Chapter 8
8
7 February, 1827
No.’s 25-27, Mercer Street
Edge of Seven Dials
Marianne had no idea how long she'd have before Con Dyer returned from appeasing his brothers, but she was determined to make the most of the time. She'd taken the silver fork the maid had provided for her supper and began fiddling with the tines. They were thin and straight, a stroke of luck. Not fat and tapered.
When she knelt at the lock on her cell door, his two dogs crowded around with interest. Since she was wielding a fork, perhaps they thought more food might be in the offing. She set her stew bowl with the leftovers on the floor to deflect their interest. After a few minutes, the tumblers clicked and the door opened. That was too easy . With a pang of guilt, she looked back at the two trusting wolfhounds. She hugged each of them around their shaggy heads and locked them back inside as she left.
She'd noticed pegs along the walls leading down to the kitchen level when she'd first arrived. As she suspected, a maid's warm cape hung from one of them. She borrowed the cape and a mob cap hanging from the peg beside it. When she slipped up three levels, using servants passageways, she had a hunch there would be access to his private quarters for laying a fire, or bringing up trays of food.
She was certain he hadn't returned the precious malachite jewel casket to the man she'd stolen it from. She'd bet her favorite bow he'd kept it for himself to try to crack the mystery of how to open the box and see what was hidden inside. And there was only one place he'd hide it.
When she finally made her way inside his most private lair in his bedchamber, her heart sank. A damnable French cast iron safe sat in the corner. This particular model was one of the most expensive, a fireproof model made by Gueux. A brass disc hid a keyhole which would be simple enough to get by if she couldn't guess where he hid the keys.
However, two dials set into a metal rectangle on the front of the safe posed an additional puzzle. The question was, did the dials represent numbers or letters? She tried the letters first, since that posed only twenty-six options. After she determined the code involved letters, the rest fell into place. All she had to do was try two-letter combinations of the letters that made up the names of his beloved dogs, Lugh and Aengus.
To save time, she first searched for the keys to the lock. She could of course pick the lock with the bent fork tines she'd brought with her from the cell. However, that would add too much time to the whole process. Her best bet was to figure out where the man hid his keys. After a few false starts, she finally found them placed carefully beneath a well-worn black bowler hat on the top shelf of his clothing armoire. As the man who was the major crime leader in the rookeries, he was remarkably easy to decipher.
Now that she had what she needed, the safe opened like a lover to her ministrations and within minutes, she once again held the small green malachite jewel chest in her hand.
When she whirled to retrieve her cape and escape through the lower levels of the renovated tenement, she ran into a solid, warm mass. His arms enclosed her tightly, and she could hear his sharp inhale of her scent. He placed his mouth near her ear and began to describe what he did to women thieves captured in his bedchamber. When he got to the part about how he'd settle her onto his cock and punish her slowly until she begged his forgiveness, she jerked away only to have him pull her back again.
She'd told herself from the moment they'd met she wasn't going to let him smother her with his arrogant, overpowering charm. But when he whipped her around with her back to him and raised her skirts with his powerful hands, she was lost. She could already imagine their mingled juices sluicing down the insides of her thighs, and the soreness she'd gladly endure in the morning. She was no missish virgin, but her body trembled at the thought of what it would feel like being penetrated by such a powerfully built man.
When his hand moved to cover her mound beneath her skirts, and his teeth nipped at her earlobe, she opened to him with a sigh, and all her anxious thoughts fled like sheep before a wolf.
* * *
Con could not believe he was about to do precisely what his brothers had not an hour before warned him about. He was one of the most powerful crime lords in London who plotted out every move in his life with cold-blooded determination. And yet here he was, about to plunge his cock into a maddening woman thief whose true name he didn't even know. And she'd just broken into his expensive, high-end French iron safe as if it were a butter dish.
His long middle finger found her heated, throbbing cunny and moved into the wet, satin softness as if he'd been there a thousand times before. This woman's scent, and body, made him feel like he was coming home. He'd always been able to separate his carnal life from his professional life with ease before. This was different, but on a whole separate level. This woman was dangerous. She could bring all of them down.
She'd broken out of his "dungeon" as if it were made of rotted wood instead of bars and double locks. How could such a seeming innocent know the Black Art as well as his little thief? Who the hell was she? Who the hell cared?
He couldn't wait to bed her properly, and for an inexperienced young woman, she seemed uncommonly ready for his cock. He pulled her back with him to his bed and sat on the edge where he grasped her hips and lifted her onto his stiff, twitching cock in one swift move. She moaned low but didn't push him away. Instead, she began to move as if riding his cock was the most natural thing in the world for her. The gentle rocking soon became frantic as each fought for what they wanted. The mysterious Mrs. Smith came in a panting heap first, giving out a low, guttural growl. He followed soon after and struggled to lift her away before pumping his seed, but she fought like a tiger to keep his cock inside.
Later, when they lay side-by-side on his bed, she was first to speak. "Is this how you punish all the women thieves you encounter?"
"Umm-hmm," was all he could manage. Post-tupping lassitude was making his arms and legs feel as if they were huge iron weights holding him down.
"Well, I must say this is much preferable to being relegated to your little cell in the bowels of the building." With that, she rolled over and fell asleep.
Con tried to stay awake, but at some point lost consciousness. When he awoke to the morning sun slashing through the opening in his heavy bed curtains, she was gone, along with the malachite jewel box.
* * *
8 February, 1827
No.'s 25-27, Mercer Street
Edge of Seven Dials
John Crisp stood outside the door to his employer's bedchamber and prayed all the evidence he'd stumbled upon thus far did not mean what he thought it did. When he went to check on the young thief, only Lugh and Aengus were poking their noses through the bars. He let the silly beasts out, and they went bounding off in search of the housekeeper Mrs. Bonham...and their breakfast.
If his master had released Missus Smith from her cell, then why had he left the dogs locked inside?
Cook had already complained to him that she'd had to lend her woolen cape to the young maid she'd sent out to seek vegetables at the market that morning. Someone had stolen the girl's own cape hanging from a hook in the passage to the servants' quarters.
He dreaded climbing the steps to Mister Dyer's private lair to check on his employer. After a few steps up the back staircase, he was nearly bowled over by the man thundering down the servant access stairs.
"Where the hell is she, Crisp?"
He'd been with the infamous Con Dyer for the last four years, and he thought he'd seen everything, but the fury radiating off the man at that moment was a terrifying sight, something he'd never seen before. The man flexed and unflexed his huge hands as if he were envisioning them wrapped around the young thief's throat.
"Why, she escaped from her cell and locked the dogs in. And then...perhaps she stole a cape from the servants' hall, and she's gone now...sir." If Crisp had not been face-to-face with his gaffer with the steep stairs behind him, he might have tried to calm the man down, but he seized the path of self-preservation and turned to race back down toward the lower levels, shouting over his shoulder that he'd send for Wu and the other guards to meet him in his office.
And then something clicked into place in his mind. How had Con Dyer known the thief had fled, when it was obvious he was just leaving his bedchamber and hadn't yet been down to the dungeon? Crisp banished the thought and crossed himself for good measure whilst picking up speed.
* * *
8 February, 1827
Rented Warehouse
Covent Garden
Marianne had slipped into her Covent Garden warehouse in the middle of the night and retrieved a pile of pound notes from her own small safe hidden behind a framed, watercolor landscape of her home in Wales. Although the painting was her first effort at the age of ten, it was still her favorite. She'd caught the fading light on the lake in front of Oxley Hall perfectly. Her childish smearing of the reds, yellows, and pinks she'd seen at the plunging of the sun still resonated realistically.
She also retrieved her Robin Hood costume and a few basic items to tide her over whilst she went into hiding. At the last moment, she snatched up her sketch pad and charcoal stubs.
She moved with extreme stealth so as not to wake either Robbie or Lucinda. That was easy. She was a practiced burglar. The hard part was trying to forget what had happened the night before. She had not expected to ever want a man as much as she wanted Con Dyer in that moment. The hardest thing she'd ever done was to walk away from the warmth of his bed, the shelter of his arms. He was an acknowledged criminal, a man who did unspeakable things, but she couldn't shake the yearning she still felt. She tried not to dwell overmuch on what that attraction said about her.
Suddenly, a vision of her father invaded her thoughts. He wasn't a criminal in the same sense as Con, but he was ruthless in his business dealings, ruthless in how he treated the people in his employ, ruthless in how he'd treated her mother, and worst of all, in how he'd treated her. Because of his extreme wealth, his ruthlessness was looked upon as "good for the country." No doubt the men who risked their lives in the Oxley mines every day might have a different point of view.
Carrying a small bag with a few necessities and disguises, she slipped out into the dark abyss of a Covent Garden night. She didn't notice the man dressed in black with his hat slouched over his eyes step out of the shadows and fall in behind her once she was a street away.
* * *
8 February, 1827
Early Hours
Covent Garden corner
Marianne dropped into a deserted Covent Garden market stall after racing out of view of the black-suited bastard following her. She waited for the sound of his footsteps to echo sufficiently past before she sprinted for a nearby dark side street. A handful of prostitutes walked back and forth near the corner and gave her suspicious looks when she flew past. Her heart beat like the hooves of a runaway horse, making her wonder if the fickle organ could be heard outside her chest.
She slowed and decided it might be in her best interest to purchase some information from the women. Unoccupied prostitutes on their own without paying customers near dawn on a Friday morning could not afford to be choosy about how they made a living. Her hunch paid off. One woman dressed as a shepherdess, complete with a crook, said she remembered a man in black racing past them.
"What kind of hat did he wear?" Marianne dreaded the answer.
"A sort of small bowler hat in dark gray."
Her heart fell. She acknowledged what she'd feared all along. Her father had turned his private army of sneaks on her, the sneaks who kept watch over his mines and workers and weren't afraid to use violence to get Thomas Oxley what he wanted.
With her father's black gang on her trail and Con Dyer undoubtedly angered enough by now to pay someone to murder her, she'd have to think fast to find a safe rat hole in which to hide until Con and her father gave up looking for her. As for how long they'd look? Con might give up in a month or two, but her father would search forever.
The whore dressed as a shepherdess intrigued her. "Where do you live?"
"I've got me a crib down on an alley off Maiden Lane."
"How much money do you earn in your, um, sort of work in a month?"
The girl leaned heavily on her crook for interminable minutes, apparently adding sums in her head. "A guinea, in a good month, above the rent on my crib."
Marianne leaned close and whispered into the girl's ear. "If you take me to your crib, I'll pay you what you'd make in a month."
The girl was immediately suspicious. "I'm not that kind of whore," she huffed.
"I don't want you that way. I need a place to hide for a while. You can take your earnings and go spend time in the countryside, if you like."
The shepherdess hesitated for only a few moments before turning and motioning for Marianne to follow her.