She stepped away from the door and crossed to the pallet she slept on. Reaching underneath, she pulled out two folded pieces of parchment. She held them carefully but with a white-knuckle grip. “I know even the dead ain’t safe from the Kincaids, but they’re nearabout as safe as anyone gets.”

“The dead?”

She nodded. “I know someone who helps people in trouble, gives ’em a way out. I asked him to give me one.”

She held the papers out to him.

He took them both, eyeing the top first. It was a letter of recommendation for a “Kate Mitchell.” That made no sense. The second even less so. “Who’s this doctor that’s declaring you dead, Gemma?”

“He ain’t real, I’d wager. Someone said to be away from London so folks here won’t sniff out that he’s about as real as the wax figures I’ve been looking after.”

A forged declaration of death. “It even has a seal.”

“Right and tight. No one’ll question it.”

“If your family sees you walking around London after hearing you’re dead, that’ll give away the—” In a flash, he understood. “That’s why you’re so set on leaving. You get away from London, have this sent to the right office, and, for all intents and purposes, Gemma Kincaid Milligan is dead.”

“And Kate Mitchell gets to live a life free of resurrectionists and violent family members.”

“And unwanted husbands?” he asked quietly.

“More you bein’ rid of an unwanted wife. You’d be free, Baz. You could marry someone you wanted to be married to.” Though her voice didn’t waver, something in her eyes told him she wasn’t as content with that outcome as she sounded.

He folded the papers and handed them back to her. “Why is it you’re so certain I don’t want to be married to you?”

She turned away, taking the two steps back to the pallet.

“Gemma?”

She knelt and put the papers back where they’d been.

He stepped over to her, sitting on the pallet she knelt beside. “Why do you think I don’t want to be married to you?”

“I heard you talking to Fletcher and Elizabeth. You told them there weren’t anyone else to help me, so you felt you had to. And that if there’d been any way to help me besides marrying me, that’s what you would’ve done.”

Blimey. He hadn’t realized she’d overheard that. He couldn’t even entirely remember what he’d said. “Marrying a stranger is a drastic thing, Gemma. For both people involved.”

He heard her take a deep breath. “Now, you can get out of that drastic thing.”

He set a free hand on her back, gently urging her to look up at him. She didn’t.