The Winter Rose (32 page)

Gemma admired herself in the mirror, turning this way and that,
twisting her thick brown hair up and letting it fall again. Sid noted
the luscious curve of her bottom, the way her breasts swayed as she
moved, and found himself wanting her again.

"You look smashing," he said.

She smiled, bounded back to the bed, and straddled him.

"Ooof! Crikey, luv, go easy," he said.

She thanked him again, kissed him, then sat up and took him inside
herself, rocking back and forth, slowly, tantalizingly. Her hair was
loose and wild about her shoulders, and the diamonds sparkled against
her skin in the dim lamplight. He tried to reach for her, but his wound
made him wince.

Gemma shook her head. "Lie back," she said. "Be still." She cupped
her breasts and squeezed them, sliding her thumbs back and forth over
her stiff, dusky nipples.

"Aw, Jesus, Gem..." he groaned. It was too much. She was so gor-geous, so wild. He came almost instantly.

When he'd caught his breath, she leaned over him and kissed him. "There's not a third piece, is there?" she asked coyly.

"A third? You want a bracelet, too, you greedy girl?"

"I want a ring, Malone. A diamond ring."

Sid sighed. "Ah, Gemma. You're not going to start that again, are
you? I told you what was what from the start. I'm not the marrying
type."

"I know what you said, but I thought maybe things had changed, that maybe..."

"I take care of you, don't I?" he said brusquely. There had been
other jewels. A flat of her own. A dozen dresses. A fur or two. Even her
solo in the Gaiety's upcoming revue was due to him, though she didn't
know it.

"Of course you do," Gemma said. "You give me so many things, but not the thing that I want most--your heart."

"It's not on offer," Sid said. It never would be. He didn't want to
love anyone. Ever. He had loved once, a long time ago. In another
lifetime. And the loss of what he had loved--his father and mother, his
entire family-- had nearly destroyed him.

Gemma was angry. He could see it in her face. "You're walled off. You
know that?" she said. "You've been sleeping with me for two months now,
and I still don't know the first thing about you. I don't know if you
have a mother or where she lives. I don't know where you come from. Who
your father is."

"And you never will," he said. "Either get used to it, luv, or get out."

Gemma's eyes flashed. "Good enough to bed, not good enough to wed, is that it?"

"No, that's not it. It's because I do care for you that I'd never
marry you. You know who I am, what I do. What kind of man would I be to
drag you into that life?"

"I'd take the bad with the good," she said.

Sid laughed bitterly. "What good? It's all bad. You should find
someone else if marriage is what you're after. I won't stand in your
way."

"It's not what I'm after. I don't want to marry for marrying's sake. I
want you. I want to be with you proper like. It's all I dream about."

Sid wondered what it was like to have a dream. He was sure he'd never
know. Not everyone got to have dreams; some got only nightmares.

He got out of bed, pulled on his trousers, then crossed the room to
pour himself another glass of whisky. This row was giving him a
headache. Gemma Dean was an East London girl, a girl with few illusions.
Sid fig-ured she could probably deal with the darkness of his past
better than most. But he doubted even she could deal with the worst of
it. He could barely do that.

The memories were always there, lurking. He could keep them down
during the day, but at night they tortured him. He barely slept anymore.
When he closed his eyes, images came rushing at him--his dockworker
father dying in the hospital. His mother lying in the street, her blood
seeping into the cracks between the cobbles. His early days with Denny
Quinn. Prison.

It had all started with Quinn. Things could have gone so differently
for him after his mam's death, if only he'd known it. He might have gone
to his uncle Roddy, not a blood uncle but a family friend, and told him
what had happened--that he'd run at the sight of his murdered mother.
Lost his mind for a bit on the Isle of Dogs. Then got into a fight with
the real Sid Malone and killed him. But he'd been afraid. Roddy was a
police constable, and Sid thought he might turn him in. So he'd gone to
Quinn instead, and that had been the end for him. The sale of his soul
hadn't happened all at once, but in bits and pieces. Den had started him
out on the softer stuff-- collecting debts, strong-arming unruly
punters, guarding his whorehouses. He'd done well with those duties, and
progressed to more challenging tasks--knocking off wharves, finding
buyers for high-end swag, selling smuggled opium.

And then he got caught. He'd broken into a jeweler's, stolen some
rings, and had been stupid enough to be seen wearing two of them the
very next day. He'd swaggered and boasted, telling anyone who'd listen
what a dod-dle the job had been, and the next thing he knew, he was
standing before a magistrate, listening to the man sentence him to three
years at Wormwood Scrubs.

He'd turned eighteen two weeks before he was sent down, and he'd felt
his life had ended. When he first saw his cell--cold, damp, and
dirty--he vowed to put distance between himself and Denny Quinn. He
would serve his time, get out, and follow the straight and narrow. The
days were horri-ble. The back-breaking, mind-destroying tasks: smashing
rocks, walking a treadmill, turning a crank on a revolving
drum--sometimes for eight hours at a time, and all for no reason. The
pointlessness. The loneliness. The beatings for the smallest things,
talking maybe, or just making eye contact.

The days were bad, but the nights ...If Sid could have taken a knife
and cut out the part of himself where those memories were kept, he would
have. The lockdown, then lights out. He would sit on his bunk, barely
moving, barely breathing, just leaning over every now and again to vomit
into the tin chamberpot. The sick feeling always started early, when
daylight began to wane. He would sit there in the darkness of his cell,
forsaking sleep, and listen, every muscle in his body tensed, for the
footsteps. Hoping that they wouldn't come. Knowing there was nothing he
could do if they did. He'd wanted to kill himself in those early days.
And he would have, too, if he'd been able to get hold of something to do
the job.

Quinn had twigged. He'd come for a visit, taken one look at him, and said, "I want a name."

Sid had shaken his head. There would be another death on his head if he gave it, and he'd be bound to Denny forever.

"Don't be so fucking stupid!" Den had hissed. "You've been in for
four months. Your sentence is three years. Can you survive three years
of this? Three fucking years?"

Sid had finally choked out the name of a guard. "Wiggs. Ian Wiggs."

Two days later, Ian Wiggs was dead. Throat cut. Body dumped in front
of the prison. The screws left Sid alone after that. So did the other
prisoners. It was the beginning of things. Of a reputation. Of power and
respect. When he got out, he was twenty-one years old.

"You have served your time, Mr. Malone. Your debt is paid," the
warden said, upon his discharge. "We hope that you have learned from
your mistakes and that the justice meted out to you has had a reforming
effect upon your character. I trust you will now follow the straight and
narrow path."

"Yes, sir," he'd said. The hell I will, he'd thought.

The nick had changed him all right, but not in the way the warden
intended. It had made him hard, bitter, determined never to be at
anyone's mercy again. Because there was no such thing as mercy. Not for
him.

As soon as he returned to the East End, he went straight to the Taj,
sat down with Denny, and announced that he was going to take over East
Lon-don. North and south of the river.

"Bit ambitious, don't you think?" Denny had said. "Bowler Sheehan
might have something to say about it." Sheehan, one of the East End's
most vicious men, controlled Whitechapel, Wapping, and much else on the
north bank.

"I didn't say I'd do it next week," Sid said. "It'll take time." And
it had. He'd gathered men around him. Lads he'd known and others he'd
met in prison. Lads who understood, as he did, that it was better to be
smart and quiet about what you did than dumb and loud. Lads who'd
figured out, as he had, that power--real power--was found in a man's
head, not his fists.

They had started on the south side of the river. Like a general
mounting a campaign, Sid positioned his men in a loop on the outskirts
of Rotherhithe and Southwark, then tightened that loop bit by bit,
driving out the lesser gangs by reason when possible and by force when
not. Letting it be known there was one guv'nor now, one manor. Making
his way slowly but surely toward the wharves and the riches they
contained.

After two years, he'd gotten the south bank locked up. There was
almost nothing going on there--fights, prostitution, gambling, fencing,
protection, drugs--that he and his men didn't get a piece of. He'd just
started to make inroads on the north bank when Denny Quinn had been
murdered. He'd had his throat cut by Bowler Sheehan, who'd objected to
Denny's fraternizing with Sid. And then Sheehan himself had wound up
dead, his own throat cut in Newgate jail. Sid hadn't done it, but many
believed he had. He let them. With Sheehan out of the way, the north
bank had been his for the taking, and take it he had.

Sid had never wanted the life, and he didn't want it now, but he was
in too deep to ever get out. He'd made too many enemies. And too many
friends. Like Billy Madden, who'd murdered dozens on his way up the West
End ladder, and the Sicilians--Angie Vazzano and Nicky Barrecca-- who
ruled Covent Garden and the Haymarket. They all shook hands when they
met, bought each other dinners, drinks, and women, but Sid knew they all
coveted his patch and would go for him in an instant if they ever
scented weakness.

And for Sid Malone, the greatest weakness of all was love.

"Won't you come back to bed?" Gemma asked now, in a conciliatory voice.

Sid was about to answer when there was a knock at the door. He tensed. "What is it?" he barked.

"There's someone here to see you, guv." It was Lily, the barmaid.

Sid yanked the door open. "Who is it? Donaldson? I told him we had nothing to do with the Morocco."

Donaldson had accused Frankie of burning down the wharf and killing
its watchman. Frankie had sworn he'd had nothing to do with it, and Sid
believed him. He wouldn't have dared do such a thing, not after Sid had
told him, and all his men, to steer clear of the place.

"It's not Donaldson," Lily said. "It's a woman."

Bloody hell, Sid thought. Fiona.

"It's the doctor. Ozzie said so. The one that saw to you in the hospital. Missus Jones."

Sid felt a split-second's relief that the visitor wasn't his sister,
but the relief was replaced by anger upon learning that it was the
doctor. "What?" he said. "Here? In the pub?"

"Yes."

"Anyone with her?"

"No. She's on her own."

"Jesus Christ. I'll be right down. Lily, keep an eye on her, will you?"

Sid grabbed his shirt. He stuffed his feet in his boots and reached for his jacket.

"What's she doing here?" Gemma asked.

"I'm wondering the same thing," he said. "Trying to commit suicide, maybe?"

He bolted down the steps two at a time and scanned the bar, but
didn't see her. Fear rose in him. She had no idea what sorts frequented
the Bark, and what they were capable of. Finally, he spotted her. She
was sitting at a table on the far side of the room--hat straight, knees
together, hands in her lap. She might have been waiting for a bus on the
Brompton Road. He was at her side in a few strides. She smiled when she
saw him and started to speak, but he cut her off.

"Have you gone completely mad? What are you doing here?"

"I came to see you. You said if I needed anything to come to see you. Well, I need something. So I came."

"You bloody stupid woman. Do you know where you are?"

"The Barkentine?"

"Don't play the smart arse."

"I beg your pardon!"

"How'd you get here?"

"Hackney, mostly. I had to walk part of the way."

"You're lucky you weren't killed. Or worse."

"I can't imagine there's anything worse than being killed."

"There is. Trust me. Come on," he said, motioning for her to get up.

"Where are we going?" she asked, standing.

"You are going home."

She sat back down. "I am not."

"Dr. Jones..." Sid said, through gritted teeth.

"I need your help, Mr. Malone. It is truly a matter of life and death."

Sid sat down. He leaned across the table. "Do you know that the
rozzers are afraid of this place? Big strong men with big heavy
truncheons are scared to walk in here, but you sail in without so much
as a by-your-leave."

"I have you to protect me. They do not," she said.

Sid saw he was getting nowhere. "What is it you want?" he finally asked.

"I need devices. For my patients. French letters, Dutch caps, sponges. They're contraceptive devices."

The men on either side of her turned and stared. India didn't notice, or didn't care if she did.

"Aye, I know what they are. Keep your voice down, will you?" Sid
passed a hand over his face, mortified. With all that he'd seen, all
that he'd done in his life, he didn't think anything could mortify him,
but he was wrong.

"I need quality goods. No off-the-back-of-a-cart rubbish. Can you get them?"

Sid considered her question. "I don't mind telling you, this is the oddest request for a job I've ever had," he said.

"I'm not asking for a favor. I'd pay you, of course."

He winced at that. It didn't even occur to her that he might not want
to be paid. That he might want to help her. Because she wanted to do
some good and there were so few in this world who did. Let a bad man do a
good deed, Ella had said the day he'd left the hospital. He'd overheard
her arguing with India in Gifford's office, but India wouldn't let him.
Fine. Sod her, then. If she wanted to pay, she'd pay.