by Bec McMaster
She eyed it for a moment, then reached out with her right hand and accepted it. Too late, he recalled her aversion to being touched there. But then her warm, slim fingers were sliding over his, the kid leather beneath his touch smooth and well-worn.
“Barrons, this is Mrs. Marberry, my new secretary,” he introduced.
“A pleasure.” Barrons nodded.
Rosa smiled, but Lynch had the feeling it wasn’t genuine. “The pleasure is mine, my lord. I never expected to be rubbing shoulders with someone from the Council of Dukes itself.”
Barrons studied her, then glanced away. “An honorary member, my dear. I stand in my father’s place until he recovers.”
Lynch said nothing. The Duke of Caine had been afflicted with a mysterious illness for years. The chances of him recovering were slim and Barrons knew it.
The fact that the craving virus was a possessive disease was not unknown. It tolerated no other viruses or illnesses in its host’s body. Yet few dared tell Barrons that to his face. He knew it. The man was no fool, after all.
Whatever illness afflicted his father, he kept rumors of it under lock and key.
Barrons gestured toward the study. “Perhaps we’d best view Falcone first. Your men can deal with the bodies. They’re through there.” He gestured behind him, at the library and the bedrooms.
Though Lynch wanted to see the bodies himself, Falcone was of the greater interest to him. “I was unable to examine Haversham properly. He’d killed himself before we arrived. I thought it guilt at the time.”
Barrons shot him a sober look. “I don’t believe so. I don’t believe Haversham had enough control of his senses to suffer such an emotion.”
“Then you think he was murdered? I examined the body myself. The entry and exit wounds seemed consistent with suicide and powder burn was found on his hands and jaw. I could smell other people on his skin, but I assumed they were his victims.”
“Like I said, I don’t believe Haversham had the faculty to kill himself.”
They strode along the carpeted hall. It was darker here, a single candle burning in the sconce.
“What should I expect?” he asked. “Was Falcone close to the Fade?”
“Falcone’s barely forty.”
“There’s neither rhyme nor reason to the Fade,” Lynch argued. “Sometimes the virus colonizes a man swifter than it does others. I’ve seen an eighty-year-old with a CV count as low as twenty-three.”
“There’s no sign of albinism,” Barrons countered. “His skin carries a healthy glow, his hair is still light brown, and his eyes are hazel. If his CV count were higher, his color would have begun to fade before now.”
Muffled screams began to penetrate. Lynch’s gaze locked on the closed study. “How precisely did you subdue him?”
“I shot him with a dart of hemlock,” Barrons replied. “It paralyzed him for barely a minute.”
“A minute?” Rosa blurted.
Lynch had almost forgotten her. Almost.
The two men looked back.
“My apologies,” she said. “I’ve read of these new hemlock concoctions in a scientific journal. I thought they paralyzed a blue blood for nearly ten minutes?”
No scientific journal would dare speak of such a thing. Lynch’s lashes lowered in consideration, running over her. The propaganda pamphlets the humanists printed, however, were a different story. Did his secretary have humanist tendencies? Or was she simply one of the many curious in London who read the pamphlets when they were distributed?
He knew a man, an informant who was emphatically loyal to the Echelon, who liked to read the pamphlets, regardless of his loyalties. Jovan thought the caricatures of the prince consort as a pale, bloated vulture hovering over the queen were humorous.
“The amount of time the concoction paralyzes depends upon the amount of craving virus in the blood,” Barrons explained. “The higher the CV levels, the quicker paralysis wears off. I’ve tested it on myself, actually. It takes me four and a half minutes to begin regaining control of my limbs.”
Which meant Barrons had a high CV count. Lynch filed that away for future thought.
“Then if Lord Falcone doesn’t have a high CV count, how on earth did he manage to recover so swiftly?” Rosa frowned.
“That is the question,” Barrons said. “There’s no explanation. In fact, there’s no explanation for his state at all.”
The three of them stopped in front of the study door. From within came the muffled sounds of a thud. Then something splintered.
Barrons reached grimly for the dart gun at his side. “I tied him to the chair,” he admitted. “I believe he’s just broken it. Be prepared for anything.”
Reaching for the door, he eased it open and slipped inside. Lynch clutched his cane-sword and glanced at Rosa. “Stay there,” he snapped, and hurried after Barrons. If he allowed the Duke of Caine’s heir to get killed, then his own head would be forfeit.
The room was silent and dark, a breeze blowing through the gauzy curtains. The splintered remains of the chair littered a rug in front of the desk, with rope discarded in bloodied pools.
Barrons hurried to the window and looked out. “Bloody hell,” he swore. “He must have gone through it.”
The hair along the back of Lynch’s neck lifted.
“This is a catastrophe. If he gets loose in the city, it’ll cause mass hysteria,” Barrons said. “We have to capture him before he goes too far.”
“What are we dealing with here?” Lynch asked, aware of everything the young lord had not said in front of Rosa.
“A blue blood acting like he’s in the Fade when he isn’t. Presume you’re facing a vampire, Lynch, and you might come close to the truth.”
Lynch stilled. Becoming such a creature was the only fear a blue blood had. A vampire could kill hundreds before he was brought down—and had in the past. But the Echelon had become adept at controlling such matters. If a lord somehow managed to alter his CV readings, then the telltale signs of the Fade began to show in his flesh. He began to stink of rot, his body slowly deforming into a wiry, maggot-pale quadrupedal creature.
The hair along his spine tickled. Lynch scrubbed at the back of his neck. Barrons strode past him toward the door but Lynch hesitated. He could smell something now. Something sweet, like flavored ices or sugared buns.
Blood dripped.
“Barrons,” he said slowly. “I don’t think he went out the window.”
The lord reached for the door, his gaze snapping back over his shoulder. Lynch slowly rolled his eyes up and Barrons’s head lifted. He didn’t need to see what had caught the lord’s attention to know where Falcone was.
Barrons jerked his pistol up and Lynch dove out of the way as the man who’d once been Falcone dropped from the plaster ceiling. It landed where he’d been standing and as Lynch rolled to his feet, it sprang for Barrons.
Gunfire spat in the dark room, momentarily singeing Lynch’s vision. All he could see were a pair of dark forms grappling and then Barrons’s yelp as the young lord went down.
Lynch had his own pistol up, but the center of his vision was a mess of glittering lights. Leaping forward, he reached for Falcone and yanked with all his strength, tearing the creature off the fallen lord. Blood stained the air. He could taste it in his mouth, smell it thick in his nostrils. There was no time to see the damage however. Falcone twisted in a way not even a blue blood should be able to and leaped for him.
A blow smashed into his hand and the pistol skittered across the floor. Lynch ground his teeth as his arm was nearly wrenched clean out of the socket. He twisted back, avoiding another blow, and finally caught a good look at his adversary.
Falcone’s face twisted in an expression of rage, his eyes bloodshot and wild. Nothing human lurked there. Blood matted his hair and clothes, and the nails on his hand were sharp. Lynch had a split second to examine him before they raked toward his face.
Parrying with the cane-sword, he barely managed to block the first blow
, then the next one, let alone use it to his advantage. Falcone was monstrously fast and each blow echoed up the muscle in Lynch’s forearm. Lynch ripped the sword free of the cane, but Falcone lashed out, nails screaming on steel as he knocked it out of Lynch’s hand.
“Help!” Barrons yelled, scrambling upright. Blood bubbled on his lips and his chest was a raw mess. He clutched at the stained velvet, trying to drag himself into a sitting position against the wall.
Falcone’s head turned at the sound and Lynch seized his chance. He leaped forward, tackling the man to the floor and using his own considerable strength to force Falcone onto his face. Yanking on an arm, he wrenched it up, putting a shoulder lock on the creature.
Light flooded into the room as the door opened.
Lynch recoiled from the bright glare just as Falcone gave a mighty heave beneath him. Rosa rushed inside, backlit by the light, a pistol in her hands and her face grim as her eyes locked on him.
“Get out!” he bellowed. “Get out of the house!”
Falcone strained, the tendons in his shoulder tearing. Lynch could feel his grip slipping, and horror sank its cold claws into his gut as he saw Rosa’s jaw drop in surprise.
“Run!” he screamed as Falcone rolled and threw him aside.
Lynch hit the wall, the breath whooshing out of him. He landed on hands and knees, just in time to see Rosa flee down the corridor. Falcone went after her in a blur.
“Perry! Garrett!” He shoved off the wall and lurched toward the door. Something hurt in his side. Maybe a cracked rib. No time though. He had to stop Falcone—before the creature tore Rosa’s throat out.
That thought burned through his chest like fire. Tearing through the door, he saw the flap of Falcone’s coattails as the lord bounded down the stairs. Rosa screamed out of sight and a gun barked.
“Bloody hell!” Garrett’s voice echoed through the entry.
Lynch sprinted along the corridor as shouts broke out. He didn’t know what was happening. More gunfire coughed. Perry screamed Garrett’s name and then the gunfire fell silent.
Vaulting over the rail of the staircase, Lynch leaped through the air, raking the scene with a sharp glance. Rosa tripped on the bottom step and went sprawling. Garrett was down, clawing at his chest. He was perhaps the only reason Rosa was still alive. Falcone had stopped to attack him first.
Lynch landed hard on the marble foyer below, the vibration shivering up his legs. Falcone ignored him, leaping on Rosa and riding her to the ground. Her head cracked on the marble tiles and the gun in her hand tumbled free.
No!
Blind rage turned his vision to shadows. The demon in him—the hungry, darker side of him—rose with a choking grip until he could barely see. The next thing he knew, he was hauling the creature off Rosa and throwing it into the wall. Falcone gathered his feet under him as he hit and rebounded off it with athletic grace.
Lynch had a knife in his hand before he knew it. Falcone hit him hard, blunt teeth sinking into his throat. Lynch drove the knife up, deep into the creature’s chest. As if realizing his intentions, Falcone jerked, his jaw opening. Lynch grabbed him and yanked him over his shoulder, slamming the lord flat on the ground. His bone handled knife hilt gleamed in the golden light, and he knelt down, using his knee to shove it home as he grabbed Falcone by the head and snapped his neck.
Silence fell, broken only by the gasping wheeze from Garrett’s throat.
Lynch staggered off the body, the shadows draining from his vision. He felt light-headed all of a sudden. Rosa was on her feet, her mouth parted in shock as she stared at him.
“Stay there,” he snarled, stabbing a finger toward her. One last glance at Falcone—he wasn’t getting up again—and he staggered toward Garrett.
Perry was on her knees, hands clamped over the wound on Garrett’s chest.
“How bad is it?” Lynch demanded. Not Garrett. He’d been only a boy when Lynch took him on, streetwise and full of an insincere charm he used to protect himself, running along at Lynch’s heels, emulating him, driving him insane with a thousand and one questions.
He reached out and tilted Garrett’s head to the side.
Garrett winced. “I’ll live,” he gasped. With a bloody smile, he added, “Can’t leave so many bereft women behind. They’ll be…crying for days.”
Perry shrugged out of her coat and pressed it over the mess in Garrett’s chest. Lynch saw blood pumping through an artery and felt the iron grip of those icy fingers rake his gut again. The heart. Falcone had hit the heart. There was no surer way to kill a blue blood.
“He needs a physician,” Perry said in an emotionless tone, but that didn’t mean she felt nothing. When she looked up, light gleamed off her eyes, suspiciously bright. “Fast.”
Lynch straightened and looked around. “Where the bloody hell are the Coldrush Guards Barrons brought with him?”
Nobody could answer that.
“Rosa, I need you to fetch help,” he said, trying to prioritize needs in his mind. Lynch liked Barrons enough that he didn’t wish to see the lord die—but more than that, he knew losing the Duke of Caine’s heir would be a monumental catastrophe. Garrett however…Garrett was personal.
“I’ve got him, sir,” Perry said softly, seeing the dilemma in his face.
He nodded shortly. “Barrons is down. I need to see if he’s going to survive. Rosa, send for a physician or a doctor. Even a bloody midwife will do.”
Rosa’s gloved hands were clenched in her navy skirts as she stared at him with those liquid-dark eyes. She made no move to obey.
Had the fright shocked her insensible? “What?” he snapped.
“You’re bleeding.” Her lips compressed, a hint of defiance glinting in her eyes. “Quite badly.”
He slapped a hand to his throat and felt the wetness there. The room stank of blood—most of it not his, thank goodness. But the smell of it… Lynch almost groaned, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. That was the only sign of his discomposure, but she saw it.
“I’ve had worse,” Lynch said, tugging the collar of his leather coat up. Gesturing toward the door, he added, “Hurry. Before the others bleed to death. And then make sure you stay outside until this is dealt with.”
Lynch needed her out of here. He’d not risk her life again and right now, with the way she was looking at him and the intoxicating scent of blood, he just might be the one who lost control.
* * *
Rosalind shivered on the doorstep of the mansion, tucking her cape-jacket tight about her shoulders. More of the Nighthawks had arrived in the last hour, as well as a pair of physicians and enough Coldrush Guards to secure the mansion. Crowds of curious onlookers loomed beyond their impassive forms, desperate to know more of what had happened.
“Was it them humanists?” a blue blood lord called, his top hat bobbing in the crowd.
“A vampire?” another cried, waving his walking stick.
Panic edged their voices and the crowd murmured. Rosalind edged back into the concealment of the trailing roses that cascaded over the entrance and tugged her bonnet up around her face. Nobody would know her here, yet vulnerability rode her. She was surrounded by too many blue bloods—half the Echelon it seemed, clad in their flamboyant velvets and silks. Even at this time of the day, gaudy feathers bobbed in ladies’ bonnets and Rosalind caught a glimpse of several white wigs and powdered faces in the crowd—older blue bloods, by the look of it, those still mired in fashions from the past. Or perhaps seeking to hide the effects of the Fade. Who knew?
“Rosa?”
Lynch’s voice cut through her scrutiny. Rosalind turned swiftly, her skirts slithering over the tiled portico and her heart leaping into her throat. She was used to keeping a cool head in moments of stress, but once the excitement had settled, she couldn’t seem to stop her heart from pounding. So close. Falcone’s eyes had been full of madness and hunger. She’d heard his harsh panting as he chased her down the hall, knowing that she’d never make it in time, knowing that he w
ould have her… And then Garrett had looked up, his eyes widening in shock before he smoothly drew his pistol and put a bullet into Falcone’s chest.
He’d saved her life. A second more and Falcone would have had her. As it was, the shot had barely slowed him. Rosalind had stumbled down the stairs, Garrett launching himself past her to meet the maddened lord—another action that saved her.
It was easy to despise the blue bloods after everything they’d done to her, but Garrett had risked his life for hers without a thought. She didn’t like that. It didn’t fit her view of the world.
Lynch had tried to hastily wash the blood from his skin and rake his hair back into place, but the same feverish glow that burned in her chest lit his eyes. “I need you. Come.”
Tugging her notebook and pencil out of her reticule, Rosalind followed him inside. The stale scent of death seemed to permeate the air in the grim afternoon light and two of the Coldrush Guards were stationed inside. Her gaze went immediately to where Lynch had launched himself over the railing of the banister. He’d landed lightly, the edges of his long leather coat flaring around him, his eyes cold with purpose, before he’d thrown himself at Falcone. Killed him in fact, with grim, efficient purpose. She hadn’t missed the way he’d moved; someone had taught him a brutal fighting style. Falcone had been stronger and faster, but Lynch knew how to disable a man with a few swift chops of the hand.
Rosalind looked up, light gleaming through the facets of the chandelier above. A good twenty-foot drop and he’d handled it like it were a step off the porch. A shiver worked its way along her spine.
Dangerous.
Blue bloods were superior in strength and speed to a human, but that didn’t always mean the balance was uneven. A trained assassin could cut down an untrained blue blood in hand-to-hand combat. Someone like Lynch though? Impossible.
If he ever realized who she was, Rosalind had no intentions of getting close enough to him to find out who would win.
“Here,” Lynch said, gesturing to the body by the stairs. Someone had draped a sheet over the corpse, but it clung wetly to Falcone, drenched in blood. “Write this down. We’ve taken an analysis of Falcone’s CV levels with the portable brass spectrometer. They came in at fifty-three percent. Note: Request Haversham’s CV levels when we return.”
