Chapter 4 Kane #2
But he didn’t finish what he’d been about to say. Because at that moment someone peeked around the corner, eyes enormous in the shadows. Someone with a small face, whose head barely reached Kane’s waist.
Oh, hell.
It was a little girl. She couldn’t be more than three. Those large eyes found Kane’s hand on her father’s neck, and her lips parted as someone reached for her from the other side of the wall.
“Lizzie, no.”
The child pulled away, and a woman appeared. Despite the child hovering between them, she was scarcely older than Kane himself. Everything about her was still distinctly girlish. Her expression was pinched as she took in the scene before her, attempting once more to drag the child back.
“Please forgive us.”
Kane’s heartbeats collided with one another. The man had stilled in his grasp. Please forgive us, she’d said, when he was the one who had barged into their home. The one strangling her husband right in front of her.
God, he was a monster, wasn’t he?
He loosened his grip. The man slid down the wall, slumping against it. His hand went to his neck, and his face was wild, terror mingled with confusion.
Kane’s face was nothing at all.
There was a long moment during which no one moved an inch.
Or perhaps it only felt like an eternity to Kane.
His mind whirled aimlessly, and he regretted the drink.
What did they see, these people, when they looked at him?
He must be their nightmares realized. Their fears in the form of a wild-eyed, knife-wielding boy.
But he couldn’t hurt the man further; not like this.
Not in front of a wife who would shut her eyes when the blade came down and a daughter who wouldn’t know to do the same.
And yet he couldn’t return to Ward empty-handed.
“If you can’t pay,” Kane said, his voice an unrecognizable hiss, “then be gone within the hour. Or I assure you someone worse than me will come to collect, and they won’t just be looking for money.”
“But—” the man began, and his wife shushed him with a breathless shriek.
Kane knew what he’d been about to say: Where will we go? It was a fair question. But homelessness was better than death, at least for now.
The man still looked as though he might argue. That was a problem; Kane needed them to agree. Because if he returned without the money, weaving tales of a family who’d fled, and Ward discovered he was lying…
The room was impossibly quiet as Kane knelt, lips at the man’s ear. “This is a gift,” he breathed. “This is mercy. I assure you, you will not get it twice.”
Finally, blessedly, the man nodded.
Kane’s muscles relaxed. He straightened, readjusting his collar. “Be out by dusk. Don’t return.”
The little girl’s eyes locked with his, just for a moment, and he imagined the alcohol in the pit of his stomach burning anew.
When he left, he did not look back.
“Fletch!”
Kane called his friend’s name, ducking his chin to avoid the putrid spray of the river.
Fletcher stood at the edge of the docks, surrounded on three sides by shipping containers.
Workers scuttled past with hats drawn low over their faces and vests soaked through.
Their hollers and the ch-chk, ch-chk of their carts over stone were all but swallowed by the wind.
It was crowded despite the weather, but Fletcher, being taller than Kane—who was quite tall—veritably towered over everyone else.
He raised an eyebrow as Kane approached. “Had some trouble, I take it?”
Kane ran a hand over his swollen jaw, wincing. “This is going to sound mad, but people aren’t keen on debt collection.”
“That does sound mad. I’m sure you were ever so charming.”
Kane made a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat. He’d forced a family into homelessness today. A child.
Fletcher’s brows knit together. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Look—a few ships are docked up ahead.”
It wasn’t as though he’d just noticed; they were, after all, fairly large.
Stares from the dockworkers held a tangible heat as they navigated the throngs, but Kane didn’t care.
It was Fletcher’s gaze he felt the most, dissecting his expression as if any moment he might say, Wait. What are you hiding?
A bird screeched somewhere overhead. It sounded like a warning.
Kane skirted two men arguing over some kind of cargo marked with the words SAVILLE SHIPPING CO.
, lifting his chin as they neared a ship bearing the matching logo.
He tried not to dwell on the time they’d spent working for Saville—time they’d wasted—only to learn nothing of import.
“The necklace wouldn’t have arrived on one of Saville’s boats, though,” Fletcher muttered thoughtfully. “It was coming from Ireland, right? Courtesy of George Waterhouse and Co.”
Kane inclined his head. “Saville’s company employees would have dealt with it when it arrived.
They would have decided where it should dock.
” He swallowed an impatient sigh. “Maybe we should have gotten hired on here. I figured Saville’s personal crew would know more than the dockers.
That we might be able to track down some kind of ledger. But…”
“You couldn’t have known,” Fletcher said. “It was a good idea. I doubt the dockers know anything about which ships are carrying what exhibits. Besides, people are clamoring for these jobs, and they’re picked at random. You can’t con your way in.”
Kane sighed. Those had been his exact words when he’d convinced Fletcher they were better off conning their way into Saville’s inner circle. And even now, when it seemed he’d made the wrong choice, Fletcher still supported him without question. What had Kane done to deserve such undying loyalty?
He knew the answer: He hadn’t done anything. Other than condemn his friend to a lifetime of servitude.
“Ward has never wanted something this much,” Kane said darkly as they continued down the docks. “At least not that I can remember. I’m afraid of what he’ll do if we fail.”
There. He’d said it.
Fletcher cast him a sideways glance. “You’re important to Ward. Everybody knows that.” He elbowed Kane lightly in the ribs. “That’s why I hang around you. For the safety.”
Kane felt as though someone had injected ice directly into his bloodstream. He forced a painful grin, unable to bring himself to respond.
A number of ships had been anchored away from the main docks, some of them bearing words Kane didn’t recognize. Partially due to impatience—and partially because he couldn’t bear to continue the conversation he and Fletcher were currently having—he grabbed the arm of a young docker walking past.
The boy started. He couldn’t have been more than twelve, Kane saw now, with a shock of reddish hair and dirty cheeks. When he cursed, though, it was with the vocabulary of someone far older.
“Calm down,” Kane barked, trapping the boy between himself and Fletcher. “I only want to ask you something. And I’m not going to hurt you,” he added, “so relax. Do you know if any of these ships came from Ireland?”
“It’s important.” Fletcher’s arms were crossed, his face damp from the misty wind and the river spray. The boy shied away from his towering form, a seemingly automatic reaction.
“I—I don’t know,” he said. “It’s busy round here as of late. There might’ve been such a ship, though. If there was, I ain’t telling you for free.”
Kane made a noise in his throat. “Fair enough. Here’s my offer: You answer the question, and he doesn’t chuck you in the river.” He tilted his head at Fletcher, who was stone-faced.
The boy blanched, then glowered. “Blazes, fine! That one at the end arrived this morn. Some of the older guys were saying it had come from round those parts. That it was full of expensive shit. A bunch of fancy-dressed toffs and coppers came by as it was being unloaded. I stayed back, mind you; father tells me not to trust men like that. That’s all I know. ”
Kane’s stomach plummeted. Could that have been the Irish ship transporting the Waterhouse exhibit? He hoped not, given that everything on board had apparently already been moved. With his luck, though, he wouldn’t be surprised.
“That might well be it,” Fletcher said, echoing Kane’s thoughts. He peered in the direction the boy had gestured, easily able to see over the heads of everyone else in the vicinity. “It’s certainly a fancy enough vessel. I think we might be in trouble, Kane.”
Kane roared his frustration into the wind, spurring the boy to run like hell.
Panic and helplessness rendered him speechless for a moment, and he yearned to hit something as he dragged his hands through his hair, yanking at the roots.
Everything they’d done up until now had been to avoid this very outcome, and it had all been for naught.
“We’re going to have to steal the blasted necklace from the Exhibition, Fletch.” To Kane’s horror, his voice held a quaver.
“Okay,” Fletcher said, staring out over the fog-shrouded river. The set of his mouth was determined. “Okay, that’s not ideal, but it’s fine. We’ll make it work. You always have a plan, right?”
A laugh bubbled like hysteria in the back of Kane’s throat.
Yes, he did tend to have a plan, but this wasn’t supposed to be happening.
He wasn’t supposed to need a backup plan.
Sure, he’d spent sleepless nights imagining how he might steal from the Exhibition if it came down to that, but those had been stress-induced exercises in futility.
He forced himself to take a steadying breath. Fletcher’s life was on the line. And just as they’d said a hundred times before, there was nothing the two of them couldn’t steal.
“Yeah,” Kane said, even as his stomach continued to churn. “Yeah, Fletch. I’ve got a plan.”