neat script with a distant look. Dragging this out would only hurt us both. "Tomorrow morning we'll go pick up the book. If you guys could meet us at the museum after lunch--"

  "So soon?" Derry said in dismay.

  As the others began to echo with their own protests, Kathleen stood up. "If your heart tells you it's back at home you belong, then home you must go." Clouded gray eyes met mine for a moment and she tapped her fingers lightly on the tablecloth. "We'll have our supper, gentlemen, if you please."

  And we did, in quiet that was broken only by the sound of carriages passing in the street outside. I didn't know if everyone else had lost their appetites, but I'd certainly lost mine. Meeting Ezra's eyes, I looked for some sign that he understood and was going to forgive me for needing to go back to my own life. If there was a wistful glint in his gaze, there was warmth, too. The wished-for forgiveness was there and I found myself wishing that forgetting could come as easily.

  After supper, I helped Kathleen with the clearing up and though she was characteristically quiet, there was a tension in her shoulders and a set to her mouth that worried me. I had a feeling it was more than just my going home that upset her. Whatever it was, I didn't want to leave with that sudden distance between us. When Hannah went out to the garden to shake out the tablecloth, I cornered Kathleen in the kitchen and asked her what was bugging her. She looked startled by the question, then to my surprise, went red in the face and turned back to the sink to avoid my gaze.

  And then I had an inkling of what was going on in that smart but oh-so-Victorian mind of hers.

  "How long have you known?" I asked, trying to make it easier for her, though I figured she couldn't have known for very long at all.

  "Last night," she said quietly. "After you came in."

  I thought she'd already gone back to bed when Ezra kissed me on the stairs. It sure as hell hadn't been a kiss she could mistake for mere friendly affection. "I'm sorry, Kathleen. I didn't mean for you to find out that way." Or at all, really. "Guess it was a shock."

  It took her a long minute to get out a reply. "I cannot permit it in this house." She still couldn't look at me. "Mr. Cotton's room is made up--"

  "Kathleen," I interrupted gently. "I'm sorry we deceived you. This is your house, after all, and you have every right to dictate the rules and enforce them. But I can't spend my last night here apart from Ezra. So," I continued before she could cut in, "we'll go somewhere else."

  She looked at me then, dismay mingling with her uneasiness. "Somewhere else?"

  "Yeah. It's okay. Ezra probably knows some place. And you'll still come to the museum tomorrow, won't you? To see me off?"

  Her troubled expression deepened. "You do understand, I am grateful to you for so many things. But--"

  "I know. A relationship like mine and Ezra's, it's not exactly stamped with approval, not even in my time. You think we're bad guys?"

  "No..."

  "Do you think we're mentally ill?"

  "No."

  "So in your estimation, we're fairly decent fellows."

  Her frown eased a fraction. "Fairly. In my estimation. But--"

  "God disagrees?"

  "You won't be changing my mind, Morgan Nash, nor His." A little flustered, she dropped a wet plate and I caught it and handed it to her with a grin.

  "How about if I just bend it a little?"

  Her gray eyes locked with mine, stern and searching. "Charm and a clev
er tongue do not put one in the right."

  "Do you really believe I'm so far in the wrong? In my time, it isn't so much looked upon as illness or perversion, but just another way two people fall in love. Ezra and I--"

  "Are you telling me you love him?"

  She had a way of getting to the heart of the matter, I had to give her that.

  "Well, I do, but..."

  "You do--and you're leaving all the same?"

  I didn't know if I could explain why I had to go. A soft shuffle at the door spared me having to try. Arms tight around her bundle of linen, Hannah looked at me, then dashed into her room and shut the door.

  Ezra wasn't the only one who'd gotten too damned attached to me. And I was a jerk for not realizing what my leaving might do to Hannah. I started after her and Kathleen caught my sleeve. "Let me go to her. It would be best." At the door, she looked back at me. "Do make sure the street door's locked before you go up to bed, if you please. We may be safer in our beds from the likes of Leather Apron, but cracksmen are still common enough."

  Not quite sure I'd heard right, I gave her a quizzical look and she snorted impatiently. "What sort of creature would I be, to send you searching for any meager lodging when you're leaving us tomorrow? Certainly after all the good you've done," she added quietly, "the Lord Himself might overlook it, just for the night."

  "I'm more interested in your decision to overlook it." I moved nearer, to see her face in the lamplight. "Mind if I ask--who was he, Kath?"

  "Derry never told you, then?" There was a wistful hint to the curve of her mouth. "I was just seventeen years old. A sheltered girl not old enough to know her own mind--"

  "But you knew your own heart," I countered.

  Gray eyes took me in with gentle if guarded humor. "And how would you be so sure of that?"

  "Because after all these years, you still love him. Your parents put an end to it?"

  "And his parents as well." The hurt and regret in her voice was as fresh as if it had happened yesterday. Her demeanor did not invite a hug but I slipped my hand around hers and offered a comforting squeeze, one she didn't pull away from.

  "Let me guess," I said quietly. "He attended a different church down the road."

  She nodded. "Derry had already hied himself to London and told me to run away with the lad and we might stay with him until we were settled. But our mother was ill and I could not leave."

  "If you had it to do over--"

  "I prefer not to think on it. I did what I believed best and you must do the same." She pulled gingerly from my grasp and patted my arm. "Go along now. There's someone wanting to say his farewell. I won't keep him waiting nor will you."

  I found Ezra tucked in a corner of the window seat, watching the last light fade. He beckoned me over without a word and, smiling mysteriously, handed me something wrapped in brown paper and tied with a bit of string.

  "What's this?"

  "Your birthday is not until the twenty-seventh, I know, but..." He slid closer as I tugged the string loose. "It's just something to remember me by. I can't imagine any harm could come in taking it with you."

  It was a watch and chain like Ezra's, a handsome piece of work that I'd have no opportunity to ever wear back at home. I loved it, anyway. As I opened it to look inside, he rambled on, "I know the one you wore about your wrist was broken on the journey here. If this one is damaged on the way back, there will surely be someone who can repair it?"

  "Sure..." I cleared my throat, but the small ache at the back persisted. He'd had the watch inscribed. My voice was still a little rough as I read it. "To Morgan, all the time in the world. Ezra." Well, so much for staying dry-eyed. I looked up at him and managed to form something like a grin. "You probably should've given it to me in the morning. You'll never get any sleep now."

  "I didn't intend to." He put his arms around me. "And this isn't over, you know. I think we shall see each other again some day."

  "Yeah? So we've gone through the centuries together?"

  "We have. I think your heart would not be so familiar to me, otherwise." He was getting misty too and I decided that was enough sad talk. Tucking the watch safely into my jacket, I led Ezra over to the bed and dropped on it with him, tangled in a comfortable hug. "If we have gone through centuries together, why'd we miss each other this time?"

  He loosened my tie, then began to unbutton my waistcoat. "Perhaps you overslept."

  "But I showed up for a little while," I reasoned, reaching under his busy hands to start on his clothes. "That's something, right?"

  "One may live a lifetime in a fortnight, I suppose." His fingers stilled and he closed his eyes, resting his forehead to mine. He drew a long breath and tried to smile. "Trust you to turn up in the wrong bloody century."

  "I could do a lot of damage, spending a lifetime in the wrong century," I said softly. "I could change the future in ways we couldn't imagine."

  "You've changed mine."

  "You changed yours. By the way, I forgot to thank you for saving my ass last night."

  "Thank Annie, Polly, Catherine, and Elizabeth. I would have been patrolling the street-door in vain if not for them."

  "Yeah? I'd like to thank them. Are they around?"

  He shook his head. "I shall pass along your thanks if I see them again," he promised.

  "I guess they hustled you upstairs after me at the brothel, too?"

  "No, that was your Mr. Sullivan, concerned and rightly so, I think, that Sid might do you harm."

  I was glad I didn't have to turn in a report to Faulkner on this one. "Saved by ghosts all 'round, huh?"

  "You very nearly became one, yourself."

  "If I had, I'd have come around to cheer you up."

  "Dear God. Haunted by Morgan Nash. What a thought." The banter, light and teasing as it was, didn't entirely mask the emotion he was keeping under wraps.

  "Who better to be haunted by? Anyway, you'll forget all about me in a month or two."

  "Whatever may be said about you, you're not a man easily forgotten."

  "You will meet someone else."

  I knew he didn't want to hear that. The idea that he'd meet someone else bothered me too, though I wanted him to be happy. He exhaled a warm steady breath against my ear. "I suppose I shall." There was a spark of good humor in his eyes as he lay back against the pillow and studied my face. "The thing of it is, he won't be a rather daft FBI agent from the future who happens to be much too handsome and far too full of himself for his own good."

  I grinned. "Well, yeah. Gems like that are few and far between."

  "Just so," he murmured with an indulgent snort. "Then you must tell me how I will get along without you."

  We should have said good-night and gone to sleep. It would have been smarter and maybe even less painful. But tender kisses kindled fiercer ones and not even the bittersweet awareness that this was good-bye kept us from making the most of our last night. Ezra might not have verbalized the full measure of his feelings for me but he didn't need to. It lit his eyes, his whole face, scorched my skin under his touch, consumed me until my muscles quivered and bones ached, and all the time I encouraged it, just about begged for it. Whatever those emotions were, spreading into every nook and corner of me, distracting me just a little from the pain of having to give him up, I let them come. The tears that burned in my eyes mixed with the damp sweet kisses. He knew them for what they were without having to taste their salt. His own eyes gleamed without apology and I knew if there was a time he might ask me to stay, that time was now. But he only settled beside me, head tucked close to mine, and pressed a kiss on my shoulder. "You'll remember me, I think," he whispered.

  I was grateful to him for managing to sound cheerful. "Think so," I whispered back, still catching my breath. "A soft-hearted psychic who's too patient and gentlemanly for his own good? And that's not even taking into account your insatiable--" He stopped me with a kiss, which only proved my point. "There's no way I'd forget you, Ez."

  "And if I come a
long in some other form in your own time, will you know me? Suppose I am Reese--"

  "You're not Reese," I said emphatically, then wondered why I was so sure. "Anyway, I don't think I really want to think about it. Unless you can arrange to show up as Ezra Glacenbie."

  "I'm afraid Ezra is restricted to this particular lifetime." He rested his cheek on my shoulder and closed his eyes. "Byron was right. Farewells should be sudden, when they will be forever."

  The knot that formed in my throat kept me from replying. Not that I had anything especially wise or comforting to say. I wished I had. I wished a lot of things. I wanted to wish that I hadn't ever come here to begin with. But never meeting Ezra at all, that felt like a circumstance far worse than knowing him and giving him up.

  His hand found mine and interlaced our fingers. "'Hence, and be happy,'" he murmured. "Good night, Agent Nash."

  We'd pushed the morning away as long as we could. I could barely keep my own eyes open another minute. As the hands on my new watch moved steadily toward three, I listened to the familiar stomp of Dr. Gilbride returning from his late shift. I heard him speak briefly to Derry, probably discussing the fact I was leaving tomorrow, and then he went on up. Footsteps which must have been Derry's paused for a long moment at our door, then shuffled on downstairs. The house fell quiet and the sound of Ezra's even breathing was all I could hear. It was a sound I'd fallen asleep to for days and two weeks from now, I probably wouldn't even remember it. Life would return to normal in the noisy, fast-paced, steel and concrete Mecca I knew best. Ezra and the quieter, more intimate world he inhabited would be a vivid dream that would fade as the days passed.