He’d left her to sleep in his bloody bed alone, taking himself off to pace the rooftops as he waited for the sun to rise. He’d thought perhaps the cold air would do him some good. Not so. The fire was in his blood now.

A good thing he was a persistent bastard.

“Reed,” Blade called, clasping hands with the guild master and tipping a nod toward Lady Peregrine. “An unexpected surprise.”

Holding out a chair for his wife, Garrett then claimed the basket seat directly opposite Blade, his fingers curling over the cane arms. He’d grown into the position of guild master that he’d undertaken six months ago. Not many men would stare so directly at the Devil of Whitechapel like that.

“An unfortunate one,” Perry replied.

“I have a witness claiming she saw the Duke of Goethe murdered on the edges of Whitechapel earlier this morning,” Garrett said, adding, “By you, no less.”

“I see.” Blade leaned back into the seat, his eyes growing steely. “I trust you’ve got ’em in protective custody?”

“Of course,” Garrett replied. “Somewhere nobody will be able to get to her, including you.”

“Have you checked her for a Falcon’s tattoo?” Leo asked.

A breath. Then Garrett asked softly, “Should I?”

“Most likely in her hair,” Leo suggested. “Or if she doesn’t have one, then I’m certain she’s recently come into contact with someone who does.”

Rubbing at the bridge of his nose, Garrett sighed. After years of being used, the Nighthawks had no love for the prince consort. “Bloody hell. So this is a plot. Do I even wish to know?”

“The prince consort sees Blade as a threat, so this is obviously a ploy against him,” Leo murmured, circling the room to the decanter by the window. It was definitely time for some blood. For all of them. “You knew what we were setting out to do six months ago.”

Nine men and women had made a decision one foggy morning to bring down the prince consort and restore peace to the city. Leo and Blade had been the instigators of that meeting, but Garrett and his wife had their own reasons for wanting to remove the madman from power.

Since that day, repeating rifles and supplies had been smuggled into the rookery, even cannons mounted on the walls, though those remained out of sight. Whitechapel was the base of operations, the heart of the effort to bring down the prince consort. Both Blade’s ranks and the Nighthawks’ rosters had swelled, men coming in by the dozens.

“Knowing isn’t quite the same as being trapped between a rock and a hard place,” Garrett replied, accepting the glass of blood that Leo offered him. “I’ve been summoned to the Tower to make a report to the prince consort as soon as I’m done here.”

“Then go to the Tower,” Leo said, crossing back toward Blade. “Make your report. There’s nothing to find.”

“Was there something to find?” At his short nod, Garrett swore under his breath again. “So Goethe’s dead?”

“Missin’,” Blade corrected.

“The prince consort will insist there’s a case to build.” Garrett downed his blood in one swallow.

“Without a body you have nothing but a witness. Start searching for Goethe, but stay close to Goethe’s house and his relations. The prince consort can’t press you too closely on Whitechapel without going out of his way, and that’s suspicious. You’re simply following leads, questioning everyone—trying to find a link between Blade and Goethe when there really isn’t one,” Leo said.

“Keep us up-to-date,” Blade insisted.

“We will,” Garrett said, standing and offering Perry a hand. He locked eyes with Leo. “How goes that other matter you were dealing with?”

Leo grimaced. “I managed to meet with some of Wetherby’s mechs last night at the Venetian Gardens. Wetherby wanted something public. I’m going to send him that three-pounder Hotchkiss cannon I got my hands on. Wetherby’s certain he can create something similar for us to mount on the walls of the rookery, just in case.” When revolution started fires in the city, they needed a stronghold where they could fall back if matters went badly.

A grim silence settled over the room. “So this is it,” Perry said, letting go of a breath.

“This is it,” Blade murmured, staring at nothing. “Or the start of it, anyway. Once we got the guns, we can start movin’ them to other parts of the city through Undertown.”

“We’ll try to make this as bloodless as possible,” Leo said grimly. “A quiet coup, if I can get us into the Ivory Tower where we can take the prince consort prisoner and see him executed…but I’m not about to do this unprepared. If we don’t need to use any of the weapons we’re stockpiling, then I shall consider us lucky as all hell. He won’t go quietly.”

“But ’e’ll go,” Blade murmured, a dark light gleaming in his eyes.

“He’ll go,” Garrett agreed. “We cannot afford for him not to.”

Five

“Extra, Extra, read all about it! Airship stolen from the Venetian Gardens last night by a gang of vigilantes! The pilot admits he was overpowered, and Lord M— demands more Nighthawks on the streets to protect good, loyal citizens!”

—Paperboy overheard by Leo Barrons

Leo had barely returned from the rookery, easing his shoulders out of his coat, when his butler appeared with a carefully folded piece of parchment resting on a silver salver. The red wax seal bore the stamp of the Duke of Morioch, the current Chair for the Council of Dukes.

Leo slid the coat back over his shoulders and took the missive with a sigh. “No other messages?” he asked, feeling weary to the bone. No sleep in over twenty-four hours would do that to a body, and the previous month in Russia had been taxing. The Russian Court made the Echelon look like a bunch of lambs.

“Your father’s footman arrived to schedule your chess game,” Montgomery replied with a sonorous air. “Today at five, if it please my lord.”

Not so much a request as a summons. Though he was the duke’s heir, they’d barely spoken in more than three years, not since Leo had cost Caine much in the political arena by helping Blade duel Vickers, the Duke of Lannister.

The chess games, however, were regular occurrences that Leo indulged his father with, though he didn’t know why he bothered or why the duke even requested them. They barely spoke and Caine trumped him almost every time, berating him for his lack of forethought.