Joanna Bourne - The Black Hawk

“It is the same thing.”

THE HEAD OF THE BRITISH INTELLIGENCE SERVICE sounded like a powerful man. Anybody’d think he’d be able to tell Justine DuMotier to go upstairs and sleep for the afternoon. Not so.

She sat beside him in the coach and lifted the edge of the curtain to peer out the window. “I hate carriages,” she said. A line of bright light painted itself across her face and down her body. A thin triangle of street showed, going by. “They are traps. One might as well pin a target on the chest and be done with it. A carriage is the worst place to be if someone wants to kill you.”

He made a two-finger width, opening his own curtain. “Maybe they’re tired of trying to kill you. Maybe they’ll kill Pax for a change. Or me.”

“That is unduly optimistic.” She went back to being suspicious of the pedestrians.

Pax sat forward, across from them, one pistol on the seat beside him and another in his lap. He was still loading the second, polishing the frizzen and pan with a clean handkerchief, taking off the last film of damp before he poured in the powder.

Owl was right. A coach was a moving target, easy to follow, easy to hit. Every street was an ambush about to happen. The wood and leather on the sides of a coach weren’t any use. They might as well have been riding around in a paper sack.

Because he had never learned not to argue with this woman, he pointed out, “You were safe at Meeks Street.”

“I am safe at home.”

“If you would give me a damn week to find out who’s behind this, we might avoid getting anybody killed. And you could let your bloody arm heal.”

“My apartment is secure. Mr. Thompson and Mr. Chetri will sleep in the shop. Séverine will spend the nights with me, and she is protective as a mother tiger. She is also a very good shot. The crown jewels are more carelessly protected. ’Awker, we do not know anyone is after me at all. I was not attacked until I came to see you.”

“Oh, you’re part of it, all right.” He knew better than to keep arguing. He never won an argument with Owl. “Your knives from your shop. Your stab wound. Your blood all over the streets of London.”

“You exaggerate, as always.”

“I’ll station a man in the alley at the back. And I’m staying with you.”

She didn’t answer. She did that trick where she raised one eyebrow and looked superior.

He was wondering whether staying with her in the apartment meant he’d get to go to bed with her. It was too soon, probably. Almost certainly. He was playing the old friend card now. Sneaking up on her, like. He’d put his arm across the back of the coach seat and waited till the coach jolted hard to let it settle down on her shoulders.

An old friend could put an arm around another old friend.

Besides, if she had Sévie with her in the apartment, she wouldn’t be getting into bed with him. Looked like he’d be sleeping on a patch of floor in front of her door. Like Muffin.

That was a humiliating comparison. On the other hand, Muffin had spent most of lunchtime with his head in her lap, which was not a bad place to be.

Another long delay on the street while some ham-handed squire from the country got his wheels unlocked from another carriage. Then they turned the corner, onto Exeter. Pax, hands steady as rock, tapped a nicely graded quantity of powder into the pan.

Nobody followed them on foot down Exeter Street. Didn’t seem to be any carriages or wagons making the same turn.

When the coach slowed down, coming up outside the shop, nobody took any notice. As far as he could see, there was nothing moving in the buildings across the way. He had a clear, bright view. The rain had washed all the soot out of the air. It was sunny now, and not too hot. Couldn’t be a nicer day for doing this damned stupidity.

Pax said, “I’ll be back.” Before the coach stopped, Pax opened the door, swung down, dodged an oncoming horse, and crossed the street. He lounged his way up the row of houses and shops, blending in, his hand in his pocket keeping company with the gun. He turned the corner and disappeared.

Owl frowned at the shop front of Voyages. Maybe even the shimmering clean glass wasn’t clean enough for her. She was probably hurting. There was just no way a man could protect and coddle a woman like Owl. Pointless to try.

He pushed past her, opened the coach door, and kicked the step down.

One old idiot in a dove gray jacket and maroon vest toddled past the shop, rubbing his nose like he was exploring someplace interesting and foreign. That was not an assassin. Left of Voyages the shop that sold travel books and botanical prints was empty. Beyond that, the milliner’s and the watchmaker were open for business, but also quiet. On the right hand, the confectioner’s had two women inside. They didn’t look immediately dangerous.

He stepped down to the pavement. Took in every twitch of movement along the street. Stillwater, a good man, was driving the hackney and also keeping an eye out.

Inside Voyages, Thompson had seen them. He started down the length of the counter, headed out to meet them. Two customers were absorbed in something exotic and expeditionary laid out on a table. One woman left the confectioner’s, turning to walk in the opposite direction.

Owl held the sides of the doorframe to take the first step down, because she needed the support and shouldn’t have been running around in coaches at this stage in the recovery period from getting stabbed, for God’s sake. Stubborn as a mule. Anybody else would . . . But if she was anybody else, he wouldn’t give a hang about her.

He picked her up and put her on her feet. Flipped the step up and slapped the door closed. The hackney rolled away. “Let’s go. Off the street. Into the shop.” This open space grated on his nerves. He wished he could be on all sides of her.

“We are in equal danger, you and I. But it is a sensible suggesti—”

He heard the shot. Heard the thud of lead hitting wood.

He ducked. Owl was down, face to the pavement, scrambling toward the shop. He crowded so he was half on top of her and pushed her ahead of him to the door.

No one in sight. That was rifle fire. No cover anywhere. Some idiot came out of the bookshop to peer around.

“Get the hell back inside.”

Owl pushed the door to her shop open and threw herself in. He followed.

The three men in the shop were all on the floor. He lifted himself up off Owl enough to roll her over and have a look at her. “You’re not hit anywhere.”

“Of course I am not hit. If I were hit I would be bleeding.”

Oh, that’s useful to know, that is. Across the street all the windows were open. The sniper was in one of them. No movement. No sign. Look for it . . . Look for it . . . There. Ten yards to the left, two floors up. A puff of smoke was just now drifting out the window into the street.

Owl was looking over his shoulder. Saw the same thing. “Go. Go out the back way and around. Do not waste this.”

“Oh, hell. You did this on purpose.” Bait. She’d set herself up as bait. Damn the woman. Damn him for a fool, not seeing it.

“Go. Now is the time to catch him. Go and be careful with yourself.”

“Right.” He kissed her hard on the lips and unglued himself from the most beautiful woman in London and went to find out who was trying to kill her.

THE house where the sniper had been had one of those doors you could just kick down if you hit it right. The hall was filled with squawking tenants who wanted to get in his way. The room on the top floor was left with the door swinging. It was empty except for a pair of chairs, a table under the window, a Baker rifle left lying on it, and the smell of black powder.

Outside, the street was full of gawkers and talkers. Some of them were inspecting a bullet hole in the wood framing of the bookshop’s window. Pax was doubled over, propped on the wall next to Voyages. Not hurt. Just out of breath. No prisoner with him. Pax said, “Was anyone hit?”

He shook his head.

“Good.” A couple deep breaths. “I lost the sniper.” Pax wiped his mouth. “I saw her face.”

“A woman?”

“Thin. Very pretty. Light hair.” Pax’s eyes cut in and out through the crowd around them. Always the chance there was another killer on the job. “I chased her to Gorton Street and lost her. She faded into the crowd. Lots of practice. Lots of skill. Professional.”

“Which way?”

“Headed toward Piccadilly. Hawk, I know who she is.” This might be the end of it. This might be the answer. He didn’t take his eyes off the hands and arms and faces around them. “Who?”

“You know her too. Think back. Paris. End of the Terror. The Coach House. We took Cachés out of there.”

“Ten of them. Four girls. Last I heard they were married and raising kids. They didn’t take the mail coach down to London to shoot at us.”

Pax shook his head. “Not the ones we rescued. We left one girl behind. Remember? Scrawny girl with straw-colored hair.”

Some moments from that night were starkly clear. Not that girl’s face, though. She’d been a shadow, off in a corner, away from the lantern. “It was dark. You were the one arguing with her.”

“I had a good look. Justine probably saw her through field glasses back when she was reconnoitering the Coach House. When we get back to Meeks Street, I’ll draw you a picture.”

IT TOOK ONLY A MOMENT TO BE SHOT AT. IT TOOK hours to deal with Bow Street.

The watchman from the end of Exeter Street must come to bustle about like a chicken. Then those most closely concerned—she and Hawker and an officious old man who had been passing on the pavement—must go to Bow Street. A report must be taken. Lengthily and in detail. She must ceremoniously meet Sir Nathaniel Conant, the magistrate, who was apparently a great friend of Hawker. Then a Runner and a subsidiary youth, whose job it was to nod at intervals, must return with her to her to her shop to inspect the bullet lodged in the wall and dig it out and discover that nothing whatsoever could be determined except that it had not hit her.