There was a long, dead silence.
Angelika glared at him. “Is that how you would have introduced me at the military academy ball?”
“Are you still angry about that? It was weeks ago.”
“Yes, I am angry that my brother refused to take me somewhere to dance with soldiers and to meet the new commander.” She put her hand on her hip. “It’s my fault I’m considered odd, and superior, and a bit witchy. It’s my fault I’m unmarried. But it’s your fault, too.”
Victor ran a hand through his famous honey-red hair; the same color as hers. “I accept that I could do more,” he conceded. “But I draw the line at country dances.”
“Lizzie will want to go to them.” Her brother’s betrothed was currently packing her belongings, in preparation for becoming Mrs. Frankenstein as soon as possible.
Victor smiled at the mention of Lizzie’s name. “Only she could drag me to one. Be proactive. Pick a chap here tonight, and if he survives, you can bring him tea trays in bed, wearing your prettiest gowns.”
“Oh, certainly, much less effort than attending a dance.” She held it in as long as she could, but then cackled at the absurdity. “All right, husband, please volunteer. I promise you do not have to tell me a single thing about yourself.”
Victor was laughing, too, and gagging, in the unventilated back corner of the room. “Other women order lace and hat trimmings. My dear sister is tailoring a suitor, right down to his cock.”
“I hate you, Victor. So very much.”
Sincerely, he replied, “I love you, too.”
Angelika found a corpse she had not checked. Her pulse throbbed in her throat, and Victor’s teasing faded into the background.
Here lay a beautiful man, frozen at the climax of the fight for his life. He appeared incredulous to have died. His brow was creased between the eyebrows, his jaw was gritted tight, and his hands were half-curled in fists. He had faced death like a gladiator, and when she rolled up one of his eyelids, there was such a direct challenge in his brown eye that she felt true fright and released him. “You fought hard, didn’t you?”
She watched for his furious inhalation, which never came. It was terribly sad.
Tousling a gentle hand through his thick bronze-brown hair was very forward of her, but she could not resist. It was soft as tabby-cat fur. She noticed his smile lines and long lashes. He had neat fingernails, and all his teeth were present. “Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful,” she whispered to him. “Would you like to be mine?”
She was inspired in a new way. She’d never been somebody’s last chance before.
“Are you alone? Are you afraid?” She took a deep breath and had to muster her courage for this next question. “Can I do this for you? Do you wish to come back?” Her lantern flickered, and a breeze blew in, banging the door against the wall. Her skirts swirled around her ankles. Even Helsaw clutched his chest and barked an obscenity.
Angelika knew, deep in her bones, this dead man’s answer was: Yes, yes, yes. Bring me back.
“That was eerie,” Victor remarked blandly from where he was tapping his hands on a chest, feeling for evidence of fluid. “Who’ve you found there?”
She cleared her throat of sudden strong emotion. “Someone perfect. I won’t change a thing about him.”
“That’s not the experiment,” Victor argued. “My nemesis, Jürgen Schneider—”
She cut over him. “I know full well who your mortal enemy is.”
“Then you know that in his exquisite German laboratory, he’s reanimating entire men left and right.” Victor could not think of the man without a tormented growl. “I must go bolder and exceed him, and do what he said is impossible. My achievement must be made of many parts, all sewn back together, to be better than Schneider’s. Is everything present and accounted for?” He nodded toward Angelika’s beau.
Angelika looked under the filthy scrap covering the handsome man’s loins and considered what she saw. She had been reading a lot of anatomy manuals; possibly too many. What she saw lying on his lap was unremarkable. And upon closer review, his chest was trim and strong, but not the heavy padded muscles she preferred. “He looks . . . fine.”
Victor came over to assess Angelika’s claim. Bending the corpse’s joints, he said, “He probably died only today. He’s an excellent candidate, and his looks are almost as refined as mine.” He searched around for a mirror, and then declared, “Keep his head, and we’ll remake the rest.”
She followed Victor to the next table. Then she glanced back at the handsome man.
He seemed alone, in a way the others did not.
She noticed something on the next man along, a stocky fellow in his fifties. “This one has a tattoo. ‘Bonnie.’”
It was unlikely that Bonnie would approve of tonight’s activities, and reality struck, harder than this imagined woman’s slap. Angelika began defending herself out loud. “Surely a second chance is better than being tossed into a hole in the dirt?”
She wasn’t talking to Victor, but he answered anyway. “If it’s not us, it’s them.” He nodded to the doorway. “The difference is, we have a chance to reverse this. A few years too late, I suppose.” He meant for their parents, and they both swallowed a lump of sadness. With forced humor, he continued. “Here, you’ll like this one over here. Rippling all over with muscles, and a cock like a hog’s hind leg. I think you’ve got a few options to work with here.”
The shroud was pulled down to the knees, and she assessed the body part in question. The anatomy manuals had not prepared her. “Is it . . . too big?”
“Sister, I cannot advise you on such things,” Victor replied. “Just get spares where you can.”
It was good advice. Their laboratory smelled of burning hair.
This person’s biceps did not give under her prodding finger, and his hands were black from coal, or metal. The body belonging to her handsome man had been refined and clean; this one was a brute. She faltered, looking back again. “I still like mine as he is.”
“I think this was the blacksmith. Athena threw a shoe in the village last year. Shame.” Victor slapped the man’s shoulder heartily. “He put up with her biting very well. Don’t look so worried, Jelly. We will make somebody who is ideal to you in every way.”
Helsaw was leaning through the doorway. “What’s taking so long? Heads are now an extra sixpence.”
Victor ignored him. “I think this time’s the charm, don’t you, Jelly? We learned from the last three attempts. When I present my rebuilt man at the next Cerulean Order meeting, Schneider will cry himself to sleep.” A cruel expression spread across his face. “I’ll bring Lizzie along, to remind him of all the ways he has lost to me.”
“’Urry up,” a second voice said from the doorway, putting true fear in the siblings. It was their elderly servant Mary, tired of waiting with the pony cart. “What the bloomin’ heck is the holdup? How hard is it to pick a couple of dead lads? You,” she threatened Angelika with just a word. “You.”
“I’m finished,” Angelika defended herself. “Why does everyone think I am slow?”
“I’ve told ’em,” Helsaw gossiped to Mary. “There’s twenty waiting. Any minute, the night watch might come around. Pick, pay, and get out.” Against the wall, the queue of young men huffed in unison. “But there ain’t no rushing these two.”
“You don’t know how hard my life is,” Mary replied bitterly.
“We’re done,” Victor reassured her with a smile. “I bought you a fruit bun at market today, my dear Mary, and here is an extra shilling for your time, Helsaw.”
Overcome by sudden adoration, both beamed at him.
Turning back to his sister, and instantly devoid of charm, Victor began to move the blacksmith. “Come on, Jelly. Get his ankles.”
“I will pay you to carry for me.” Angelika tried to bribe Helsaw, but he turned away with a sniff. “What is the difference between my brother and me? We both pay well, just the same.”
“Does our heart good to see you lift a finger,” Mary said. “Get a little sweat on that pretty brow, my lady.” It seemed to be true for the entire waiting queue. They laughed and heckled, egged on by Mary, as Angelika helped to lug their first pick outside. She wouldn’t lower herself to respond and kept her eyes trained skyward. It was a full moon tonight, and there was something different in her favorite constellation.
“See, I’m telling you. There’s a new star.”
Victor didn’t even look up. “Scientifically unlikely.”
“I’ve been looking at that constellation since I was a child. I know what it is supposed to look like.”
Her brother shook his head. “Not now. One, two, three—” They hoisted the man into the cart. “Let’s go back for your dream man. We can’t forget him.”
Angelika wished again on the new star for luck. “I couldn’t forget this one if I tried.”
Chapter Two