Savage Wings: Book Three of The Whitechapel Chronicles

Chapter 40

Author's Note: Greetings gorgeous Chapelites, just a quick note to say a big thank you to my wonderful friends ScarletteDrake & Amy-Sharp this week - Scarlett for rescuing me from a plot hole so big that not even a 100-strong rescue team, a pack of sniffer dogs, 5 helicopters and Bear Grylls could have helped save me and Amy for persuading me that sometimes my ideas aren't quite as insane or ridiculous as my mind tries to convince me they are.

Thank you, Chapelites, as always for your patience, for reading and for being just bloody brilliant xxx

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"No offence, but you look bloody terrible."

And he did look terrible, like someone who hadn't known the joys of sleep for many moons, like someone who had witnessed the most awful of things and was changed irrevocably because of it. His eyes spoke of terrors unbridled and of pain undiminished.

"I guess death doesn't become us all," he said with a wry smile that softened the sharpness of his cheekbones and brought light to the darkness that lingered in his expression. His gaze flickered over me, prompting him to arch one dark brow. "You look ... different." He nodded to the glow emanating from my hands that had dimmed to the faint hum of fireflies on a summer's night.

"Oh yeah," I said self-consciously, clenching my fists as if it would douse the light. "I'm positively glowing, huh?"

He reached out with a hand that tremored weakly and hooked a lock of my hair behind my ear. "Well, I think it suits you. Like Dorothy when she found her ruby red slippers."

"Hmm, except this isn't Kansas and it sure as hell isn't Oz, either." I glanced around, hearing the anguished whispers pouring out of each painting, my eyes finally coming back to rest on him. There were so many things I wanted to say. So many things I wanted to ask. But I knew that now was not the time. Whatever he had known about Lucius' fate was not important right at that moment. He was here and that was all that mattered although I hated to see how haunted he looked. Hated the thought of him trapped in that painting, enduring an endless waking nightmare, to be used over and over again as a pawn against me.

"I'll make him pay, Garrick. For everything he did to you, I'll find a way to make him pay."

"Lucifer?" He shook his head. "Believe it or not, he never did a thing to me. At least, he never once raised a hand against me or hurt me in any way. In fact, the times he spoke to me, he was actually very ... courteous, for want of a better word. Always the perfect gentleman."

"You're kidding me, right?" Yet as soon as I said it, I really had no doubt that every word Garrick said was true. I suspected what Lucifer was capable of in how he dealt with his demons, but how he dealt with everyone else? Somehow it just didn't seem his thing to torture us, not physically anyhow.

"Mind games and temptation are where his skills lie," Garrick said, echoing my thoughts. "I honestly believe that he would have considered any personal acts of violence towards me to be very bad form." He perfected a posh English accent in clipped tones that brought a smile to my lips. "No," he continued. "Whenever he came here it was to debate, to discuss, to try to sway my mind with perfectly executed argument and persuasive rhetoric. Never to hurt me. He's quite the tormentor, a true master of his game, but he torments the mind and the soul, not the body. And he's quite the conversationalist."

"Careful, you sound as if you might even like him."

He laughed softly, but I could see a wariness in his face, something that told me he wasn't quite as comfortable talking about this as he seemed.