Mina Wentworth and the Invisible City Part 1

MINA WENTWORTH AND THE INVISIBLE CITY.

A NOVELLA OF THE IRON SEAS.

MELJEAN BROOK.

Chapter 1.

Even after eight months of marriage, Detective Inspector Mina Wentworth couldn't decide whether it was better to let her husband know that she'd been hurt on the job as soon as she returned home, or to wait until they readied for bed, where he'd see the evidence of her injuries for himself.

She didn't know if there was a better time to tell him, or if when didn't matter at all. Either way, Rhys always worried and regretted not being there to protect her.

Perhaps he worried too much. The latest wasn't so bad-just a bruise on her back, the result of a foot chase in pursuit of a suspect that morning, followed by the tussle when she'd caught him. Mina barely felt the ache in the muscles below her shoulder anymore, and her bugs would probably finish healing the damage by bedtime. She wanted to believe that if her husband didn't see the bruise, then it was almost as if nothing had happened. She wanted to believe that if she concealed the evidence-if Rhys never knew-then he wouldn't have to worry so much . . . but she couldn't.

When Mina had lived with her parents, she'd always hidden her bruises-those that she could hide, at least. Whether the injury had come from her job or had been a personal attack because she resembled the Mongol officials who'd ruled over the Horde-occupied England, she'd taken great pains to avoid the haunted expression that appeared on their faces whenever she'd been hurt. But as one of the most visible people in England, she couldn't hide her injuries from Rhys, even if the evidence disappeared.

After she'd thrown herself into the path of a bullet to save Rhys Trahaearn's life-to save the Iron Duke, England's most beloved hero-hardly a day pa.s.sed when her name wasn't mentioned in the newssheets. While she'd been recovering, journalists recounted every step of the murder investigation that had first brought her to the Iron Duke's door, then had sent Rhys and Mina in pursuit of a deadly weapon that threatened everyone in England. When the Blacksmith had successfully replaced her clockwork heart with a new one made of mechanical flesh, the newssheets had devoted a full column to describing the man's arrival at her home, the length of time the operation had taken, and the Blacksmith's expression when he'd left. After she'd returned to work, journalists had dogged her footsteps for almost a month, even following along behind the police cart that Mina and her a.s.sistant, Newberry, used to get around London. They'd impeded her investigations and frustrated Mina to the point of fury-until, abruptly, they'd stopped hounding her so closely.

Though she'd never confirmed it, Mina suspected now that Rhys had been the reason the journalists had retreated. Both the police commissioner and Superintendent Hale had warned them away without much effect, and although the Iron Duke couldn't stop them from reporting, a threat from him would be powerful enough to change the way they gathered information on her.

Three months after Mina had been shot-the day she'd first seen Rhys again, striding toward her across Anglesey Square-she hadn't noticed any journalists in the area. Yet they must have been there or they'd talked to someone who had been, because the next morning the newssheets had reported that she and the Iron Duke had argued before he'd picked her up and carried her into a nearby building. Someone must have seen and guessed the reason for Mina's happy tears when they'd returned to the square; the following day, newsboys had been shouting "Will the Iron Duke marry Inspector Wentworth?" on the street corners. When they had married a week later, the headline filled half the front page.

Mina had hoped that would be the end of their fascination with her, but she ought to have known that her and Rhys's combined celebrity and the nature of her job meant the journalists would follow every murder she investigated with glee. Though she often had to drag a single word from witnesses, they were all too happy to speak with journalists paying for details about whom she'd visited and the questions she'd asked-and, if the journalists were lucky, a description of any fights or chases that took place in the course of an investigation.

Mina had quickly discovered that there was no hiding her injuries from Rhys. The first time, she hadn't even meant to hide it. The graze from a murderer's knife across her cheek had stopped bleeding within minutes, and was healed by the time she'd returned home; she hadn't even thought to mention the incident to him. The next morning, however, they'd been enjoying their breakfast when Rhys had suddenly grown quiet and dropped the newssheet he'd unfolded. She'd only had a glimpse of the headline-"Inspector Wentworth Ravaged by Knife-Wielding Madman"-before he'd hauled Mina out of her chair and carried her up the stairs. Heart pounding, she'd a.s.sured him that the shallow cut hadn't been anything akin to "ravaged," but Rhys hadn't stopped shaking until he'd stripped her down, inspected every inch of her skin. When he'd kissed her, she'd tasted his relief, and she'd matched his need when he'd taken her fast and hard on the bed, desperate to let him know that she was all right.

So hiding the bruises and cuts didn't save him from worry-and Mina preferred that Rhys heard the mundane truth from her rather than some exaggerated account.

Still, she hated to see the tension and fear that overcame him in those moments before he confirmed that she wasn't truly hurt. She hated being the cause of it, and would have given anything to hide any injury from him, as she had from her parents for so long.

But Mina didn't live with her parents anymore.

The last of a brilliant orange sunset faded as the steamcoach approached the gate guarding the entrance to the Iron Duke's estate. Grizzled and gray, Wills peered through the gatehouse window. Inside the open carriage, Mina lifted her hand in greeting. The gatekeeper waved them on, and the steamcoach rumbled past the tall, wrought-iron fence that surrounded the estate's park. Wide expanses of lawn stretched out on both sides of the lane, calm and lovely after the chaos of town. In the past week, they'd had a series of those rare days when most of the smoke cleared from the air, a breeze kept the temperature from climbing uncomfortably high, and the sky almost appeared blue instead of yellowish-gray. The typically thick, stifling days of summer would return, no doubt, but Mina didn't mind.

As far as she was concerned, every single day since she'd married Rhys had been perfect. She didn't expect that to change.

She sat forward in her seat as they neared the mansion, her indecision regarding her injury giving way to antic.i.p.ation. Her heart pounded as the coach entered the courtyard and stopped in front of the wide steps leading to the door. Gray stone walls gave the impression of bleak solidity, unyielding strength. Before she'd married Rhys, never had she imagined that the sight of his fortress would soften everything within her. She'd loved living with her family in their London town house; her home had been safe, comforting. Rhys's was safe, beyond a doubt-but she was still surprised at how quickly the mansion had become her home, until it seemed that those hard gray walls only existed to welcome her in and protect her.

And even after eight months, she still felt antic.i.p.ation and joy every day, simply because she was home again, because she'd soon see him again. Before Rhys, she'd never imagined that marriage would be this. She'd imagined devoted companionship of the sort her parents had-not companionship and a racing pulse.

Mina met the housekeeper in the foyer, where she handed over her hat. "Good evening, Mrs. Lavery. Any messages?"

Mrs. Lavery knew that she didn't mean the social invitations that arrived every day, or the confirmations from those attending Rhys's ball next week. "Only a gram from Miss Anne, Your Grace."

"Thank you." She accepted the folded paper and looked down the long hall. The library door was closed. "Is he in with someone?"

Rhys had told her to walk in whenever she wished; but though she wanted to see him the moment she arrived home, Mina didn't like to interrupt his meetings. When Parliament had been in session at the palace near police headquarters, he'd often come home in the steamcoach with her and spend many of the evening hours working. Now that the summer recess had begun, he focused on business during the day, which allowed them more time together at night. If she went in now, he might not be able to finish as quickly.

"He is with Lord Scarsdale, ma'am."

Rhys's friend, business partner, and the man he relied on to navigate through the murky waters of London society. She felt comfortable walking in unannounced, then-though she wouldn't. Mina grinned and started down the hall.

Two weeks ago, she'd opened the library door without warning. Rhys and Scarsdale had been standing close together in the middle of the room, and at her entry, had quickly moved in opposite directions-the cheeks of both slightly flushed, Scarsdale walking stiffly to the sofa. Mina pretended not to have seen anything. She'd allow her husband his secrets, and when he wanted to surprise her, she would pretend to be surprised.

This time, she knocked at the library door and read the gram from Anne while waiting for his reply. His response came a few seconds later than it normally did. When she entered, both men were breathing heavily, as if from exertion. Frustration marked Rhys's bold features, darkening his expression with lowered brows and a scowl. Though Scarsdale appeared amused as always, his mouth was tight with pain.

Poor, brave Scarsdale. With bones made of iron, Rhys was a heavy man. Scarsdale's toes had certainly suffered-and all to save her toes on the night of the ball, no doubt.

Rhys's scowl lightened when his eyes met Mina's. He came to her as he always did, his gaze locked on her face as if his entire being focused on her. She waited by the door, barely able to breathe until he took her hands, bent his head to hers. With Scarsdale here, it was only a brief kiss instead of the hungry taste that he often greeted her with, but it still burned Mina to her toes, made it difficult to let him go.

She'd never imagined that, either. Though Mina had always hoped that she'd find love and companionship, she'd never really dreamed they would actually be hers. Yet she had them now, and she loved being married to Rhys. Every day, she knew him better and loved him more.

It was astonishing how much she did, really. And a little frightening. If Rhys wanted to, he could hurt her worse than a knife-wielding madman ever could-and she thanked the blue heavens that he never would.

His hand in hers, he led her back to the sofa. As soon as she'd settled next to Scarsdale, he sat against the front edge of his desk, facing them. Her husband didn't trust chairs, she'd learned-even those designed to support his weight.

His gaze fell to the folded paper in her hand. "Is that another message from Anne?"

And here was another worry. Though he didn't express it in so many words, she knew that he'd come to care for the young tinker who'd lived with Mina for almost a year now-and who'd lived with them since they'd been married. "She's staying at my father's house again tonight."

As the girl had for several nights that week. It wasn't completely unusual-at the Blacksmith's suggestion, Mina's father had begun teaching at the Creche and setting up an apprenticeship with the older children who wanted to study medicine. Though the children raised in the walled compound in Whitechapel were notoriously secretive and rarely let an adult past their front gates, the Blacksmith had somehow convinced them-but had also known that his word alone wouldn't ease the children's suspicions and fear. During the first week of teaching, the Blacksmith had given Anne time away from his smithy to accompany Mina's father. The tinker girl had lived in the Creche before she'd moved in with Mina; even if the children didn't completely trust the Blacksmith or Mina's father, they did her. So Anne had stayed with Mina's father and mother that week, the easier to travel back and forth-and on the days when Anne didn't work at the Blacksmith's, she sometimes still stayed the night with her father and visited the Creche with him during the day.

But this time, Anne was due at the Blacksmith's in the morning, and her father was well-established at the Creche. Why stay another night?

Mina missed the girl and wanted her to come home, but she didn't know how hard to push. Eleven years old now, Anne had been little more than a baby when the Horde had been forced out of England during the revolution. She'd grown up with the other children of the Creche and followed their rules. Though she and Mina had seemed to adopt each other, Mina didn't know if she could step in as a mother-or if mother would even mean anything to Anne.

Did it? Mina simply couldn't guess. She didn't want to alienate the girl with too many restrictions-and at least she knew where Anne was, that she was staying at her parents. Perhaps that was good for them, too. With Mina married, her brother Andrew serving as a midshipman on the Terror, and Henry living up north, perhaps Anne's presence would ease the sudden emptiness of their house. Mina couldn't think of anywhere safer or anywhere better for the girl to stay . . . except with her and Rhys.

Because she's mine. A little sister, a daughter-Mina didn't know exactly what she felt for the girl, but Anne belonged to her now. So she'd let the girl have tonight, but if Anne didn't return after that, Mina would go and get her.

Rhys gave a small nod, as if reading the sudden determination on her face and agreeing with it. "Yes," he said. "We'll have her back."

"Try a smile when you do, captain, so that you don't terrify the poor girl," Scarsdale told him before offering one to Mina. "And how was your day, inspector?"

Which part of it? Mina chose her favorite. "Inspector Mason brought in the body of a man whose lover said he fell down a flight of stairs. I spent the afternoon proving that the shape of the victim's head wound matched the back side of the cutting apparatus grafted onto her arm, not the edge of a step."

"So she killed him?"

"Oh, yes."

Scarsdale gave a mock shudder. "I hate to think of the sins you'd discover if you ever opened me up."

Not many that she didn't already know. Scarsdale was one of the rare men who didn't need to be opened up to find the truth of a story; he opened his mouth of his own volition. But then, she'd discovered that many bounders did-perhaps because they'd never lived under the oppressive rule of the Horde. Many of them talked long, they talked often, and said nothing worth hearing at all.

With exceptions, of course. Scarsdale couched almost everything he said in humor, yet every word was sharp and only a fool refused to listen. Her a.s.sistant, Newberry, spoke only good, strong sense, and Mina often looked to Superintendent Hale's example as a model for her own career.

Yet even they had something in common with the others: Every bounder that Mina had ever met could tell the story of each ancestor who'd escaped to the New World before the Horde had infected England. The tales had been pa.s.sed along until they'd become family legends-the n.o.bles and the gentry almost always including descriptions of what they'd left behind and how much they'd spent for pa.s.sage across the Atlantic. Those bounders who were descended from laborers always mentioned which aristocratic or moneyed family they'd attached themselves to, and whether they begged, borrowed, or stowed away-or sold themselves into indentured servitude. Some were proud that their ancestors had been among the first to go, and spoke of them as if they'd descended from prescient deities. If their forefathers had been the last to sail, they invariably included a tale of a harrowing escape, as if the Horde had conquered England with their war machines instead of nanoagents concealed in sugar and tea.

Families like Mina's had stories of ancestors who'd remained in England. Two hundred and fifty years ago, William Wentworth, the fourth Earl of Rockingham, had stood in Parliament and named every n.o.ble who didn't stay to fight and to protect England, calling them all cowards. He'd stood in attendance when the Archbishop of Canterbury had placed the crown on Charles the Second's head after the old king had died-and who had been the last king whose reign hadn't fallen under Horde rule. Over the next half century, the Earl of Rockingham also witnessed the Horde darga coronate Charles's son, had seen his estate in Northampton seized and the remainder of his holdings slowly shaved away to pay the Horde's taxes, until the only property the Wentworths owned was the town house in London where Mina's parents lived now.

But the man who'd been on Mina's examination table that afternoon probably had no stories of ancestors to tell. Unlike the aristocracy and landed gentry, the commoners hadn't been given the privilege of keeping a family. Their children had been taken and raised in a creche, where they were trained for work and their bodies modified for the Horde's use. The next generation had been bred in the Frenzies that were induced by the Horde's radio signals-and the resulting generation also reared in a creche. The man on her table likely hadn't known who his father and mother were, let alone those who'd lived two hundred years ago.

Had the man lived, however, he would have had another story to carry on, a story shared by everyone in England: where he'd been the night the Iron Duke had sailed his pirate ship up the Thames and destroyed the Horde's tower. He could have told his children about the emotions that had flooded him when the radio signal the Horde used to prevent the strong, enhanced population from rebelling-suppressing their hate, their love, their fear-had suddenly stopped broadcasting. He'd have said how many of the Horde he'd bloodied in the revolution that followed, how many of their buildings he'd helped burn.

The Horde's holdings where Rhys's mansion sat now might have been one of them. Perhaps that man had helped rebuild part of London after the Horde had fled . . . but he would never say so, and Mina would never know that story now. She only knew that his lover had smashed his brains in.

"So that is why you are late," Rhys said softly-and with a hint of relief. He'd been thinking the worst, Mina realized. "You were doing another inspector's work."

Not exactly. Inspector Mason couldn't have performed the examination, but it needed to be done, so it became Mina's work. Yet Rhys wasn't wrong, either. The examination had added to her duties, and she had run late because of it.

"Yes," she said. "That and the horrid traffic on Viktrey Road."

"And your morning?" he asked. Just as Mina would have in his place, Rhys picked up on the part of the day she hadn't mentioned-and a.s.sumed she deliberately hadn't mentioned it.

"I survived it in one piece." Her eyes locked on his. "I caught a dockworker who strangled a boy. He got a blow in before Newberry took him down."

She saw the sudden tension in him, the way his gaze moved all over her, though he'd already looked her up and down when she'd come in, though he'd already watched her walk across the room without any lingering stiffness. Many dockworkers had been augmented with pneumatic pistons in their shoulders and steel arms, increasing their strength. Rhys would know that any blow a dockworker laid on her wouldn't have been a light one.

"Are you all right?"

"Yes," she a.s.sured him.

That rea.s.surance wasn't enough, she knew. If Scarsdale hadn't been here, she'd have been stretched out on this sofa within a few seconds, naked as Rhys looked her over-then holding him as he s.h.a.gged her, hard and fast.

As much as she enjoyed Scarsdale's company, there were times when Mina wished the bounder wasn't here so often. She saw the same thought enter Rhys's mind, the humor that lifted the corners of his mouth.

But despite that smile, his tension didn't leave, and a small heavy weight settled in her gut. That worry couldn't just be about her injury. He knew she wasn't hurt. This fear had to be based on something more . . . and it appeared too often.

Sometimes she thought Rhys wasn't adjusting to marriage as well as she was.

Ignoring that ache, she looked to Scarsdale. "And did you tackle any dockworkers today?"

"Unfortunately, no. Not while I'm still searching for a wife."

He'd been searching for months-but eventually, Mina knew he'd stop looking and choose a woman to marry, even if he was never physically attracted to her. Scarsdale felt his responsibility as a future marquess too keenly to ignore his duties . . . but he'd keep on running for a while longer. Mina hoped he found someone who could be a companion to him, even if they didn't share a pa.s.sionate love.

Dear heavens, she'd been so very lucky, hadn't she?

She looked to Rhys. With a single glance, she'd already seen how he'd spent part of his day-his valet had obviously forced him to sit still long enough for a trim. Mina would thank the man later. As much as she loved to sink her fingers into Rhys's dark, overlong hair, she loved even more seeing those small gold hoops at the tops of his ears and the strong line at the back of his neck. "And you, sir?"

"I wish I could have tackled a dockworker-and I've already found my wife."

He surprised her. Though he never made many jokes, his humor came more often and more easily than it once had. "So you have. Picked her right out of Anglesey Square."

And thank the heavens for that, for his stubbornness that matched hers. While she'd been sitting alone at the feet of his statue, he'd come to her, insisting that they would be together, despite her protests and her certainty that he no longer wanted her. How long ago that seemed now-the pain of not being with him, of thinking that he was done with her. Whatever small doubts and aches still lingered, they were nothing compared to that agony.

"Yes, he has a wife to tackle dockworkers for us," Scarsdale said. "So we have spent the better part of a day trying to put together an expedition to search for a lost ship in the Arctic, and offering absurd amounts of money for a Vashon to lead it."

The famous family of airship captains. "Will you get him?"

"Her," Rhys said. "And, yes. I want her, so I'll have her."

Of course he would say that. He hadn't bought Mina, but the Iron Duke was still so certain that he could buy everyone else. Mina didn't think she was the only exception . . . but there were apparently so few exceptions that his usual methods still worked.

She smiled faintly. "Hopefully you won't convince her as you did me."

Oh. And that had not come out as lightly as she'd intended it. All remaining traces of humor left Rhys's face, drawing his skin tight. Her heart pounded.

"No," he said. His voice was gruff, as if rasped by smoke. "No, I wouldn't."

"Partially because Captain Vashon has enough years on her to be his grandmother," Scarsdale said easily, as if he didn't notice Rhys's tension-but of course he did. He always did. He knew Rhys well.

He knew Rhys so well-and perhaps that was why Mina was afraid to ask Scarsdale about certain things, fearful of what the answer might be. Perhaps he'd tell her that Rhys's fierce lovemaking wasn't just because she'd been injured, but because he was driven now and again by the same need that had driven him before: to possess her. But he had her now . . . and Mina was a liar if she didn't sometimes wonder whether he felt his pursuit had been more satisfying than the having.

He loved her. She knew that. But maybe he didn't love her more than he had eight months ago. He'd asked her to fight with him . . . but maybe he was fighting to stay excited, fighting to keep his desire for her alive.

The sick ball in her stomach became heavier. She needed him, needed to feel him against her, inside her. Now. Rising to her feet, she said, "Excuse me. I can still smell the slums on me, so I ought to change out of this uniform before dinner. I'll return in a moment."

Mina knew Rhys would follow her. That tension meant he'd devour her. She needed that at this moment, more than anything-the rea.s.surance of his touch, of his kiss, of his need.

She almost ran into Mrs. Lavery outside the door. The housekeeper held a folded gram, her blue eyes wide and worried.

"A wiregram from Superintendent Hale, Your Grace."

Likely a murder, then-one that the superintendent wanted Mina to handle, since she was being summoned after her shift had ended. d.a.m.n it. Mina unfolded the message, hoping she was wrong.

Viscount Redditch. By the heavens. She and Rhys had just eaten dinner with him the evening before.

She looked to Rhys, who'd come into the hall after her. "It's Redditch. He's been killed."

Surprise pa.s.sed over his expression. "Where is he?"

"His garden. In Westminster." On the other side of London.

"Ask Mr. Muller to ready the two-seater," he told Mrs. Lavery before catching Mina's hand in his. "The balloon will be faster than the river or the roads. Do you want me to fly you there?"

It wasn't the sort of time alone with him that she'd hoped for, but Mina would take it. "Yes."

Chapter 2.