ChapterOne
THE BOWERY, NEW YORK CITY – OCTOBER, 1891
Noah Cheevers never let anything that he truly wanted go without a fight. That was why he’d dropped everything in London—his job, his membership in The Brotherhood, and all of his family connections and responsibilities—withdrew every shilling he had in the bank, and leapt on a ship crossing the Atlantic to New York City. His London friends had called it wickedly impulsive. His sister had wept and pleaded and suggested he employ a doctor to cure his head, silly thing. Noah listened to none of them, though.
Because Noah was in love. True love. The sort of love that bards composed sonnets about and sages studied as examples of everything love should be. Noah loved so deeply and so steadfastly that he had abandoned everything to rush to a new city, a new world, to track down his beloved, and at last, he’d found him.
Word throughout the Bowery was that Marcus Albright had taken up lodgings in the building that housed a particularly notorious nightclub, The Slippery Slope. Determined to carry out Love’s mission, Noah pulled open the door to the club and marched inside, like the conquering hero he knew he was, the morning after first scouting the place. As it happened, after the closure of The Slippery Slope’s rival club, The Slide, just a scant week or so before, The Slope was already buzzing with activity, even though it was barely nine in the morning.
Noah was a bit surprised that every eye in the place didn’t turn immediately to him as he stood triumphantly just inside the club’s doorway. One table in the far corner was occupied by five men who seemed to have set up some sort of business within the club. A few others ate simple breakfasts at some of the other tables while engaged in low, murmuring conversations. Still others sat at the bar, sipping coffee and reading the day’s newspapers, as though the establishment were a café instead of a seedy den of vice.
One man at the bar in particular caught his eye. Noah had met the dark-haired, handsome young man the night before, when he’d finally traced Marcus to the bosom of The Slippery Slope. Beckett Smith had been friendly and sympathetic to his cause when the two of them had spoken amidst the bustle and celebration of some sort of victory that the patrons of The Slope had won against a band of anarchists. It had been a delightful celebration, and Noah had gladly joined in. He was always up for a bit of fun.
But that was not why he was there at the club now.
With a swagger in his step and the exhilaration of romance beating in his blood, he approached the swarthy, middle-aged gentleman behind the bar—one of the owners of the club and the object of Beckett Smith’s unrequited affection, Mr. Graham Ravenswood.
“I have come for my love, Marcus Albright,” Noah announced in a rich tenor, worthy of the finest stages of Covent Garden. “Would you please have him fetched at once so that I can bring our love story to its climactic and satisfying conclusion?”
Ravenswood turned from where he’d been washing glasses to stare at him. Those who were sitting close enough to the bar to overhear went silent and gawped at him. Beckett Smith put his coffee down and sat suddenly straighter, eyes going wide.
Of all the times and circumstances for the patrons of the club to finally notice him, that was not one of the ones that Noah would have liked. Their stares were like sharp punctures in his confidence. They made whispers of doubt and the prickles of anxiety lash through him. They made the voices restless.
Noah pushed the horrific feeling of being pulled inside out away, standing taller and smiling as broadly as he could manage.
Ravenswood turned away from the back counter with a sigh and walked over to the bar, staring at Noah. “Marcus will come down when he comes down,” the man said. “And when he does, he will likely head straight to work. As should you, if you know what’s good for you.”
“I am not employed at present, sir,” Noah said, fighting to maintain his heroic demeanor in spite of the voices within him that whispered he was stupid and foolish, that Marcus would never want him back. He pushed his smile wider and said, “I am here on the business of true love.”
Beckett Smith twisted on his barstool to watch Noah with a surprised look. He then glanced to Ravenswood, as if to see what the man would do.
Ravenswood sighed. “I’m not sure what you hope to accomplish, sir,” he said, standing straight and frowning at Noah. “Marcus is together with Jasper now, Jasper Werther. They’re awfully happy.”
Noah had heard the same vicious lies the night before. He struggled not to deflate entirely. Marcus was his. The two of them were meant to be. Nothing could stand in the way of true love, not evenJasper Werther.
“I believe I have the prior claim,” he said, attempting to turn on the charm to win Ravenswood, and whoever else was listening, to his side. He moved to lean saucily against the bar and said, “Marcus and I have been living together for more than a year. We are one soul in two bodies.”
Ravenswood leaned against the other side of the bar in imitation of him. “Then why did Marcus show up in New York a few months ago, shack up with Jasper, and decide to build a life here with him instead of going back to London?”
Noah’s heart dropped, but he rushed to pick it up again and cling to his hope. “It was a misunderstanding,” he said. “Just a misunderstanding. All will be resolved, and our lives and love will be renewed. It will shine brighter than it ever has. It will—”
Noah’s words were cut off as Marcus himself stepped into the club from a small doorway against the back wall, just behind the bar. He was dressed in an ordinary business suit and already had his hat on, as if he were, indeed, on his way to work, as Ravenswood had said. The moment Marcus spotted Noah, he stumbled to a stop, and his face lit with excitement.
Or, well, if Noah were being truly honest with himself, the expression was more one of horror than excitement. But Noah was determined to change that entirely as soon as he could.
“Marcus!” he breathed out his lover’s name, his heart pounding furiously against his ribs. “Darling! I have found you at last!”
Noah pushed away from the bar, highly conscious of Ravenswood’s and Beckett’s and everyone else’s eyes on him, and raced to his beloved. He opened his arms to embrace his long-lost lover, but Marcus dodged him with a strangled sound of protest.
“Noah!” Marcus gasped. “What in God’s name are you doing here?”
Undeterred by Marcus’s slight, Noah declared, “I have come to win you back, my love.”
“You’ve…what?” Marcus balked, wide-eyed and open mouthed, all color draining from his face.
A second man stepped into the club from the back hallway. He was beautiful and svelte, with bright, cheerful eyes and just a touch of rouge on his lips. “Marcus, darling,” he said casually, “you forgot your—”
He stopped cold and stared at Noah as he came to a stop just behind Marcus’s shoulder.