“Dammit, Adair. Do yourself a favor and forget her.” Even as he said the words, he knew his heart could not follow its own advice.
When he arrived at the Augusta, a stocky young man with wavy brown hair greeted him at the door. “Can I help you, sir?”
“Cameron Adair,” he said, handing over his card. “Mr. Riordan sent for me.”
Without looking at the card, the young man opened the door wider. “This way, sir.”
He stepped inside, removing his hat. “And you are?” Anywhere he visited, Adair always made it a point to get to know the staff. They were the best source of information.
“Peter.”
“What do you do here?”
“A little bit of everything.”
Keeping a brisk pace that tested Adair’s endurance, the wavy-haired guide led him to the second floor of the building. The silence surprised Adair.
“Where is everyone?”
“Tonight’s the final showing of The Spinster. I don’t expect the actors to arrive until later this afternoon. Mr. Riordan normally celebrates the end of a play with a midnight buffet and dancing. Though I’m not sure it will be appropriate this time.”
“Why not?”
Realizing he’d said too much, Peter ducked his head and increased the pace. Before long, they came to a bloodred metal-studded wooden door. He knocked three times, and a thin-faced gentleman sporting a monocle over one of his close-set eyes immediately opened it.
“Mr. Adair?” he inquired of Peter, who nodded before disappearing.
Waving a hand in a wide arc, he said, “Please come in, Mr. Adair.”
Adair eyed the private reception area, taking in its austere yet elegant furnishings. The twenty-foot-high ceiling gave the small room an illusion of airiness and grandeur. Two ornate high-backed chairs flanked a long cushioned bench. The large looking glass opposite the door added to the impression of spaciousness.
“May I take your hat, sir?”
“Thank you, no.” Adair adjusted his hat beneath his right elbow. He’d learned long ago to keep his belongings close at hand.
The man gestured toward a narrow, dimly lit corridor. “Follow me, if you will, sir.”
Adair limped after him. Though the man’s coat was of fine quality, the material hung from his narrow shoulders, making him appear overburdened and frail. But he knew appearances were often deceiving. Considering the gentleman’s confident tone and direct look, Adair suspected there was nothing frail about this man.
“Are you Mr. Riordan’s clerk?”
“I’m whatever he needs me to be, Mr. Adair.”
The corridor seemed to go on forever, the distance broken only by a pair of doors halfway down. Out of habit, Adair pressed his left arm against his side until he felt the solid, reassuring handle of his blade. Given his injured right shoulder, he hoped he would not be forced to use the weapon.
“Why do I feel like I’m being led into the bowels of hell, Mr.—?”
“I assure you, our destination is anything but.” The clerk deftly ignored Adair’s prompt for a name.
They came to the end of the passage, and his escort paused to knock on yet another bloodred door. He waited for the rumble of a masculine voice before twisting the handle and pushing the door open. Golden light spilled into the narrow corridor.
Over the years, Adair’s work had taken him from some of the most opulent homes in London to the most desolate slums of the city. He had held gold so pure that it could be scarred by a careless fingernail, and gemstones large enough to cover a man’s palm. But nothing he’d witnessed so far compared to the lavishness of the manager’s office.
Priceless paintings covered every inch of one wall and rich, jewel-toned drapes warmed every corner. Behind the gleaming mahogany desk, the spines of hundreds of books stood at attention, greeting awestruck visitors. Glass display cases hung on the adjacent wall at various intervals, carrying ancient scrolls written in an indecipherable script and what looked like playbills from long, long ago.
Blake Riordan’s office was nothing less than a museum of priceless antiquities. Antiquities to be enjoyed by one man.
Adair’s gaze finally settled on the imposing figure sitting behind a desk large enough to fit two people. The manager smiled, no doubt used to first-time visitors gawking at his collections.
Rising, Riordan strode forward, extending a hand. “Mr. Adair. I’m Blake Riordan, manager of the Augusta. Thank you for coming on such short notice.”
“Of course,” Adair said with a nod. “How may I help you?”
“Can I offer you something to drink?”
“No, thank you.”
The manager shared a look with his clerk. “The usual for me, Willis.”
“Very well, sir.” Rather than exit the way they’d come, Willis slipped behind a sapphire drape protecting one corner of the chamber.
The door behind Adair closed with a soft click. He whirled around to find a large bull of a man standing before the exit, arms crossed, features fixed into uncompromising lines.
Adair stepped back until he had both men in his line of sight.
“Be easy, Mr. Adair,” Riordan said. “Marian’s orders are to keep people out, not you in.”
Marian?
“Perhaps Marian would be more comfortable in the corridor, then.”
Riordan considered his request a moment before nodding to his bodyguard. The bulwark’s top lip curled into a snarl as he unfolded his massive arms and left the room.
Adair said, “An unusual precaution in an empty theater.”
“I’m not fond of surprises. Marian ensures I am not bothered by any.”
Riordan indicated a set of chairs near the ornate fireplace. “Shall we make ourselves more comfortable?”
“If it’s all the same to you, I’d prefer to stand.”
Riordan claimed one of the chairs. “You don’t trust easily, do you, Mr. Adair?”
“No,” Adair said with his customary frankness. He had learned a long time ago to keep a certain distance until he had a man’s—or woman’s—measure.
The sapphire drape rustled, signaling Willis’s return. A squat glass filled with a generous amount of amber liquid sat in the middle of the small silver tray he carried. He transferred the brimming tumbler to a side table near his employer’s chair.
“Thank you, Willis.”
“Anything else, sir?”
“Not at the moment.”
Willis disappeared once again, leaving a strained silence in his wake.
“Why am I here, Mr. Riordan?”
The skin around the theater manager’s mouth tightened. “What do you know of Lord or Lady Winthrop?”
He searched his mind. “From what I can recall, the lady likes her charities, and his lordship enjoys his cards.”
Riordan nodded. “Lady Winthrop has been a grand patroness of the Augusta for a number of years. Not only has she donated a good sum of money to the theater, she’s attended every production, without fail.”
Adair said nothing. He waited for the inevitable connecting dot.
The manager steepled his fingers, drumming the soft pads together. “This morning, after a set of auditions for a new play, we found the baroness’s slain body left inside one of our entrance passages.”
“Slain, how?”
“Five stab wounds to the stomach and a slash to her face.”
“What was stolen?”
“No one knows for sure. When we found her, she wore no jewelry, and her reticule contained only a few coins. Her husband is convinced a footpad followed her into the passageway and divested her of her valuables. I’m hoping the baroness’s lady’s maid can tell us what she was wearing.”
“Where did you find her reticule?”
“Still strapped around her wrist.”
“It would be unusual for a common footpad to kill his victim. Incapacitate, yes. Kill? Only if he feared for his life. And I have my doubts whether the baroness was capable of doing physical harm
.”
“People act outside expectations all the time.”
“True. But, for argument’s sake, let’s say this thief had murderous tendencies. No one of his ilk would be idiot enough to take the time to empty her reticule after murdering the victim. Her assailant would have taken the item with him and discarded it elsewhere. Not to mention the fact that committing theft and murder on the doorstep of a theater seems highly unusual.”
Riordan leaned back in his overstuffed leather chair, considering Adair. “I agree. This appears to be too brutal a killing for a random theft.”
“Why do I get the feeling you never believed the baroness was killed for her valuables?”
“It seemed the logical conclusion.”
“Then, I repeat. Why am I here?”
“I would like you to look into the murder.”
Adair raised a brow. “You’ve been misinformed, Riordan. I locate stolen goods and return them to their rightful owners. Murdered peers are Bow Street’s business.” Over the last year, he had accepted commissions to track down difficult-to-locate individuals. But these always came to him by word of mouth.
“The Bow Street who was sent over was inexperienced with an investigation of this caliber.”
“Then Winthrop should have requested another Runner.”
“Winthrop already has his mind made up and is content with his assessment. I, on the other hand, want to track down the bastard who not only killed a peer, but a patroness of the Augusta.”
“Then I wish you well, sir.” Adair nodded. “Be careful of whom you select. Bow Street won’t like others trampling on their turf, no matter how inexperienced their Runner.”
“I’m willing to pay handsomely for your trouble.”
In the midst of pivoting toward the exit, Adair paused, curling his fingers until he felt the bite of his nails. Since becoming a thief-taker, he had ruthlessly committed himself to accepting any lucrative case, whether or not he was keen on it. His drive to build his wealth had taken precedence over his conscience, always and without hesitation.
But after the Harrison case a few weeks ago, he had begun to question his priorities. “The amount of your blunt does not change the fact that I’m a thief-taker, not one of Bow Street’s investigators.”
“What about Nicholas Bellwood?”
The muscles at the base of Adair’s skull coiled. Only a few people existed that Adair would call friend—someone he would trust with his life. Nick Bellwood had been among that small number. Thirteen months ago, a dockhand found had Nick’s corpse bobbing in the Thames.
Seeing his friend’s often smiling face bloated and discolored from too many days in the water, and the mutilation done to the lower part of his body, had catapulted Adair into a mission of vengeance. It had taken him three weeks to hunt down the jealous merchant, whose wife preferred Nick’s company to his.
Not knowing exactly what Charley had heard about Nick’s death, he had chosen to spare her the grisly details of their friend’s murder. If only he could spare himself such knowledge.
When the merchant’s lifeless body had slipped beneath the muddy surface of the Thames, Adair had expected to feel more satisfaction, jubilation even, for having avenged his friend’s senseless death. He’d enjoyed none of those sensations to the extent he had anticipated. In fact, the blood on his hands and the merchant’s vacant, wide eyes had made his stomach cramp with revulsion. For a day or two.
Adair eyed the theater manager. For obvious reasons, few knew of his inquiry into Nick’s murder. “What of him?”
“I understand you did not rest until you’d located the man who killed your friend.”
“Where did you come by that bit of gossip?”
“Willis, my clerk, is Mr. Bellwood’s mother’s brother.”
Adair caught the curse between his teeth. All too clearly, he recalled his brief conversation with Bellwood’s mother after disposing of the merchant. He’d come upon her at the place where they had pulled her son’s body from the river, weeping into her handkerchief. Though she sobbed quietly, her bone-deep anguish reached his ears, and he hadn’t been able to stop the damning words from spewing forth.
To his credit, he hadn’t offered her a lengthy explanation, only a single, comforting comment. Rest assured, your son is at peace now. She had lifted her watery gaze to his, read the meaning behind the words in his eyes, and cried anew. He hadn’t known what to make of her reaction until he heard her choke out a soft, Thank you.
Flattening his gaze, Adair said, “I don’t believe I follow.”
Riordan smiled. “You’ve nothing to fear. The family is grateful for what you did, and Willis would not have shared the information with me had he been concerned I would not protect it.”
Adair’s gut knotted all over again, almost as if he stood at the river’s edge, watching the merchant’s body disappear beneath murky waters. Gratitude was the last thing he sought.
“Anything I may or may not have done several months ago would have been driven by grief. As I said before, my expertise lies in my ability to recover stolen property.”
“Then I’d like to hire you to recover a killer.”
“It’s not the same thing and you know it.”
“Do I? The steps you take to achieve your goal appear almost identical. You hunt, you locate, you collect, and you deliver. However, in this instance, I would ask that you leave the meting out of justice step to the authorities.”
Adair felt his resolve waver. Solving this case would not require him to set aside his principles in order to fill his coffers. Quite the contrary. He would be easing the minds of many people once he uncovered the killer’s identity.
Anticipation began to pulse through his veins. He had always enjoyed the pursuit, pitting his mind against that of his quarry and coming out the victor. Each fragment of information he collected brought him a step nearer to unraveling each mystery. When it came to the merchant, quarry became prey. What disturbed him most was the heightened exhilaration he had experienced when his search had propelled him closer and closer to Nick’s killer. He’d worked himself into a near frenzy by the time he’d found the man.
Reading Adair’s silence as refusal, Riordan said, “Very well, Mr. Adair. I can see you’re not influenced by monetary persuasion. If the boy’s convicted of Lady Winthrop’s murder, the theater will still suffer some repercussions from today’s atrocity, but not to the point of ruination.” He stood and extended his hand. “Thank you for coming.”
Ignoring the man’s outstretched hand, he asked, “Boy?”
The manager swept an arm toward the door, explaining as they walked. “The poor chap who stumbled over the body as he was leaving the theater and who will no doubt become Bow Street’s main suspect.”
“How old is he?”
“Fifteen? Sixteen? I can’t be sure.”
Near Trigger’s age.
“Do you think he killed her?”
“No way to know. I’ve seen him around the theater, off and on. He auditioned for a part in our new play. Quite talented, and he seemed a good lad. Then again, one cannot detect what lies in a man’s heart by his face and words alone.”
True. He’d witnessed acts of violence so heinous as to make him question the existence of God. What kind of husband beat his wife until she lost the use of one of her limbs, or caused her to die in the family’s home of a punctured lung while her children watched? What kind of person chained a dog to a wooden post and abused the animal for no other reason than to hear the animal cry? What kind of mother sold her young daughters to lustful men in exchange for a day’s worth of gin?
Yes, Adair had seen much to make him question the goodness of mankind. Yet no matter how hard he tried, he could not envision a young man Trigger’s age murdering a woman. Anyone, for that matter. Trigger understood the perils of London’s seedier side, though he did not possess an ounce of cruelty. Perhaps this boy Riordan spoke of was the same. Then again, maybe not. For all Adair knew, the urchin might gr
ow into one of the most detestable men roaming the streets.
Riordan placed his hand on the door’s latch. Adair’s blood thickened, heated, boiled from the pit of his stomach to the tips of his ears. His head pounded.
The door opened.
Adair pressed his palm against the surface, pushed until he heard the telltale click.
“His name?”
A sly smile cut across Riordan’s features. “A soft spot for children, Adair?”
“His name?” he repeated.
“Felix Scott.”
Iron rippled up Adair’s back. It would not do for Riordan, or any potential client, to take it into their head that he had a vulnerable spot in his armor. News of that nature traveled like a storm-charged wave, barreling across the open ocean. Someone in his position could not afford to have such a weakness become common knowledge.
So he made sure Riordan understood it was about the money and nothing more. “How handsomely?”
“Pardon?”
“You said you were willing to pay handsomely for my trouble. How much?”
The other man’s face turned sour. He named a figure.
“Double it.”
“I’ll do nothing of the sort.”
“Involving Bow Street will complicate my investigation by several degrees. And they have a head start.”
Riordan glanced away; a tic in his jaw revealed his barely leashed temper. “Very well.” His hard gaze bore into Adair’s. “Do not disappoint me.”
Adair raised a brow. “Have you stopped to consider that you might not like where the clues lead?”
“I have considered everything, Mr. Adair. At the moment, I’m most interested in containing the situation and easing my staff’s concerns.” Riordan opened the door again, and his hulking bodyguard appeared. “I’ll send Willis around to escort Mr. Adair to where we found Lady Winthrop’s body.”
Crossing the threshold, Adair kept both men in view.
Riordan said, “I might also suggest you speak with the apothecary and the boy’s sister.”
“Apothecary?” The word emerged harsh, almost guttural.
Night Storm (Bones & Gemstones Book 1) Page 9
