A Rip in Time (Out of Time #7) (8 page)

Victor would leave first and find a spot on the east side of Buck’s Row. She and Simon would follow a few minutes later and come up the opposite end of Buck’s Row. Between them, they’d see something.

It was a good plan, but that didn’t comfort Elizabeth and a chill ran through her.
 

Simon looked down at her. “All right?”

She shrugged and Simon nodded in understanding before winding her arm through his and setting them off back down Brick Lane.

In the half hour they’d spent in the pub, the streets had all but emptied. A few men slept in doorways. The only other signs of life were muted voices that could be heard behind the painted glass of the pubs they passed.

The path to Buck’s Row was a simple one with few turns. As they made the first, Elizabeth heard footsteps behind them. It was probably just another pair of men searching for the next pub, but the echoing footfalls in the quiet darkness were unnerving. She felt Simon tense and he hurried their steps.

They’d just passed through the halo of one gas lamp and into the next stretch of darkness when two men stepped out of the shadows of a doorway and into the empty street.

“Just keep walking,” Simon said softly.

She kept her head down, but her eyes up as they drew closer to the pair. They’d almost passed them when the men stepped in their way. Elizabeth’s heart stuttered.

“What’s your hurry?” one said.

Simon tried to guide her off the curb, but the other stepped that way to block them.

“You ain’t even sayin’ hello?” the skinnier of the two said with a broad smile that revealed two missing teeth.

“We don’t want any trouble,” Simon said, managing to keep his upper class accent under wraps.

The skinny one laughed and elbowed his friend. “He don’t want no trouble?”

The other one laughed and then abruptly added, “I’m afraid you’ve found it, mate.”

The sneer on his face made Elizabeth’s blood run cold. These were men who enjoyed the sport of terrorizing people and didn’t have anything to lose.

Simon led Elizabeth across the street and up another, but she could hear the two following behind. They’d barely gone half a block when two more men appeared in silhouette ahead of them. She could see the dark outlines of clubs in their hands.

She and Simon stopped abruptly. Her heart raced. They were trapped between the two pairs now.
 

Simon pulled her close to him, and she could feel his heart beating against his chest. She gripped his right arm more tightly. She saw his left hand dip into his pocket. He had a gun, but with four of them….

“You know where you are?” one of the first two men said from close behind them.
 

She and Simon spun around. The first two were nearly on top of them and she could hear the others drawing nearer.

Elizabeth looked around quickly. The buildings on either side of them were dark. She thought about calling for help, but it would surely set the men off, and she had a sinking feeling no one would come to their aid anyway.
 

One of the men waved his arms expansively. “All this belongs to me, see?” he said. “And you ain’t got my permission to be here.”

“Doubles the price, ya see,” one of the new men said, as he took out a large knife from his waistband. The long blade glinted in the gaslight.

Simon held up one hand. “This is all I’ve got,” he said as he dug into his pants pocket and pulled out a small handful of coins.

One of the men, he seemed to be the leader, took a step forward. He looked at the coins and then toward Elizabeth and back to Simon. His smile was thin.

“That’s not all you have.”

A jolt of fear rushed through her, knowing where this was probably headed, but she kept still.

“Take the money,” Simon said with surprising calm.
 

The leader’s eyebrows shot up in amusement. “Oh, I will. And your lady.”

He nodded toward Elizabeth and one of the men grabbed her from behind.
 

He spun her around, but out of the corner of her eye, Elizabeth saw Simon start to pull out his gun. The moment he turned, one of the men brought down his club against Simon’s arm. He cried out as it crashed into his hand, knocking the gun to the ground.

The other man scrambled to pick it up.

Simon clutched at his hand and one of the men twisted him around and punched him square on the jaw. Elizabeth winced as the she heard his knuckles connect with bone.

“Simon!”

The blow left him wobbly and the man wasted no time. He delivered two swift, powerful blows to Simon’s midsection making him crumple to his knees.

Elizabeth struggled against the man that held her and called out to him.

Simon hunched forward, gasping for breath. One of the men rifled through his pockets and pulled out the watch. He whistled, impressed, and held it up to show the boss.

He stood and gave it to the leader, who practically purred. “Now what do we have here?”

“And this,” the one with the gun said, as he gave it to the leader.

The leader admired them both and walked casually over to Simon who was still bent forward, his head hanging down.
 

“Hmm?” the man said.

Simon didn’t respond and the man lifted his foot to shove him to the ground with it. It was an unfortunate miscalculation on his part as Simon quickly reached out and grabbed the man’s leg and twisted. The man flipped up in the air and to the ground with a thud. Simon was on top of him before he or the others knew what had happened.
 

One quick punch to man’s jaw and then Simon struggled to find the gun. By some miracle, he did. He cocked it and pushed it against the leader’s throat just before his men could react.

The leader lifted up one hand to stop his men.

“Let my wife go,” Simon said, as he knelt on the man’s chest, holding the gun, pushing even further into his skin.

The leader, his lip split and blood trickling out from the cut, smiled. “Maybe I’ll just have Len gut her first.”

Elizabeth felt the tip of a knife press against her ribs. Worse yet, she felt the momentary panic of knowing their one chance had just gone up in smoke.

Simon turned and his face, wild with anger, fell. His eyes caught hers and the pain and apology in them was almost too much.

He looked down, defeated, and moved the gun away from the man’s throat. One of the thugs grabbed it from him and another lifted him off the leader, who stood and brushed off his pant’s legs and straightened his jacket. He looked at Simon once then back to Elizabeth.

“Do it.”

Elizabeth struggled in the man’s grip, desperate to twist out of it.

“No!” Simon lunged forward, but one of the men hit him hard in the stomach again with one of the clubs. He doubled over and the man lifted his club to bring it down against Simon’s skull when Elizabeth heard a dull thud.
 

The man stopped in mid-swing, seemingly frozen, until his eyes rolled back in his head and he fell to the ground unconscious. Behind him stood Victor, a scarf covering his face and a lead pipe in his hand.

Another of the men charged him, but it was a man against boys. Victor dodged the man’s awkward attack and swung his pipe against the man’s back. He grunted in pain. Victor spun around and swept the pipe at knee level. The sound of bones cracking rang out in the small street. The man cried out in agony and fell to the ground.
 

The leader took out his knife and started toward Victor.

Elizabeth called out to warn him.

Victor spun around and in the same movement, reached into his jacket and pulled out a knife. It flew across the alley and embedded itself in the leader’s chest.

The man looked down at it, stunned. Victor strode over to him. He pulled the knife out and the man gasped. He finished him off with one, sharp punch.
 

The man who held Elizabeth didn’t dare let go to help his friends, and pressed the knife harder against her ribs. “Hey!” he called out. “I’ll gut her.”

Victor turned slowly and wiped his knife off on his leg. Slowly, he shook his head.

Elizabeth could hear the man’s breath coming hard and fast. “I will.”

“No,” Simon said, from behind them both. “You won’t.”

She heard the man holding her swallow hard and then his grip loosened. Elizabeth slipped out of it and turned back to see Simon holding a knife to her captor’s throat.

Carefully, Simon eased around so he was in front of the man and shifted the knife to his off-hand.
 

“Are you all right?” he asked her, but kept his eyes on the man.

Elizabeth let out a shaky breath. “I’m fine.”

“Then it’s your lucky day,” Simon said to the thug.

The man narrowed his eyes in confusion. Simon lunged forward and punched him hard in the gut and then delivered a jaw-breaking uppercut as the man doubled over. Simon grabbed him by the collar to keep him from falling and hit him once more. The man was unconscious before he hit the ground.

Panting, Simon turned back to Elizabeth and Victor. He closed the gap between him and Elizabeth, and looked her over for injuries before turning to Victor.

“How did you know?” he asked.

Elizabeth knelt down and grabbed Simon’s watch from the leader’s pocket.

 
Victor picked up the gun and handed it back to him and then nodded toward the far street. They started toward it leaving the pile of injured men behind in the muck.
 

“I passed those two up on Montague, looking for trouble,” Victor said quietly as he tugged down his scarf so that it now rested around his neck. “I was nearly there when I doubled back. I had a feeling you two would be trouble tonight.”

And thank goodness for that, Elizabeth thought, ignoring the slight. “Thank you.”

“Yes,” Simon said. Elizabeth heard the pain in his voice. He probably had broken ribs, but she could see from the look on his face he wasn’t going to relent now.

Victor grunted in reply and took out his watch. “3:25.”

He snapped it shut and the three of them hurried down the street toward Buck’s Row, hoping they weren’t too late.

T
HEY
TURNED
UP
A
little street called Whites Row and Elizabeth could see the street widening ahead into a V-shape with a wedge of tenement buildings dividing it in two. On the right was the narrow little Winthrop Street and on the left was Buck’s Row.

They hurried along until Victor held up a hand to stop them and motioned for them to move into a side street to the left. With her heart in her throat, Elizabeth pressed her body up against one of the buildings and hid in the shadows. In the darkness next to her, Simon groaned softly, his breath shallow and labored.
 

Elizabeth was about to reach out a comforting hand when she heard footfalls echoing not too far away and froze.

At the mouth of the side street she watched the faint glow of a lantern as it moved up and down with the natural gate of a man walking. Her heart beat a little faster. Whoever he was, he was getting closer.

Victor held out his arm, waving it urgently back toward the building. The three of them melted back into a brick arched doorway. Elizabeth could just see the silhouette of the man as he reached the intersection—a police constable, his bulls-eye lantern casting a broad beam of light in the night. She pressed herself as far back into the cold bricks as she could and held her breath.
 

The beam of the PC’s lantern swept past within inches of their hiding place. Thankfully, he didn’t turn up their street and he didn’t linger. He kept walking up Buck’s Row.
 

The footsteps got farther and farther away. Finally, Victor, who was closest to the corner, inched forward toward the edge of the building. He peered out for a moment and then leaned back against the wall, tilting his head back and shaking it.
 

“Damn,” he said so softly she almost didn’t hear him.
 

Having to see for herself, Elizabeth edged forward and peered around the building. She could see the officer in the dim light as he veered to the left and Buck’s Row. Then he stopped, the beam of his light frozen in place for a moment, and then he ran across the street toward something, his footsteps loud against the cobblestones.
 

In the street ahead, Elizabeth watched as he shined his light down on what looked to be a pile of rags. Her stomach fell with the realization. It was Mary Ann Nichols.
 

Elizabeth stifled a gasp and looked up at Simon. Even in the darkness she could see his anger and disgust, and more than a little sadness.
 

She scanned the streets near them, searching for someone lurking in the shadows, some hint of something, anything, but the streets were empty.

Jack the Ripper was gone.

~~~

Victor silently fumed as they walked the streets around Buck’s Row looking for something that might lead them to Jack the Ripper. If it hadn’t been for the Crosses, he would have been there on time. He would have seen him and this folly wouldn’t be necessary.
 

He sighed and took off his scarf, tossing it into an alley. He would probably have to get rid of his jacket as well. The gang members would be out of commission for some time, but they had friends, and friends talked. The last thing he needed was a group of idiot thieves mucking up his mission.

He glared over at the Crosses. Their inexperience had nearly cost them their lives. But he had to admit, Cross had acquitted himself fairly well, considering, and Elizabeth showed more mettle than he had expected. That, however, didn’t change the fact that they were liabilities. Especially, he chided himself, if he kept letting his emotions get the better of him.

Victor grunted.

“Are you okay?” Elizabeth asked him.

He frowned at her, but a memory of another woman who once looked at him in the same sincere and guileless way pushed itself into his mind. With another grunt, he shoved the image back down into the past where it belonged.