He hesitated, staring down at her hand in his.
“Then my name was put on a list, and one night they dragged me into the police station, and Pierce and Wilkey told me that if I didn’t help them, they would put me on the next ship to Russia and leave my mother to fend for herself.”
Corinne bit her lip. She remembered the way his mother had clutched him so desperately, calling him myshka.
“They’re going to know you helped us now,” Corinne said. “They’ll probably even think you helped us escape Haversham.”
“I know. My mother and I will have to leave. I’ll find work somewhere else. New York, maybe.”
His eyes were still downcast. He pushed his hands into his coat pockets.
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, Cor—you have to know that. When you told me you weren’t a nice person, I tried to believe it. I hoped it would be easier if I thought the worst of you. If you were just a privileged, arrogant thief without a morsel of empathy.” He met her eyes suddenly. “But you’re more than that,” he said. “And I can’t tell if you really don’t think so or if for some reason you’re determined that no one but Ada will ever find out.”
“I wasn’t lying when I said I wasn’t a nice person,” Corinne said.
He smiled ruefully. “You’re definitely not a nice person, but there’s more to it than that. I tried not to see it, but it’s impossible to ignore. You’re best friends with Ada and Saint, and you love the Cast Iron for what it could be and not necessarily what it is, and that night in the alley, you gave Harry a poem when he needed it most. You’re not nice, but you’re good.”
Corinne couldn’t catch her breath. The sincerity in his eyes was iron on her skin.
“You should have told us about the HPA,” she managed finally. “Ada and I would have found a way to help you.”
“I don’t doubt it,” he said, his eyes lowering again. “I wish . . . a lot of things had been different.”
Corinne studied his expression for a few moments, considering. “I wish things had been different too,” she said. “Especially the part where Madeline died choking on her own blood.”
Gabriel flinched, and for a heartbeat she could read the sorrow in his face as clearly as if it had been written there.
“I never—”
“I know,” Corinne said. “But that doesn’t change what happened.”
“I know.”
They were both quiet for a long while. Corinne could hear the mechanical sputtering and coughs of the car as it was cranked to life outside. If there was more to say, she couldn’t think of what it might possibly be. She had the thought that she might not ever see Gabriel Stone again after tonight. She couldn’t decide how she felt about that. She couldn’t decide how she felt about anything right now. Her head hurt so badly.
She massaged her temples and sighed. “You and Charlie drop Jackson off at the station and take Saint to the Red Cat,” she told Gabriel. “Ada and I will be there later.”
The lines in his forehead deepened, and he took a step forward.
“You two can’t just go off alone,” he said. “The HPA is still looking for you.”
“Let’s get something straight,” Corinne said. The flaring anger in her chest was easier than her other conflicted feelings, and she latched onto it. “You don’t get a say in how we conduct our affairs. Normally I would tell you that New York is a pit of despair where dreams go to die, but maybe it’s for the best if you take your mother and go.”
She didn’t relish the hurt that registered in his features, and she hated herself for the words as soon as they left her mouth, but she didn’t take them back. It didn’t matter how sorry he was. Madeline was gone. Nothing would ever be the same again. She turned away before she could reconsider and walked out of the warehouse.
Ada followed Corinne without hesitation. Corinne didn’t say where they were going, but it didn’t seem to matter anymore. They were in step again, in the way that drew everything into sharp relief, in the way that balanced the world. The night was still clear, with a raw wind blowing from the east, howling through the streets. Their skirts blew about their knees as they walked. They didn’t pass many pedestrians on their way, and the farther into the financial district they went, the more deserted the streets became.
“We’ve made a balled-up mess of things, haven’t we?” Corinne hugged herself and pressed her chin against her chest.
“Johnny used us,” Ada said. “We couldn’t have known that all he cared about was the money.”
“We could have seen it,” Corinne said. “If we’d wanted to.”
The bitterness in her voice was impossible to miss. Ada had to listen harder to catch the wounded strains underneath. Ada thought about her mother’s last admonition and nodded.
“You’re right.”
Corinne stopped walking and squinted up at the buildings around them.
“It was right here,” she said.
“What was?”