Chapter Nine

J osef had been expecting a faceless government building, or perhaps sinister army barracks. Certainly, an interrogation room. It was a surprise, then, when Alex parked outside the giant and rather ugly Queen Anne’s Mansions in Westminster, opposite St James’s Park.

“I’ll walk from here,” Dutta said, climbing out of the car. He rolled his right shoulder as if perhaps he was stiffening up after the fight. If so, Josef knew how he felt—which was about 110 years old. He staggered out of the back of Alex’s motor, grimacing. Throbbing head aside, his bruised back was killing him. And his neck, where the creature—man?—had tried—

No, he wasn’t thinking about that.

Meanwhile, Alex was speaking to Dutta in the low, familiar tone of long acquaintance. “Tell Saint I’ll be there in the morning with a report.”

A pause followed, and then Dutta spoke in another language. Impossible for Josef to know what he said, but he sounded serious and sent a couple of significant glances in Josef’s direction while he spoke. If Josef had had to guess, he’d have said Dutta was issuing a warning. Be careful of this one . What a joke! The only one in danger here was Josef.

Alex replied curtly, in the same language, but then, perhaps without realising, slipped into English at the end. “…and I know what I’m doing.”

Dutta cocked his head. “That’s what you always say.” With that, he touched his forehead in a casual salute and loped away into the night.

Alex watched him go, lost in thought.

“You’re friends?” Josef asked. “Or is he your superior officer?”

That made Alex laugh, and he was still smiling when he turned back around. “A little of both, perhaps. We’ve known each other since Cambridge and spent a couple of years working together in Ambala. In the Punjab.”

“For the Intelligence Corps?”

“No.” He gestured for Josef to proceed him into the building. “As I’ve told you, repeatedly, I don’t work for the Intelligence Corps.”

“Well, you would say that.”

Alex huffed a laugh. “One day you’ll believe me.”

“That’ll be the day you give me a plausible alternative, Captain Winchester .”

Alex didn’t reply, but Josef saw an amused glint in his eyes that made his heart jump infuriatingly. For God’s sake, the man had practically kidnapped him at gunpoint.

They were met in the foyer by a concierge who tipped his hat and said, “Good evening, my lord.” His gaze alighted on Josef in his shabby coat and flat cap, more dishevelled than usual after this evening’s events. He probably had blood on his collar.

“All right?” Josef said, injecting as much Spitalfields as possible into his accent.

“Sir.” No inflection whatsoever in the concierge’s voice. Perhaps he was used to Alex bringing home rough young men for the evening?

The thought didn’t sit well, for reasons Josef chose not to consider.

“I’m on the fourth floor,” Alex said, striding across the foyer toward a bank of lifts.

Josef followed, gazing around at the elegantly dressed men and women coming and going. He’d never been inside one before, but these modern mansion flats were all the rage among a certain class of toff. Half hotel, half lodging house, the place came with an army of servants to pamper its residents and, no doubt, all sorts of modern conveniences.

The only convenience Josef wanted as he stood in the lift was somewhere to lie down. As his tension subsided, his headache grew more severe, thumping in the back of his skull.

The lift slowed to a stop, and he felt Alex’s hand on his arm. “Here we are.”

Josef blinked open his eyes; he didn’t remember closing them.

One hand keeping a firm grip on his bicep, Alex marched him out of the lift and down a short hallway to a door that he unlocked. It led into…well, had he been in less pain, Josef might have whistled in astonishment. As it was, he had a brief glimpse of opulence before Alex steered him toward a large bathroom. “Sit,” he said.

Josef sat, knees folding as he collapsed onto the wicker chair in the corner. Half his brain thought ‘fancy having a bathroom big enough for a chair’. The other half shut down, and he slumped forward, face in his hands, and concentrated on quelling the pain.

A gurgle of pipes and the splash of running water roused him, and he lifted one eyelid to see Alex leaning over the bath, testing the temperature of the water coming out of the taps.

Odd.

As he watched, Alex straightened and turned around, drying his hands on a fluffy towel. “Right,” he said, with the air of a man meeting a challenge. “Let’s have a look at you.”

Josef said, “You are a doctor then?”

“Let’s just say I’ve had some experience in field medicine.” Which, like most of Alex’s answers, was hardly an answer at all. He crouched down in front of Josef, took his face in both hands, and examined his eyes. Warm hands, large and comforting. Which was ridiculous, all things considered. But this close, Josef could see a livid bruise rising along Alex’s jaw and a raw scrape over his high cheekbone. They made him more real, somehow, tarnishing his patrician polish. And it was impossible not to notice the flecks of green in his dark blue eyes. Or the fact that they were…gazing at each other.

Alex seemed to notice at the same time and cleared his throat. “Good,” he said with a curt nod. Josef assumed that meant neither of his pupils were blown. Standing, Alex ran his fingers lightly through Josef’s hair to the back of his skull. “Lean forward,” he said quietly.

Josef leaned, refusing to acknowledge the electric sensation caused by Alex’s fingers in his hair.

“Well, you’ve got a lump the size of an egg back here, but the cut isn't deep, and it’s stopped bleeding. Devil of a headache, I imagine.”

“And how.”

“Possibly a trifle concussed.” Alex’s fingers lingered in Josef’s hair, and after a hesitation, he added, “I need to know if it bit you.”

Reluctantly, Josef sat up, dislodging Alex’s hands. “Tell me what it was.”

“Show me your neck first.”

Too tired to argue, Josef unbuttoned his collar and pulled it aside, tipping his head to let Alex see. He jumped when Alex’s warm fingers brushed his skin, probing into his hairline and down over his collarbone. Despite his aches and pains, Josef felt a powerful charge building inside his body. Entirely autonomic and completely beyond his conscious control. If Alex was the lightning, Josef was the copper wire electrified by his touch.

“Good,” Alex said again, stepping back. His voice was a little throaty. “Now, take off your clothes and get in the bath.”

Josef stared. “What?”

“I need to see—”

“You already saw.”

Delightfully, a flush crept across those refined features. “I need to ensure there are no bites.”

“It didn’t bite my prick. I’ll tell you that for nothing.”

A twitch of Alex’s mouth. “I need to see for myself. Not just your—” He gestured towards Alex’s groin. “I need to check everywhere. I’m sorry, but to do otherwise would be reckless.”

“I swear to fucking God,” Josef said as he began unbuttoning his waistcoat, “if you don’t tell me what the hell is going on, I’ll drown you in your own bloody bathtub.”

“I do understand your frustration,” Alex assured him. “And if I could say more—”

“Oh, you will say more.” Josef threw his coat and waistcoat onto the floor and started on his shirt buttons. “Because if you don’t, I’m printing this whole bloody story.”

“That would be unwise.”

Josef smiled, angrily. “Why? Because your friend will finish me off?”

“Because nobody would believe you.”

“They will when I publish the photographs.”

Alex stared, eyes suddenly very wide and dark. Behind him the bath continued to run, filling the air with fragrant steam. “What photographs?”

Ah, so that was interesting. Josef felt the power shift between them and stopped his angry disrobing, letting his shirt hang open. “That’s for me to know and you to find out when I publish them.”

“You can’t.”

“It’s a free country. Well, it used to be. But sod DORA—the people have a right to know.” He paused, made a show of consideration. “Unless, that is, you want to give me a good reason not to.”

Alex briefly closed his eyes. “Take off your clothes. I’m not doing anything until I’m certain you weren’t bitten.”

Although he was sure he’d have noticed if a chunk of him was missing, Josef hesitated before he carried on stripping. “What happens if I was?”

Alex looked grim, face colourless save the dark pits of his eyes. Eyes which flitted to the Webley now sitting atop a wicker laundry hamper.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“I think we’d know by now if you were…infected.”

“Would we? How?”

“You’d be dead. Or…worse.”

There are worse things than death.

Josef had a vivid memory of Alex saying those precise words as he’d gazed down at the boy who’d breathed his last that morning in the dressing station. They took on a horrifying new meaning now.

In silence, Josef pulled off his shirt and sat to unlace his boots. They were filthy. He and Alex had both tramped dirt all the way through his fancy flat. Should have taken them off at the door instead of creating more work for the maids, not that Alex would ever consider the maids. His sort never did. Josef tugged off his boots, saw his big toe sticking through the end of his sock—he kept meaning to darn it—and glared up at Alex, daring him to judge. Alex watched him with that same stony expression, face like marble. No sign he was enjoying this humiliation, at least.

Josef wasn’t shy about nakedness. True, he was scrawny and rather underfed, but after spending ten months at the front, he wasn’t shy about anything. Besides, he swam—and did other things—in the bathhouse on a semi-regular basis. But under Alex’s stern observation he was irritated to discover that he did feel self-conscious. Perhaps because, last time he’d been naked with the man, circumstances had been so very different. But, like most things in his life, he brazened his way through the discomfort. When he was down to his underwear, he got to his feet. “You really think he bit me on the arse?”

“I just have to see for myself.”

“I bet that’s what you tell all the boys,” Josef said, unbuttoning his underwear and letting it slide down until he was stark bollock naked. “Want me to do a twirl?”

Alex drew closer, eyes running over Josef’s body. A clinical examination, nothing intimate at all, as he circled him. At least, that was how it began. But when Alex walked behind him, Josef felt a gentle touch on his back, fingertips tracing down his spine. “You’re bruised here.”

Goosebumps rose across his skin, coaxed out by that soft touch. Naked as he was, his physical reaction was painfully obvious. Cursing silently, Josef closed his eyes and willed his prick to behave. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

No immediate answer, but Alex’s hand didn’t leave his back. After a silence filled only by the slow running of the bath, Alex said, “I wish you’d taken my advice and left this alone.”

“I bet you do.”

“For your sake, not mine.”

Josef felt a different kind of goose bumps, and he tensed. “That sounds like a threat, Captain Winchester.”

“It’s not. I…regret that you’ve been hurt, that’s all. And I’m afraid you’ll be hurt again, or worse, before this is over.”

“And why should you care about that?”

A huff of self-mocking laughter and Alex’s hand withdrew. “A very good question to which I have no satisfactory answer.”

“You don’t have any satisfactory answers,” Josef pointed out, turning around. He found Alex watching him, his once-ashy face now warm. Flushed. Their eyes met, locking in a complex tangle of desire and distrust. Despite his accelerating pulse, Josef made himself say, “I’m deadly serious. If you don’t tell me the truth about what the hell’s going on, I’m taking this straight to my editor.”

After a considering pause, Alex said, “Has it ever occurred to you that you might not want to know the truth?”

“Like a child, you mean, protected from a harsh world by his elders and betters? No, it bloody well hasn’t occurred to me. Ignorance is not bliss, Alex. Ignorance is a prison.”

Shaking his head, Alex looked away. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“If I don’t, it’s because your lot think the likes of me don’t deserve to know the truth—”

“Deserve?” He scrubbed a hand through his hair, leaving it even more dishevelled. “Christ, do you think it’s a privilege ?”

“Of course it bloody well is! And the only reason you can’t see it is because you’ve enjoyed that privilege your whole sodding life.”

Alex opened his mouth on a retort, then snapped it shut so hard Josef heard his teeth click. After a pause, in a more moderate tone, he said, “Take a bath. I’ll have your clothes laundered; they stink of—of the sewer.” He grimaced, glancing down at himself. “As do I.”

He headed for the door, but Josef grabbed his wrist and stopped him. “You have to tell me. And no more lies—”

“All right!” Alex yanked his arm away, retreating a step. “If that’s what you want, I’ll tell you. But I’m warning you, Shepel, there’s no coming back from this. Once you know, you know. And you may live to regret that choice.”

With that, he stalked out of the bathroom, steam billowing out after him and the cool air from the rest of the flat chilling Josef’s bare skin.

***

Despite the strangeness of the situation, the luxurious bath was incredible—scented with flowers, and hot enough to turn him pink all over—and went a long way to easing Josef’s bruised body and aching head.

At one point, while he lay up to his neck in water, Alex returned with a large towel and a pile of clean clothes. He left them on the wicker chair, scooped up Alex’s filthy clothes, and disappeared without a word. Josef was somewhat surprised he didn’t have ‘a man’ to do such things for him. Then again, perhaps having naked socialists in your bathtub tended to cause gossip ‘Lord Beaumont’ would rather avoid.

He mulled on that title as he lay in the warm water, gazing up at the ceiling. The doorman had used it, and Alex appeared to live openly as Lord Beaumont. If he were a fake, surely the real Lord Beaumont would notice?

Which suggested that Captain Winchester had been the fake name. Fake rank too, which Josef was quite certain was the sort of offence that could get a man shot at dawn. If—when—he wrote this whole bizarre story up for the Clarion , he’d perhaps avoid mentioning Alex’s alias. After all, despite his highhanded arrogance, he had saved Josef’s life down in the sewer.

Even if his secrecy and scheming had caused Josef to risk it in the first place.

As the water cooled, Josef reluctantly climbed out of the bathtub and dried himself with the largest, softest towel he’d ever seen. It felt like a cloud wrapped around him. How the other half lived, eh?

At some point in his life, it might have felt a little odd, wearing another man’s underwear, but after the deprivations of the front, he barely gave that a second thought. Alex’s clothes—trousers, a striped shirt with no collar, and a heavy woollen cardigan—were a little large, but not ridiculously so, and Josef left the bathroom feeling a good deal better than when he’d entered. He found himself in a pleasant room, with expensive-looking furniture, a thick carpet, and soft gas lights on the modern mantel. A dining table stood at one end, close to the night-black window.

Alex was nowhere in sight, so Josef wandered over to the window, cupped his hands around his eyes, and peered out into the dark. The fog had thinned—or perhaps it was thinner this high up—and he could see London’s chimney pots and steeples poking up out of the mist, stretching away from them beneath a glitter of stars.

“The rent is cheaper up here,” Alex said from behind him. “People think there’s a fire risk, you see, but I took this one for the view. When it’s clear, you can see as far as Highgate.”

Josef turned from the window to find Alex on the other side of the room. Like him, his hair was wet, swept back neatly now, and he’d changed into clean clothes—a warm-looking roll-neck sweater and slim tweed trousers. He looked…good. Attractive. Appealing . Josef couldn’t suppress a pang of want, which was distracting and counterproductive. Ignoring it, he said, “I think I forgot to thank you and your friend for coming to my assistance tonight.”

“Not necessary.” Alex strolled towards a sideboard that was set beneath a large mirror on the long wall of the room. “Drink? I’ve a rather wider selection here than in Poperinge.”

“I’ll take a whisky if you have it, with a splash of water.”

“Of course.” Alex busied himself fetching glasses and pouring their drinks, keeping his back turned. Procrastinating. When he was done, he indicated the chairs before the fire, and they sat, nursing their drinks. The warmth from the blaze felt good on Josef’s feet, cosy in the warm wool socks Alex had given him. He was entirely too comfortable and was afraid that was the point, that he was being managed.

Lifting his drink, he said, “Thank you for saving my life. Now tell me what’s going on.”

Alex watched him in silence, firelight playing over his grave features. “If you leave now, your life will continue unaltered. Your world will continue unaltered. Nothing will change. If I tell you the truth, it will change everything.”

That, Josef suspected, was an attempt to frighten him. But what men like Lord Beaumont failed to understand was that men like Josef didn’t give a rat’s arse for continuity. Your world will go on unaltered? What use was that to him? The world was on fire, and he was happy to let it burn. Burn to the ground. From the ashes, they’d build a new world, a better world where men couldn’t be sent to war by governments they’d had no voice in electing. He was sick of this world, run by and for monied men who valued continuity over progress.

Leaning forward, elbows on knees, Josef said, “Changing the world is exactly what I intend to do, Lord Beaumont. So go on, change it for me.”

Their eyes locked in a push-pull of challenge and response. Alex bit lightly at his lower lip, a minor tell of vulnerability that spiked Josef’s pulse. Neither looked away, and, after a long pause, Alex said, “What attacked you in the tunnel this evening was not human.”

“Meaning what?” His mind grabbed at possibilities. “An animal? No, it looked like a man.” Not that he’d got a good look, but—

“It was a man, once, but it has been…altered.”

Josef frowned, shaking his head. “Explain. It’s an experiment? The government has…” Imagination faltered. “What?”

“The government has nothing to do with this.”

“Bollocks. You already admitted you work for the War Office.”

“Yes, well.” Alex hesitated. “That was an untruth, and I apologise. I don’t work for the War Office, or any branch of government. At least…” An odd smile touched his lips, secret and rueful. “Not this government. An…older one.”

“What? What the bloody hell does that mean?”

A shake of his head, as if trying to find words. “This is difficult. I’ve never had to explain—”

“Try.”

“I am .” His eyes flashed in irritation, and he took a sip of his whisky. “Very well. The creature you encountered tonight was what we call a ghoul.”

Josef stared. Alex stared back, his gaze steady. He didn’t appear to be laughing, which was strange because this was clearly some kind of fucking joke. “For God’s sake,” Josef growled. “Is that meant to be funny?”

“Not in the slightest.”

He shot to his feet, prowled to the sideboard, and set down his drink. “I don’t even know what to say to you. This is some posh-boy joke, is it? Let’s tell the oik it’s a fucking goblin?”

“Not a goblin, a ghoul. Goblins are different.”

“Oh, fuck off.”

“You asked for the truth.”

Anger surged, hot and wild. “This is not the fucking truth. It’s bollocks. Why are you trying to—?” He shook his head. “God, this is what you think of me, is it? That you can ridicule me, or fob me off with a load of old crap? Well sod you, Lord Beaumont. And expect to see your name in the fucking newspaper next to a picture of the dead men that…that thing, whatever it is, killed!” He stalked towards the door, his head thumping again. “Where are my fucking boots?”

“Josef, stop.” Alex was on his feet now. “Look, I know it’s difficult to believe, but you did ask—”

“It’s bollocks, is what it is. For God’s sake, you lying piece of shit, yesterday you told me it was an ‘infection’.”

Alex’s brow furrowed, embarrassed. “Yes. Well, I apologise for that dishonesty, but it was kindly meant. I was trying to protect you from—”

“For Christ’s sake! There’s a war on, man. Men are being slaughtered. The government is burning off their faces with mustard gas. Boys are dying in the mud screaming for their mothers. And you think—you think—” His voice hitched, rage choking him. “Is it all a joke to people like you?”

“Of course not, but this isn’t about the war. Rather, it is about the war to the extent that the death and horrorof it draws dark creatures—”

“Shut up!” Josef spat. “I don’t want to hear it. God, I thought—” What? That they were friends? Hardly. “I thought you had more respect for me than this.”

Fuck his boots. He’d leave barefoot rather than spend another minute in the company of this man. And he didn’t know why he was so furious, why his eyes burned hot and stinging, except that he’d thought there’d been a connection that night in Poperinge. He’d thought it had been a mutual, equal connection. But all along Alex had looked down that straight, aristocratic nose of his and seen Josef as just another one of the ignorant, unwashed labouring masses. Good enough to fuck and stupid enough to believe any old shit their masters fed them.

Well sod that. Sod that to hell and back.

“Josef, wait.” Alex followed him to the door. “Look, perhaps I could have broken this more gently. We don’t—that is, I’ve never had to explain it to an outsider before. It’s … not encouraged.” He gave a soft laugh. “To put it mildly.”

But Josef had had enough. “Keep it. I’m not interested in your lies.” He levelled a finger at Alex. “But I’m not letting this rest, Beaumont. I know what I saw tonight. I know what I saw at the front, and I’ve got the photographs to prove it. So tell your masters, whoever they are, that I’m on to them. I’ll find out what you bastards are up to, and I’ll blow it so wide open they’ll think a fucking mine went off under their arses.”

With that, he stalked to the front door and yanked it open.

He told himself the only thing he regretted leaving behind was his boots.