Hey everybody! This is the last chapter for this fic, I hope you enjoyed it. :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing!

"Damn, damn."

Nell ran a hand through her wild hair as she looked over the accounts. In the past three months her meat pie shop had gone from somewhat successful to completely empty and she had consequently acquired a large amount of debt. What little she had saved for her future by the sea had been swept away by the debt collector who had only just left.

"I'm sure you can earn enough to cover your debt somehow," he said with a licentious wink that made her skin crawl. He gathered the marks together in his attaché case and stepped toward the door, lingering a moment on the threshold to add: "If I knew you was selling yourself, I'd be first in line."

"Bloody bastard," she said under her breath. She slammed the account book shut and shoved it across the table where it teetered for a moment before slipping onto the floor.

"Damn," she said again, rising out of the chair to retrieve it.

She picked it up off the filthy floor to put it away in the roll top desk where she kept all her important papers and hid the key before returning to the futile task of making meat pies. No one had stopped by in days beside a fellow off the Bristol asking for directions. Though she'd done her best to persuade him to buy a meat pie and a pint for his surely aching belly, he refused her quite persistently. Today, she decided, if she had a customer she would not take no for an answer - even if it meant throwing the pies into their protesting mouths.

She didn't have to wait long, though, because a customer in a barber's coat came in not half an hour later. He took a look around and nearly turned to leave but Mrs. Lovett was fast and had him by the arm in a second.

"What's your rush, sir?" she asked, grasping his sleeve and hauling him to a table. "Half a minute, can'tcher?"

He sat dutifully, a little stunned it seemed, as she foolishly prattled on about her lack of customers. She hoped in his daze he wouldn't noticed the dirty floors and scattering roaches, so she continued to speak in a rush. Before he had time to think she'd placed a mostly fresh meat pie before him and offered a pint of ale to wash it down with. The poor fellow's hair was a little wild and he carried the salty smell of the sea about him, but he soldiered through a bite and she did her best to ignore the labored chewing.

"My neighbor Mrs. Mooney, she has a pie shop too see, but meat being expensive as it is nowadays I have no idea how a little old woman like that keeps herself afloat." The man opened his mouth to say something, but she ignored it. "After all, she's nearly seventy and well into senility. Does her business rightly but I noticed something strange, you see, all her neighbor's cats have disappeared."

"Wouldn't do in my shop," she said as she wiped her hands on the front of her dress and propped her elbows on the counter. "Times is hard, sir, but not that hard."

The man took a generous swallow of ale. Poor dear, he looked more ragged than anyone she'd seen in years and her lousy meat pie hadn't helped, but in his face was something familiar she couldn't quite place. His eyes were hard though, and she felt guilty for feeling so sorry for herself earlier. This wretch must have been through something to earn that stony glare.

"Trust me dearie, it's gonna take a lot more than ale to wash that taste out. C'mon, we'll get you a nice tumbler of gin, eh?" The man didn't say anything as she led him to the parlor and produced a bottle and filled a glass with the clear liquid.

"Isn't this homey, now? The cheery wallpaper was a real bargain, too. It was only partly singed when the chapel burned down." Nell handed him the tumbler and watched as he took a little sip. It was obvious it'd been a while since he'd had any real spirits as he flinched when he swallowed. As for herself, she took a secret swig from the vessel before returning it to its hiding place.

"You sit down," she said, motioning to the couch. "Warm your bones."

The man sat and looked around the parlor, seeming to see something she didn't. She stared at his face, wanting to place it in her memory. He was so familiar. She was sure she'd have remembered hair like his, dark with a shock of white streaking up from his furrowed brow. His mouth was set in a firm line and she knew he'd be rather handsome if he'd allow himself to smile. She could imagine it, warm and full of love.

"You've a room over the shop here?" he said finally, his voice low and gravelly. She nodded in response. "Times is so hard, why don't you rent it out?"

"What, up there? No, I won't go near it," she cast her eyes toward the stairs and back. "People think it's haunted."

"Haunted?" he asked. Nell nodded, sinking into a chair by the fire. A picture was forming in her mind of a man she knew long ago, but it couldn't be him, not with those eyes.

"And who's to say they're wrong?" She leaned forward a bit and put her elbows to her knees. "You see, years ago, something happened up there - something not very nice."

"There was a barber and his wife, you see. He was a proper artist with a knife, beautiful really, but he was transported to Australia some years ago. Barker his name was," she paused and looked him in the face. "Benjamin Barker."

"What was his crime?" the man asked bitterly.

"Foolishness," she replied. "He had this wife, you see, pretty little thing. A friend of mine, silly little nit. There was this judge you see, he was in love with her. Every day after her husband was arrested he sent flowers, drove me mad with dying flower petals he did, but she never gave him the time of day. She just stayed inside and sobbed for days and days."

"One night, the Beadle comes knocking on the door for her all gentlemanly and tells her the judge is full of contrition and blames himself for her woebegone state, so will she please come to his house so he can make things right? And she goes." Nell shook her tangled hair. "I told her don't go, but she wouldn't listen to me."

"Of course, when she goes there, poor thing, they're having this ball all in masks. There's no one she knows there, so she wanders, tormented, and drinks more than she ought. All the while she thinks the judge isn't there at all. He was there, all right, only not so contrite as he'd said." She watched as the man's face grew tight and angry. His hands curled into fists by his side. "It was all a trick and she wasn't no match for such craft, you see, simple little thing that she was. Everyone thought it so droll they stood about and laughed. Poor soul, she was ruined after that night. Poor thing."

"No!" he yelled. The man had come out of his chair abruptly and was shaking with rage. "Would no one have mercy on her?"

"So, it is you," Nell said finally, her vague inklings coming together to form a whole picture of who the man before her used to be. "Benjamin Barker."

"Where is Lucy?" he asked brokenly. "Where is my wife?"

"She poisoned herself. Arsenic, from the apothecary around the corner." Nell shook her head sadly, remembering how she found Lucy lying face down in a puddle of vomit, the bedclothes torn to shreds around her broken body. "I tried to stop her, but she wouldn't listen to me."

For a long moment he didn't move, only stared at a spot on the wall behind her.

"And he's got your daughter." She said, almost as an afterthought. She'd thought little of Johanna in the past fifteen years.

"He? Judge Turpin?" he spat.

"Adopted her," she said softly. "Like his own."

"Fifteen years," he began cruelly, taking heavy steps toward the lace-draped window that faced the street. "I've sweated in a living hell on a false charge. Fifteen years dreaming I might come home to a wife and child."

"Well, I can't say the years have been particularly kind to you, Mr. Barker-"

"No," he said firmly, ending her train of thought. "Not Barker. That man is dead. It's Todd now, Sweeney Todd, and he will have his revenge."

They stood for a moment facing each other, neither saying a word. Nell was frightened of this new personality, but she also saw an opportunity. She had debt and a room to let, he had skill and a reason to stay, so why not? If she could persuade him to stay in his old loft and bring in customers, maybe she'd sell more pies. Eventually she'd be able to buy some real meat and pay off her debts.

"Well, Mister T," she said, coming out of her chair. "Seems you'll need a place to stay, aye? C'mon with me, I'll set you up right."

They took the side stairs into the upper room. It had been a while since Nell had dusted up there, about ten years in fact, and it had gotten quite filthy since then. The green and yellow wallpaper that had once paneled the downstairs parlor had begun to peel off the wall in strips, which Nell quite enjoyed the sight of. She hated that paper, after all. Todd lingered on the threshold. Nell imagined he was seeing the room as it used to be, a place where he had worked happily while his wife and infant daughter played in the corner.

"Come in," she said at last, her hands planted on her hips. "Nothing to be afraid of, love."

He took a step inside and looked about as she looked for a specific floorboard. It'd been years since she'd taken her treasures out to admire. The temptation to sell them when times were bad had become too strong, so she hid them away from herself. Todd noticed the brass cradle against the back wall as she found the right board and she noticed his face crumpled a bit to look at it. She lifted the velvet box from the floor and removed the lid. Inside, six gleaming razors winked in the dim light.

"When they came for the girl, I hid them," she said as he approached. "Could've sold them, but I didn't."

Todd lifted one out of the box and flicked it open, running his thumb over the sharpened edge with reverence. Mrs. Lovett hovered over his shoulder as he did, breathing in the scent of him and admiring the way he handled the blade.

"Those handles is chased silver, ain't they?"

"Silver," he said softly, a cold smile playing on his lips. "Yes."

"Don't they shine beautiful?" Longing tinged her voice, but Todd hardly noticed. He clutched razors in both hands and admired the way they caught the light. She smiled warmly at him, deciding he was handsome despite the hardness. She wanted to reach out and touch him, to feel what he was feeling at that moment, and she would have if he hadn't settled his eyes coldly on her.

"Leave me," He said firmly. Nell did as she was told, feeling the weight of his stare well after she was out of his sight.

Little did she know, though, that she had just set into motion a chain of events that would change the course of her life.

R&R!