Scandalous Desires (Maiden Lane #3)(54)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

“Dear God,” Silence murmured. “I’d heard what vitriol could do, but this… it killed her?”

He stroked her hair. “It was quick,” he lied.

In fact Fionnula had probably suffocated as the terrible liquid ate into her nose and the tissues of her mouth and throat. Her death would’ve been agonizing.

“Poor, poor Fionnula,” Silence said. The baby had quieted into an exhausted slump against her shoulder. “Do you think Mary saw it?”

“Nah, she didn’t. Fionnula must’ve saved the babe,” Harry said somberly. He gently spread a handkerchief over the girl’s ruined face. “The baby was already under the bed wi’ Lad when I got ’ere.” He nodded to the connecting door to Michael’s room. “I came through there. Saw the Vicar’s man standing over ’er, jus’ lookin’. Then ’e turned tail and ran.”

“And why weren’t ye here afore the Vicar’s men to stop them from enterin’?” Mick asked coldly.

Harry flushed. “There were a fire in the kitchen. We went down to ’elp put it out afore it spread to the rest o’ the ’ouse.”

“A diversion,” Mick grunted.

“Aye,” Bert said. “A diversion right enough, Mick.”

Harry nodded. “The ’ole ’ouse was roused to carry the buckets. Weren’t until we ’eard a scream from above that we realized we was under attack. By that time they’d made the upper floors and ’twas ’ell to fight our way through.” He averted his eyes from Fionnula’s pathetic body as if he couldn’t stand the sight. “She were already dead by the time we made it ’ere.”

“How did the fire start?” Mick asked.

But at that moment Bran shoved past Bert in the doorway. Bran’s face was blackened, his hair straggling about his shoulders. He saw the still form on the floor and froze.

“No.”

Harry turned. “Aw, Bran—”

“No!” Bran batted aside the hand that Harry would’ve set on his arm. “No, no, no!”

He sank to his knees beside Fionnula and carefully lifted the handkerchief from her face. For a long moment he simply stared at the horror and then he abruptly jerked aside and vomited.

“She were a brave lass,” Bert said thickly, his eyes reddening. “Must’ve jus’ ’ad time to shove the babe under the bed afore they were in the rooms.”

Bran had his hands over his face and was simply rocking as if too stunned to move away from his position beside Fionnula. His reaction was stronger than Mick would’ve expected—he’d never thought the boy as in love with Fionnula as she’d been with him. Perhaps it was the shock of her terrible death.

Or perhaps Mick simply didn’t understand love.

Mick felt Silence shudder within his arms as she stifled a sob.

He stroked her hair. “A brave lass indeed. We’ll give her a proper burial, Bran, never ye fear.”

“Damn you!” Bran looked up, his face white and clear of tears. His eyes seemed to burn in the parchment of his face. “The Vicar had her killed because of your damned war, because of your damned pride! You whoreson! You should’ve killed him years ago, simply taken over his business and been done with him. But you’re too high in the instep for gin.” He spat, the glob of phlegm hitting the floor with a loud splat. “Damn you, her death is on your soul.”

Mick watched Bran throughout this tirade, not bothering to defend himself, though he did put his body between the grief-stricken boy and Silence. He glanced at Harry and nodded.

“Come on now.” Harry reached down and took Bran’s arm. “Times like these’s good for gettin’ roarin’ drunk.”

“Damn you!” Bran tried to wrench his arm from Harry’s grasp, but his heart didn’t seem to be in it anymore. The big man drew him up easily and hustled him to the door.

Mick glanced at Bert. “See that the room’s cleaned and Fionnula’s taken to the cellars until we can bury her.”

Bert nodded, his hangdog face heavy with sorrow.

Mick turned and left the room with Mary and Silence. He wanted them away from the scent of death and tragedy.

His own room hadn’t been touched. For a moment Mick narrowed his eyes, considering. The palace was a large and deliberately labyrinthine building. Finding a specific room was hard for those not initiated into its secrets. Yet the Vicar’s men had found Silence’s room very rapidly and without error, it seemed. How—?

“Why did they kill her with vitriol?” Silence whispered.

Mick looked down, his thoughts scattered. “Because o’ me.”

Her face was turned up toward his, pale and weary. She’d been fond of Fionnula. She’d be in mourning, too, along with Bran.

Her brows drew together in dazed puzzlement. “Because of you?”

He nodded. This was not the time or place, but he was all out of deceits and whiles. “A long time ago I attacked a man with vitriol. Threw it in his face.”

She recoiled. Well, and why wouldn’t she? It was a horrific act, the action of an animal. Naturally she’d be appalled.

“Why?”

He felt his own eyebrows arch in faint surprise. To question why an animal would act in an animalistic manner seemed absurd, but he humored her anyway.

“Because I wanted to kill him and the vitriol was at hand.”

She stared at him and blinked it seemed with an effort. “I’m very tired,” she said carefully, “but I know there must be more to the story than that…” She trailed off and shook her head as if too weary to go on. “I can’t ask the right questions tonight, but tell me this: Why should your attack so long ago lead to Fionnula’s death tonight?”

“Because,” he said, “the man I scarred with vitriol was Charlie Grady, the Vicar o’ Whitechapel.”

SILENCE STARED UP at Michael O’Connor, pirate, thief, admitted murderer. He’d confessed to a ghastly crime, one that led naturally to deserved retribution.

And yet…

And yet she refused to believe the worst of him—even if he believed it of himself. She knew him better now. All she saw at this moment, late at night in a dark room, was the sorrow in his eyes.

“Oh, Michael,” she said, and laid her palm against his cheek.

His black eyes flared wide in surprise and she almost laughed. Was compassion such a strange thing to him? Impulsively she stood on tiptoe and kissed him.