A Study in Darkness (30 page)

That was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever heard. “He needs a friend right now.”

“Only if he allows it.”

Imogen shook her head. “Promise me you won’t be an idiotic male any more than is absolutely necessary.”

He took her hands in his, kissing her through her gloves. “But I’m your idiotic male. I’ll never belong to anyone else.” And then he gave her a smile that warmed her all the way to her core.

Imogen felt tears sting her eyes. “I’m so glad.”

He looked up, startled by the catch in her voice. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” It was the spark of happiness in her breast that threatened to shatter her. It was a glow as fragile as a dandelion fluff, and she wished she could encase it in steel to keep it from harm. But that wasn’t how it worked. “I just feel so very lucky right now.”

His smile quirked. “Why?”

She thought of Evelina alone, Tobias miserable, Alice stranded in a marriage that was doomed from the start. All she had to do was play a waiting game. She could do that.

“Because I have you.”

“That you do,” he whispered. And he kissed her again, this time on the lips. And this time it lasted a long time, with searching, aching heat.

“
I’M NOT A FOOL. I KNOW YOU LOVE HER.
”

Rather than reply to his new bride, Tobias stared out the window of the hotel. They were supposed to have left for their Italian honeymoon hours ago, but word had come that the steamship had been rerouted for repairs and the next available passage wouldn’t leave for at least three days. Tobias’s new lodgings were not yet ready, so he had the choice of waiting at the hotel or taking Alice to Hilliard House. He had chosen the hotel. The Roth family home was inexorably linked with Evelina, and he couldn’t bear to spend his wedding night there with anyone else. But Alice didn’t need to hear that.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he replied calmly. “I was the one who ended things. It’s been over between us for months, and there wasn’t much there to begin with.”

Good God, I sound like my father. Chill and reasonable and a complete liar
.

In the following pause, he could hear her breathing—the rasp of someone swallowing back disappointment. The thought of having to hear that sound for the rest of his life made him want to rage. Maybe break things. But instead, he schooled his face and slowly turned around to face her where she perched on the edge of the four-poster bed.

Her face was deathly pale, made whiter still by a layer of face powder she thought no one could see. Good girls weren’t supposed to wear cosmetics, but they all did. Why Alice thought she required them was beyond him. With her deep blue eyes and copper-colored hair, she was a pretty girl—especially with her long locks unbound and falling around
her like bits of stray fire. But that only made him think harder about Evelina’s dark, lustrous curls.

“Why?” asked Alice.

“Why what?”

“Why everything?”

She looked so small and painfully young, stripped of her snowy wedding gown and now wrapped in a white robe of Chinese silk. She was the same age as Imogen, and she already had his child in her belly, though it was too soon to show yet.

“I don’t know,” he replied, bridging the awkward pause.

“I see.” She touched her fingertips to her mouth. It was an odd gesture—he couldn’t make out if she was kissing them or about to be sick—and then he saw it was to hide the trembling of her chin. But she dropped the hand a moment later, folding her fingers primly in her lap.

Silence dangled like a noose.

Blast and damn!
Now there would be a good place to start the whys—why had he seduced her that rainy afternoon in her father’s study? He’d taken her maidenhood on the big velvet chaise longue, the rain pounding on the windows in an endless, mindless patter. He’d been obsessed with having her at the time, maybe just to convince himself he might learn to love someone else besides Evelina. And so that study had become the scene of a dozen such stolen afternoons as he tried to erase the past from his senses.
Stupid, stupid, stupid
.

And now his ring was on her finger. He’d done his duty—no one could say otherwise, not even her bear of a father. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?” he replied.

Her gaze darted to the wide bed, the movement as quick and fearful as a wild animal. A fox, with all that red hair. And then she was looking at him again, confusion plain on her face. “Yes, I …” She trailed off helplessly.

He could read her thoughts—maybe her one flaw, because she was so transparent it drove people away.
You thought you would be marrying that lover, the one who caressed you like you were all the beautiful things the universe ever dreamed of. But instead, you got me
.

“I wanted this.” Her brow was crunched into a disbelieving frown. She slid off the bed, rising to her full height—which wasn’t much. There was something else in her face now, something like anger. “But you never did, did you?”

His tongue froze, unable to manufacture another lie.

Her voice rose—not much, but enough to show she had backbone. “You should have said something long before this. You had your chance to back away. Now you’ve trapped me.”

She was right, and that made things worse. He felt his lip curl. “You like to think of yourself as smart.”

“I am. I’m as good at the accounts as father.”

“So what did you miss? What sign didn’t you see? Is that what you’re wondering?”

She gave a single, jerky nod. She was so damned innocent. Tobias felt like the worst Lothario ever to grace the London stews.

“Nothing. This is it. We’re married. You won,” he said dispassionately, and knew it was cruel. But there was an anger inside he couldn’t rein in—it leapt from his belly, hot and snarling, even while his words turned cold as frost. “You have nothing to complain about.”

The savagery in his tone made her flinch. “Tobias,” she said in a small voice, but then she swallowed whatever came next, clearing her throat with a delicate cough.

He made a cutting gesture with his hand. “There’s nothing more to say. Don’t ever mention her name to me. The subject is closed.”

“If that’s how you want it.”

“I do.”

She folded her arms, clutching the front of her robe closed. They stood so close that he could have touched her cheek, pulled her to him and reassured the poor girl that he would keep her safe. But she represented everything that had snared him—her father, his family obligations, his fear of throwing everything away on a wild gamble with fate. Most of all, she personified the destruction he’d caused—or would cause, if he was anything less than the perfect son-in-law—and he
wasn’t quite coldhearted enough not to care. And so no action was completely his own. He was damned.

This was her wedding night. He should have pretended some affection, but he couldn’t stand to touch her right then. And from the look on her face, she knew it—almost. He took a step away, putting air between them. She followed the movement, her face turning up like a flower following the sun.

“You’re going?” she asked, somehow knowing before he did.

Yes
. His answer stuck in his throat, closing off the air before he could give it voice. And he barged from the room before he suffocated.

NOW DRY AND
changed out of his formal suit, Bancroft prowled the hallway of the hotel, his head a squirming mass of thoughts. Setting aside the fact that a mad sorcerer he’d believed dead had popped from the grave demanding his personal services … well, there was no setting that aside, which was the problem. He was a busy man. The last thing he had time for was an episode from a Gothic potboiler—especially one that could actually explode his political career like a hot harpoon in a barrel of gunpowder.

The ironic thing was he wouldn’t mind killing Jasper Keating. It just wasn’t time yet. There were other things he had to get ready first, and he’d be damned if Magnus was going to come crashing in and making a mess of his meticulously laid plans.

He stopped outside of the room where the wedding gifts were laid out. The hotel, and not Keating’s own guards, had been engaged to watch over it. Bancroft had learned who organized the security among the hotel staff, and had paid them to ignore the room for the next hour. Hence, the coast was clear. The door had been locked after the wedding guests had gone home, but Bancroft had learned early on in his diplomatic career how to coax open a door. The tumblers gave way with a quiet click, as hushed as a cough in a library.

Once the door was closed behind him, he reached inside
his jacket and pulled out a brass tube. He twisted the top half, then waited as chemicals mixed and a faint green glow began to radiate from its tiny glass window. The tables sprang into view, the white cloths reflecting back the green glow. A few carefully placed questions had told him Keating’s servants would be arriving soon to inventory the gifts, then pack them away for storage until the couple set up their new house. He had to act quickly.

And yet he couldn’t quite resist the pull of the scientific equipment. Bancroft lingered over the tension gauge, the leather case of calipers and fine-nosed pliers, the brass microscope with its perfect lenses. A rush of pleasure took him, pushing aside purpose for simple curiosity. He touched the cool metal of the gauge, loving the craftsmanship. He’d dabbled once with such things, but had no stomach for it anymore—not since the automatons. Not since Magnus. For a moment he envied his son the chance to use his talent, even if it was for the Gold King.

Then the tube light flickered, sending alarm through his thoughts. Time had slid past. He swept the light around, searching for what he wanted. Equipment was too large. Wine was useless. Lace was worse. But there—that was what he was looking for. He picked up the case with the emeralds. They slid chill and sinuous into his palm, and from there to the inside pocket of his jacket. He closed the velvet case and returned it to the table with a smirk of satisfaction.
A gift from the Crown, stolen so that I can save the Crown from monsters like Keating
. There was a poetical symmetry there.
And here’s hoping this scheme works better than the forgery fiasco
. He’d used up at least five of his nine lives on that one. This time, he was far more careful about whom he was working with, and even more cautious about who knew he was involved.

Bancroft twisted the brass tube again to extinguish the light and drifted toward the door. He turned the handle slowly, careful not to make a sound, and peered outside. No one in the hall. He stepped quickly outside, pulling the door shut but not locking it. It was easiest to let the theft be blamed on careless staff.

He moved quickly down the corridor, not fully relaxing until he had descended the stairs to the main level below. Then he released the air from his lungs in a heady rush, barely able to contain an urge to strut. There was nothing more to do but go home.

Then he saw his son slouched in an overstuffed chair, alone in a darkened corner of the foyer. A pair of chairs and a low table had been placed there, near the windows, for visitors awaiting their carriage—not for young men poised at the brink of life.

Bancroft’s steps slowed as irritation mounted, spoiling his mood.
The boy’s supposed to be with his wife. What’s he done now?
Tobias always managed to throw a spanner into the works, no matter what. And yet—Bancroft couldn’t completely avoid a surge of concern as he crossed to survey the wreckage of his son and heir.

“What’s the matter with you?” he demanded.

Tobias looked up wearily. “Why are you still here? Shouldn’t you have gone home?”

Bancroft sunk into the chair next to him. “I had to meet someone.”

“Who?” Tobias asked without much interest.

The meeting was a fabrication, but for an instant he considered telling his son about Magnus, then dismissed the idea. Tobias was in Keating’s power now and by definition could not be trusted. Which meant Bancroft shouldn’t be talking to him—but, well, there was only so much parenting even he could avoid. “That’s not important. Why aren’t you with your wife?”

Tobias gave him a hard look, filled with accusations left over from a hundred bitter conversations.

Bancroft waved the look away. “Oh, dear God, you still want the Cooper girl.” It was a statement, not a question.

“She’s gone.” His son nearly choked on the words.

Bancroft shrugged. “You’ve always had the option to follow her.”

For an instant, he thought Tobias would hit him. He had before. The moment had almost given Bancroft hope for his son.

“You’re despicable,” Tobias snarled.

“I’ve never laid claim to goodness.”

“No, you haven’t. Just expediency.”

“Ambition,” Bancroft corrected. “At least accuse me of the correct species of sin.”

“You have no heart.”

“Not really.” And yet, that wasn’t exactly true. There were things he cared about. The Steam Council was destroying the Empire he loved. They were destroying the villages, the countryside, the way of life he’d grown up with. If opportunism dovetailed with a just cause, he wasn’t going to argue—so long as he was the one to hand Victoria back her England to the applause of a grateful multitude.