“It’s abysmal, you know. Carrying on with this charade. Don’t pretend as if you didn’t beg me to send that correspondence for you.”

“I’m carrying on a charade?” Thomas asked, anger lacing his voice. “Yet you’re the one lying to everyone in this room.”

“You’re a degenerate. No matter how often I try to shape you into respectability, it’s in your blood. Do try and show the Wadsworths some respect and pretend you’re a gentleman.”

“How disappointing.” It must have taken a monumental force of will, but Thomas managed to shift his anger into something else faster than I could inhale my next breath. He held his hand up, inspecting his nails with a look of boredom etched into his features. “I’ve been called more scathing names, mostly by you. Surely you can do better than ‘degenerate’?”

The duke inclined his head at my father. “It was nice meeting you, Lord Wadsworth. Lady Everleigh. I’m sorry it was under such dishonorable circumstances.” He shifted his attention back to me and Thomas, a flash of triumph in his gaze. “I’ll give you a few hours to say your good-byes. Miss Whitehall and I will meet you at the docks promptly at six. Good day.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

A SWIFT DEPARTURE

GRANDMAMA’S PARLOR

FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY

8 FEBRUARY 1889

“Well.” Grandmama stood, waving off Father’s offer of assistance. “That was as delightful as I’d imagined. Your father is as arrogant as you are, my boy, with none of your charm. Edmund, help me fetch my nib and ink. I’ve got correspondence that needs attention.”

My father and grandmother went off in search of the writing supplies, leaving me and Thomas alone in the aftermath of the duke’s exit. I looked at the grandfather clock’s looming form. It was nearly ten. We had less than eight hours to find a way out of this abysmal situation, or Thomas would be forced onto that boat, heading back to London. Without me. I could no sooner imagine him leaving than I could picture solving this Ripper case alone.

“No wonder you hated Mephistopheles,” I said, rearranging my gold and cream skirts for the fourth time. “Your father is like an older, crueler version of him. Without the fun bargains and circus costumes. He twists everything in his favor.”

“Not exactly twists.” Thomas leaned his head against the settee. “He searches for weakness the way I inspect people’s shoes for scuff marks and deduce where the wearer has been. His powers of observation are—honestly, they’re better than mine. He’s always teaching lessons, always pointing out places I’ve failed. Moves I’ve left open. I should’ve burned those papers. I thought since he’d sent me to the Piccadilly flat, they’d be secure. He never visits that place.”

I folded my hands in my lap to keep from fussing with my skirts anymore. “Why did you have blank papers with your signature?”

He was quiet a moment. “I was practicing.”

“Practicing.” I didn’t pose it as a question, though he answered it.

“Before we left for Romania, I requested an audience with your father. I knew how much he worried over you, so I included all the reasons why studying abroad would suit you. I wanted—I was unsure of how to sign it once I’d written it out. I didn’t want to sound pompous, but I worried he might not take me seriously as a suitor in the future, should I simplify too much.” He blew his breath out. “I’d never worried about such foolish things before. I must have signed ten different pages, all near the bottom so I could lay my letter on top, getting a good feel for how it would read. In the end, I signed ‘Thomas’ on the letter I sent your father. Who knew my name could cause such trouble?”

“It’s been causing trouble for me since we met,” I teased.

Thomas didn’t return my smile. Instead he faced me, his expression deadly serious. He took my hands in his. “Let’s run away, Wadsworth. We can elope and change our names. We’ll write to your family once we’re settled. If we leave now, there’s nothing my father can do to stop us. In a few years we can return to England. By then Miss Whitehall will surely have found a better match. And if not? She will not be able to do anything since we’ll be married.”

My immediate response was Yes! Let’s run away at once. Temptation coursed through me. It would make our lives so much simpler to run. We could stay in America, settle into a new town or city, begin a new life. Perhaps in a few years we could build our own agency, one where we assisted with forensic cases and seemingly unsolvable mysteries. I longed to say yes. I wanted it more than I’d ever wanted anything else. And yet…

“I-I cannot, Thomas.” I hated the words, but they were still as true today as they had been yesterday. “Running away… it would not prevent my family from being ruined. We’d solve your issue only to guarantee mine. Can you deny that?”

He clenched his jaw but shook his head.

“And what about Jack the Ripper?” I asked, gently pulling my hands free. “Would we run away from solving that, too?”

He shrugged. Thomas would set fire to the case—and the world—if it meant we could be together. Not out of malice or uncaring, but out of his love and devotion to me. It wouldn’t be easy for him, but he’d do it. No matter how much I wished otherwise, I couldn’t turn my back on it or my family—I’d be turning my back on understanding my brother and on speaking for all of the women who lost their lives. And all the others who were sure to die in the future if we didn’t stop him. Thomas might believe he could walk away from it now, but I knew he’d come to regret it. Just as I would.

“Do you remember what we talked about, once we’d reached New York? About our work?” I asked.

“Of course.”

I swore I was about to stick a scalpel into my own chest and twist it. “Then you must know our work has to come first. We cannot run from this case. Not when we’ve got so much left to do. We started it together; we must find a way to end it.” I glanced toward the window, watching snow fall in heavier flakes. “If your father won’t be reasoned with, perhaps Miss Whitehall will change her mind once she sees how important your work is to you. Maybe she doesn’t care if you hate her, but she might mind a husband who would rather dissect cadavers than touch her. Surely she will hate the whispers around London about your disinterest.”

He was quiet for a moment, absorbing my words. I hoped he didn’t see it as a refusal of him. I’d give anything to have a simple life together. He exhaled.

“I loathe when you’re reasonable.” He crossed his arms, though his lips quirked. “One day it’d be nice if you agreed with one of my grand romantic gestures.”

“One day when I’ve got nothing better to do, I might.”

He narrowed his eyes and sat forward, his new look intent. “Relationships are about compromise, are they not?”

I was immediately wary of where he was heading with this. “Yes, but… our short-lived courtship is technically over.”

He swatted away the technicality as if it were a fly. “Our marriage is compromised because of my father and his disinheritance threats. Let’s think this through. If I cannot find proof of his deception, I have only one option, according to my father. I am legally bound to Miss Whitehall and will be on the next boat. Which leaves”—he glanced at the clock—“in a few hours.”

Still suspicious, I nodded. “True.”

“Your theory that the Ripper has moved on to another city… if we had a good reason for leaving New York—one your uncle would agree to—we might slip away before my father realizes I won’t be at the docks and comes to collect me. Correct?”

“Thomas…” Involving Uncle in this mess was the last thing I wished to do.

“Audrey Rose,” he said urgently, “if we can deduce where he’s gone and continue our investigation there, it’ll give us a legitimate reason to delay my departure. We’d have more time to solve the Miss Whitehall issue without ruining your family’s name. Otherwise I have two options. I’ll either be disowned and hunted if I don’t get on that ship tonight, or I will be legally bound to another. Is that something you can honestly live with?”

I closed my eyes, envisioning Thomas stepping onto a boat, greeting his father and soon-to-be wife. The image was so crisp, so lifelike, I gasped. “Your father will not simply give up and travel back to London. He’ll come looking for you. And who knows what he’ll do then?”

Thomas took my hands in his again, his face earnest. “I will deal with his wrath. I need to know this is something you want.”

“Of course I want you.” How he could think I wanted anything else was beyond common sense or logic. A fresh wave of panic flooded my system. “What happens if we can’t find a good lead for the Ripper? What if we don’t have any other city to investigate by the time you have to leave?”

Thomas hugged me close. “We’ll figure something out.”

I shook my head. “Uncle will not leave here on a whim. I know him. He’ll need convincing evidence to prove there’s a good reason to go.”

“We have a few hours.” Thomas sounded a bit uncertain about this desperate plan for the first time. “We’ll find something. We have to.”

“And if we don’t?”

He was quiet a moment. “Then I’ll run. I’ll disappear so thoroughly my father will never have a chance to find me.”

We gazed at each other, absorbing that fate. If Thomas ran away from his father and responsibility, he’d also be leaving me behind. My head swam with worry, but I also needed to do something. Time was slipping away from our grasps.

“Let’s hurry. We’ll tear the journals apart if we need to. Or we’ll scour the notes from Miss Tabram’s case. There’s got to be a clue somewhere.” I accepted Thomas’s hand as he helped me up. We made our way into the corridor arm in arm, and I wondered if his heart was beating as furiously as mine was. “What if—”