Fearless (Scarlet Suffragette, Book 1): A Victorian Historical Romantic Suspense Series

by Nicola Claire

  “You believe this a comic event?” I asked, indicating the letter he still held in his left hand. His right gripped his cane just as securely.

  “I have some knowledge of the Ripper, Miss Cassidy,” Kelly declared ominously. “The penmanship alone is disparate.”

  How well did he know the Ripper then? How close had he come to those crimes when still working London’s east end streets? Like myself, Inspector Kelly was an immigrant to New Zealand. A settler who either wished to find their glory upon its pristine, unmarked shores. Or escape their past by emigrating to the farthest regions of the earth.

  You could not get farther away from London than Auckland city.

  “So he is a mimic,” I offered.

  “A poor one at that,” Kelly replied, looking back down at the letter and frowning. “Your endeavours to rouse your sisters have brought me such entertainment. What does that mean?”

  “I’m sure I do not know.”

  “Think, Anna,” he pressed, once again pacing. “This man admires you. He wishes to impress you. He’s declared his position. Laid down the foundation for his next move.”

  “His next move?”

  “Another Suffragette,” Kelly declared; the words harsh sounds on the still air. “This will not be his last. See here?” He crossed the space that separated us and pointed to the line in the letter that corresponded with his declaration.

  For I see now just how my work shall unravel.

  “What does that mean?” I asked; a repetition of his early question.

  “You have given him purpose,” Kelly replied solemnly.

  I sat down heavily in the armchair beside the fire, seeing nothing of the bright flames, feeling little of their heated touch. I’d given the murderer purpose.

  “How?” I whispered.

  “Nothing you could have done or said differently,” Kelly rushed to assure me, but guilt washed my frame from head to toe, nonetheless. “Men like this attach themselves to a cause without significant reason. They require justification of their impulses and desires, and when they alight upon such, they grasp it most fervently.”

  “You speak with some experience, Inspector.”

  “Too much, Miss Cassidy. Too much.” He turned away and paced to the other side of the room again.

  Silence stretched between us, but for the crackle of the fire and the odd wooden creak indicating life existed in parts of the house unseen. I wondered if Mina had been made aware of the inspector’s visit. If she was even now sitting with Hardwick in the kitchen sharing a cup of tea and their latest joint hopes for a better outcome from this calling.

  It was futile hope. Just as it was futile for me to stop feeling guilt at Margaret and Mary’s deaths.

  “What happens now?” I asked, my voice quiet but resolved. I would not shy away from this curse. I would not pretend I didn’t have a part to play. More of my Suffragettes could be in danger.

  The murderer knew me. Did I know him as well?

  “Now I must needs return to the station and appraise the superintendent of this development.”

  “You’ve changed your tune, Inspector Kelly,” I remarked.

  “The superintendent has agreed to keep the information from the newspapers for the time being. I have his word, which is more than enough.” Kelly trusted Chalmers even if he did not necessarily like the man.

  “And what of Drummond?” I asked. “How goes the post-mortem of Mary Bennett?”

  Kelly stopped his pacing and turned amused eyes on me.

  “You were correct,” he said simply. “Two knives. The first a larger butcher style knife, used to subdue the victim and deliver the killing blow to her femoral artery. The second a smaller and sharper knife, such as a paring knife, used to skillfully mark her face and sever her tongue. The action of the second knife was carried out in a subdued manner. He has control, but only once the deed has been done, it seems.”

  “His skill is improving,” I noted. “The tongue is both a message and an opportunity to mimic the Ripper. But the decision to take it was made prior to death. To have carried two weapons upon himself would indicate a measure of forethought.”

  “When he did not for Margaret,” Inspector Kelly concluded.

  “One has to ask, what has he planned for the next?”

  Kelly just stared at me, his lips pressed in a thin line, his brow furrowed.

  “The Suffragettes must be placed on high alert,” he advised, receiving a small nod of my head from me. “No more meetings for the time being.”

  I didn’t fancy the poor man who told Ethel Poynton that fact.

  “What of disclosing Mary’s demise?” I asked, watching as the inspector ran a hand though his dark hair in frustration.

  “We’ll tell them we’ve received a written threat.” He glanced down at the letter still held in his hand. “One we believe has an element of dire truth to it.” His gaze flitted to the box holding Mary’s tongue. “No more meetings and the utmost care taken when out and about.”

  “Margaret was killed in broad daylight.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  “Mary in the early hours, before her husband was to be home from his night shift at the brickyards.”

  “Your point?”

  “The killer does not stick to a schedule.”

  “They often don’t.”

  “Then how can the safety of the Suffragettes be guaranteed?” I demanded.

  Kelly held my hard stare with a compassionate one of his own. I was sure I would not like his answer whenever he deemed fit to give it.

  “We cannot guarantee it, Anna. There simply is not enough constables to offer that level of protection.” He paused, then looked out of my front window, staring at the trees lining Franklin Street, leaves rustling in a light breeze. “But I shall assign one to your house, for yours.”

  “I do not believe I shall need one,” I offered.

  “Of course you will,” Kelly argued in return.

  I smiled. He frowned. Perhaps he was equally certain he would not like my answer too.

  “Out with it,” he gritted between his teeth.

  “I shall have an inspector guarding me,” I said, standing up and dusting down my skirt carefully.

  “I beg your pardon?” Kelly enquired, most politely.

  My eyes lifted to his; twin storms on blue seas.

  “I gather you’ll be on the hunt for this murderer, Inspector?”

  He slowly nodded his head, still frowning, still staring bright blue daggers at me.

  “Then it would be wise to take me with.”

  He let out a frustrated breath of air, but said, “Wise?”

  “He knows me,” I offered simply. “Perhaps I know him too.”

  Twelve

  Hear Me?

  Inspector Kelly

  “Absolutely not!” I said like a blustering buffoon. What did she take me for? “I shan’t allow it.”

  “I fail to see how allowing me, as you so delicately put it, has anything to do with catching this murderer.”

  “Then you fail to see how dangerous this undertaking could be,” I argued, determined to make Anna see sense.

  “I’ll be safe.”

  “You will not!”

  “I’ll have you and, no doubt, Sergeant Blackmore too.”

  “Whilst we confront a murderer and turn our backs on you! Or, perhaps, it shall go like this; we’ll be so distracted with protecting you, the murderer will slip through the noose and kill again. Do you wish for that to be on your conscience, Miss Cassidy?”

  It was a little harsh, but the woman needed firm handling.

  She didn’t even bat an eyelash. Instead she stepped closer, hands now fisted on her hips, drawing the eye to curves better left forgotten. I forced my gaze to remain on her face, attempting a neutral expression of my own. And met her toe to toe.

  Her neck arched as she looked up at my height; for a moment I regretted placing her in such an inferior position, and then she opened her mouth and
removed all doubt.

  “He has killed twice, Inspector Kelly. Once perhaps for the sake of convenience; an opportunity he could not pass up. The second chosen with care. The connection one we simply cannot ignore: Suffragettes. And now he sends missives, gruesome gifts from the scene of his debauched desires, to my home, to where Wilhelmina, an innocent, lives. Connecting me even further with this unconscionable mess. Tying the Suffragette movement and my role in it inextricably to these crimes. Should he kill again, Inspector, I have no doubt I shall wear the guilt on my conscience forever hence.

  “What would you have me do?” she asked, her voice lower, more intimate. The vitriol having passed, and the hammer blow about to be delivered. “Tell me, Andrew. What would you have me do?”

  All thought left me. Just this moment. Just Anna and me. Her soft tone. Her bright eyes. Her fire and passion; the picture of a petite warrior. Those words. My name on her lips.

  With a groan borne of frustration and long months of denial I reached forward, wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, and hauled her close to my chest, my lips claiming hers in a blistering kiss.

  She kissed me back; my fearless warrior. Her hands tangling in the lapels of my coat, her body moulding to mine in supreme supplication. A divine moment I was surely going to pay for in hell.

  And yet I couldn’t stop. Kissing her, tasting her. Feeling the heat from her body, the way she held on so tightly; not from fear, but from determination. Taking as much as I was giving. Stealing as much as I was yielding. Matching me crime for crime.

  But Anna was not the criminal here. Sweet, fiery Anna. That role was mine and mine alone.

  I pulled back, breathless, flushed in equal measure as her, at a guess. Her lips swollen. Her cheeks pinked with passion. Fervour and desire sparking in her beautiful soulful eyes. She was magnificent.

  And not mine.

  I let a long breath of air out, closing my eyes, fisting my hands, and taking a step back. My cane long forgotten, lost to the floor, I should think. I staggered, then righted myself, connecting with a table at the last moment to avoid too much more embarrassment. I gripped it firmly, while my heart rate slowed and the pulse at the side of my neck stopped hammering away inside my head.

  I ached. For her. For a different life. Different circumstances so that I could follow through with my desires. Meet her passion for passion on equal footing. But we were not equal, Anna and I. Far from it. And all I seemed to do was taint her with my darkness.

  She deserved so much better.

  “Please forgive me,” I managed to say, my voice rough but somehow still hollow. “That was entirely inappropriate.”

  For so many damn reasons.

  “Think nothing of it,” she announced from over my shoulder.

  I wanted to turn and face her, see exactly what that soft tone actually meant. But translating Anna’s words right now would not change a thing. We were both stuck fast in our prisons. Mine of my own making. Anna’s because she’d stolen a part of me.

  Not stolen. Freely given. When I had no right to give it away again.

  “It is too dangerous, Miss Cassidy,” I said, not moving from my stand beside the table I’d blindly been clinging to. I looked down at the box holding the tongue. Mary Bennett’s tongue, and imagined that it could be Anna’s.

  “It is a danger I am prepared to take,” she countered, but the fervour in her voice was lacking.

  I turned then, unable to stop myself in the end. Needing to see her. To reassure myself that I hadn’t ruined a very decent woman.

  “My investigation is taking me to the pugilist rings,” I offered, for want of something to say. “Not a fit locale for any lady, let alone one of such good standing.”

  She scoffed, as if my words were empty. Did she not see how high in esteem I regarded her?

  “I make house calls, Inspector. Did you know?”

  I nodded my head, searching her eyes for something of her meaning.

  “Not all of them are in a suitable locale for a lady.”

  “That is not a valid argument, Miss Cassidy.”

  “I think it is,” she countered and crossed to an umbrella stand. She withdrew a parasol I had seen her carrying on occasion. In fact, the very same parasol she’d had at Mechanics Bay.

  She turned towards me and twirled the umbrella with such precision and grace, making the object appear as if it floated in space, not held aloft by the tips of two fingers.

  “Impressive,” I offered. “But hardly a point in your favour.”

  Then she flicked a button on the side so quickly it was difficult to see the manoeuvre, and the parasol changed into something it surely was not. I stepped forward. She brandished it at me with the skill of a swordsman. Slicing through the air with practised ease. In a flash, the parasol/sword came down on an apple sitting to the side of her work station, dissecting the fruit in two even pieces.

  I stifled a smile; Anna Cassidy the highwayman. Or woman as the case may be.

  “And this is?” I enquired pleasantly.

  “I never leave home without it, when I’m doing my rounds.”

  “And you believe this would keep you safe in the close confines of the pugilist rings?” Precious, but delusional. That was my Anna.

  She dropped the parasol, and took two swift steps towards me, a flick-knife in her hand, the blade to my side in a split second. I hadn’t seen where she’d had it hidden. I hadn’t registered her hand move for it until the blade flashed in her grip. The knife was held firmly, with confidence. The sharp point not breaking skin, but promising blood.

  I stood stock still, both of us breathing easily. If hers was an act, it was indeed impressive.

  Then I swung my hand up and around, dislodging her hold on the knife and sending it clattering to the floor. I had her in a strong-arm grasp before she’d made her first startled sound. I realised her by the time she’d finished uttering it.

  “I am slow in comparison to some of these fighters, Anna,” I said with meaning. “Hindered as I am with an injury. Your strength is pale compared to mine. Compared to theirs. And think you not that the murderer is stronger still?”

  I saw the moment she conceded the point, bending down and pocketing the knife in measured movements. Taking the steps necessary to part her from my side and return her to her parasol. She picked the umbrella up, pressed that button on the side, making it once again innocuous. And then let out the most wretched, to my heart, sigh.

  “He knows me,” she whispered. “He’s invaded my home. My surgery.” The latter would have you think she values her workspace more than her home space. And you would be right. Here is where Anna comes alive. Here is where she grows wings.

  I was clipping them.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, moving to the box and letter on her workbench. “Truly I am. I shall have a constable across your street in less than an hour. Stay indoors until this is done.”

  “Do you have an identity?” she asked, as I crossed to the door.

  “Not yet, but investigations have progressed on less.”

  “No name, aside from the initials SF,” she pointed out.

  “A cover, nothing more.”

  “But I have met him,” she pressed. “I was at the first murder scene, seconds after Margaret fell. I was at the second, minutes before Mary met her end. I saw people at both locations. I heard things. I smelled them. I collected it all inside my mind.”

  She turned from her blank stare at the fire and faced me. Flames of her own flaring inside those mesmerising eyes.

  “Think you not, sir,” she said deliberately, repeating my earlier phrase back to me, “that I have seen his face? Heard his voice? Smelled his cologne? Think you not that I have more to offer your investigation than blindly following clues?”

  “We don’t blindly follow clues,” I answered unconsciously. “Ours is a tried and true method. One practised for years on the darker streets of London’s East End.”

  She blinked up at me, something of int
erest and concern flashing in her eyes.

  “Have you caught him?”

  I frowned.

  “Do you have a name?”

  I began to scowl.

  “And tonight, when you leave the pugilist rings and have nothing further to add to your investigation, save perhaps another ambiguous clue, what will happen then? Another murder? Another lost Suffragette?”

  “Anna,” I started.

  “Do you want to catch him, Inspector?”

  “Of course,” I countered immediately.

  “Do you want to prevent another death?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then let me come with you. Let me help. I can do this, you know I can.”

  I shook my head, my heart a hard lump inside my chest. God forgive me; I was leading this woman astray.

  “Anna,” I tried again.

  “Andrew,” she replied, and the brief look of longing she threw my way was almost enough to fell me. But the sound of strength and determination in her tone made me proud.

  “Damnation, woman! What would you have me say?”

  She smiled; the minx. Picking up her parasol, she crossed to the door to the surgery. Popping her head around the frame she announced, “Oh, there you are. Splendid. Have all my appointments cancelled for the day.”

  I followed out behind her, stunned and beguiled at the same time. Anna could sell coal to a coal miner. I watched, mildly dazed, as she donned a hat and coat, that damned parasol again in her gloved hands, and then stood aside waiting patiently for me to pass by.

  I was vaguely away of Anna’s housekeeper and cousin watching from farther back in the house, but my eyes were all for Anna. This incredible woman. This fearless wonder. This delightful thorn in my side.

  “I’m in charge,” I said gruffly, placing my hat on my head and tapping my cane on the ground, just once.

  “Of course, Inspector,” she countered, opening the door and signalling for me to walk through.

  “I mean it, Miss Cassidy,” I reiterated. “You do as I say, when I say. No back chat. Hear me?”

  Her smile was blinding, but then it could have been the midday sun, high in the sky over her head.

  I let out a beleaguered sigh and followed her to the curricle, assisting when it came time to mount. My eyes caught hers in the movement, before she had a chance to glance away in self-satisfied pride.