After all, what could they discover that would prove her innocence? Perhaps if the apothecary who dispensed the sedative could identify that it was Fergus who purchased it, then that may assist. Though she was sure Fergus would simply say Connie had found his remedy and used it herself.
Although there was the servant Mrs. Morgan mentioned, who saw Fergus dispose of the bottle, after having been in the duke’s and Connie’s rooms… Surely that would point to Fergus as being the murderer? Particularly if the apothecary also identified Fergus.
They had to get into that club to speak with the man. But it was odd that both the apothecary and Duncan had been patrons of the same club. Or perhaps not? Connie was so confused. Honestly, she felt like her head was going to burst in short order if she didn’t get some clarity around the entire situation.
But when had she had clarity in the past few years? Rarely, if ever. And the main issue at the moment was the ticking clock they seemed to be racing against.
What if Fergus found them today? Her hands got all clammy at the idea.
Pushing the thought firmly aside, Connie brushed her hair, twisting it into a quick bun. Satisfied she had done an adequate job of minimizing the distinctiveness of it as much as she could, she turned and strode over to the door.
But then she stopped short as she spotted the file the doctor had given Alec, sitting on the side table, almost beckoning to her. Did she really want to read more details regarding the women with whom Duncan had cheated on her? She’d already glanced at their names on the list Malcolm had provided last night. Did she want to dig further?
Quickly, before she lost her courage, she strode over to the file and flipped open the cover. There were several pieces of parchment inside, and Connie quickly scanned them. Like Malcolm’s list, they contained names of the women Duncan had apparently had affairs with. But unlike Malcolm’s list, there was a bit more detail about the ladies themselves, and some even had notes about their families.
Her heart started to beat faster when she recognized the name of one of the missing women’s family members. Next to the name Cassandra Donovan, there was the name of the woman’s sister listed. Seraphina.
What were the chances that there were two ladies with the name Seraphina, both linked to the Campbells?
Slim to none was Connie’s guess.
…
“What do you mean she hasn’t been found?” Fergus had to control his frustration at the announcement. He’d sent his men to scour the city all through the night, and this was what they came up with? Nothing.
He should have expected no less, really.
But as more time passed, so was the chance she would slip through his fingers, and he couldn’t allow that. He was the only thing standing between her and the gallows. He had to find her before it was too late and the authorities did.
“Your grace, we have checked all the major hotels in the city, and she is not in any of them.” His second-in-command, Darius, replied. “Perhaps your source is incorrect, and she is not in Inverness? It is not the first time we’ve paid for information, only to later find out it had been tailored to suit our needs, containing little of the truth.”
Fergus slammed his cutlery down onto the breakfast table. “She’s here, Darius. I can feel it.” He took a calming breath, then picked up a serviette before gently wiping at the corners of his mouth. Perhaps they’d been looking at it all wrong. “Maybe she is not traveling alone as was suggested to me the other day.”
Darius pursed his lips. “I suppose that could be the case, but who would she be traveling with? Before we left, I made certain that all the servants at the castle had been accounted for, most especially the housekeeper, Mrs. Morgan, as you requested.”
Fergus had been certain that if anyone had helped Connie escape, it would have been that woman, who always acted like a darn mother hen around Connie. “Perhaps it wasn’t a servant.” Fergus rubbed his chin as he thought of the possibilities and the ramifications.
“If not a servant, who, then?”
Immediately an image came to Fergus’s mind. “Damn it. I should have thought of it sooner. If I had to place a wager on it, I would say it was Alec bloody McGuiness helping her.”
The drink that Darius just raised to his lips was returned to the table with a clatter. “Alec McGuiness? As in the younger son of the Earl of Caldwell? That could complicate things. His brother is darn terrifying, and I’m sure he’d take exception to anything happening to his brother.”
He didn’t really care much if Iain McGuiness, the Viscount of Dalkeith, took exception to anything or not. What he did care about was finding Constance, and if Alec McGuiness was assisting her, then he was aiding and abetting a felon. “We have been going about our search all wrong. We should have been looking for a couple.”
“Aye, that certainly would have helped, I’m thinking.”
“Have the men make those inquiries again, but this time searching for a couple.”
“Aye, your grace,” Darius replied, standing and bowing deftly to Fergus before spinning on his heels and leaving the dining room of the Campbell town house.
Fergus watched him go and then sighed. He’d thought he would have caught Connie before now, or certainly within the first day upon arriving in Inverness. Yet neither had happened. He should have recognized sooner that she would have needed help to have successfully eluded him. It was stupid of him to not have seen it.
“Good morning, my love.”
Fergus looked up at the doorway as his current paramour, Lady Tarlington, swept into the room. As usual, the sight of her sent a swift flicker of desire through him. Seraphina was always dressed immaculately, and this morning was no different; the red velvet of her day dress clinging to her every curve was tasteful yet seductive all at once, while the lace fichu just barely covering the swell of her bosoms above her neckline was the perfect touch of proper mixed with a hint of risqué.
He’d seriously been considering marrying her before Duncan’s death. But now… Well, he couldn’t do that now that he was the new duke. He would have to marry for duty and honor and find a suitable virgin to be his duchess. He couldn’t marry a widower with a rather mysterious past. No matter how she stirred his loins.
It was a shame. But life wasn’t always fair.
“Have you found her yet?” Seraphina asked as she sat down across from him and motioned for the footman to pour her a cup of tea.
“No,” Fergus replied. “She is proving rather elusive I’m afraid. But I think that’s because I assumed she was traveling alone.”
Seraphina raised a brow. “And you don’t think she is?”
“No. I’m beginning to suspect that Alec McGuiness is with her.”
“How interesting.” Seraphina smiled at him before taking a sip. “Though I do wonder why they came here?”
Yes, Fergus was wondering that himself. Had it been Alec’s suggestion or Constance’s to travel to Inverness instead of fleeing to London as he’d first thought she would? “I’m not certain. But I need to find her before the authorities do.”
“I didn’t think you’d alerted the police to the fact that she had escaped yet.” Seraphina replaced the cup down on her saucer with a gentle clink. “That could complicate matters.”
“Apparently the inspector arrived at Castle Kilmaine yesterday,” Fergus explained. “Unfortunately, Mrs. Morgan told him where we were headed.”
“That housekeeper has never liked you, my love,” Seraphina commented. “Perhaps we should think of replacing her?”
No, Mrs. Morgan had never liked him, a fact Fergus had been well aware of. Though he didn’t like that Seraphina was including herself in the equation regarding staff and what to do with them. It didn’t bode well for their future together, Fergus was afraid. Particularly as he now knew their liaison could never amount to more than an affair.
“Do you th
ink Constance came here because she isn’t guilty of murdering your brother?”
Fergus’s eyes narrowed upon Seraphina. “But if she didn’t kill him, who did?”
Seraphina shrugged. “Now that is a very good question. I wonder if the inspector will discover that it was one of your knives found lodged in Duncan’s chest?”
Fergus felt his insides clench. “Which is exactly why Connie did kill him, my dear. She was trying to frame me.”
“Well, whoever killed him,” Seraphina said, reaching out and patting his hand, “I’m glad of it. You know my thoughts on your brother.”
Yes. Fergus was well aware of the dislike his mistress had held for his brother. A dislike he himself felt, too.
Guilt still threatened to consume him whenever he thought about his brother’s violence and irredeemable actions, which could have clouded his perceptions. He knew he should have done something sooner to stop Duncan. He’d known it for years, ever since they were boys and Duncan had shown a sense of perverse enjoyment in tormenting and torturing any animals that were unlucky enough to get in his path.
Fergus had often prayed to God to forgive Duncan. And over the years Duncan’s sins had become numerous. Far too numerous to forgive, he’d come to believe. But still he prayed, even now. Because perhaps if God could forgive Duncan’s sins, he could also forgive Fergus’s.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
There was excitement shining from Connie’s eyes as she hurried through the door and out into the hallway where Alec was waiting for her.
He immediately straightened. “What is it?”
“The doctor wrote down some names of the missing women’s family, and I recognized one of them!”
“You did?” He stopped himself before he took her hand in his own. It was hard to remember to stop touching her. But stop himself he must, if he wanted to have any chance at stamping out this overwhelming feeling of wanting her.
Not to mention that he feared if he did actually keep touching her, even in complete innocence, he wouldn’t be able to stop. He wouldn’t want to stop. So rather than reaching out to take her arm, he instead motioned her in front of him.
“Well, a part of one of the names, in any event.” Connie’s steps were light beside his own as they walked side by side along the hallway and then down the stairs to the ground floor.
“Part of a name?” Alec asked as they entered the breakfast room. The smell of freshly cooked bread and the sound of bacon sizzling on a hot pan hit him, and his stomach rumbled in appreciation. He’d not realized he was so famished.
“Yes,” Connie said. “Seraphina.”
“As in Fergus’s mistress, Lady Tarlington?” That would prove to be an odd coincidence—and a potential lead.
Connie shrugged. “I don’t know. The woman was listed as Seraphina Donovan, sister to a Miss Cassandra Donovan, one of Duncan’s mistresses who disappeared more than two years ago.”
“Seraphina is a very uncommon name.”
“Exactly!” Connie enthused as they sat at a table. “What are the chances that there are two Seraphinas who both have been involved with the Campbells?”
“Rather slim, I’d hazard,” Alec replied.
“Precisely!” There was almost a palpable excitement on her face that Alec found entrancing. “We’re going to need to speak with Seraphina, aren’t we?”
He really had to shake himself to stop thinking about how stunning Connie looked sitting there, with a sparkle in her eyes, highlighted by the shaft of sunlight streaming in from the window to her right. There was no time to be entranced by anything. “Yes, I think we should speak with her; I only wish I’d thought to ask her more about the whole incident when she helped me in your escape. I just never thought she may be connected to it at all, apart from her observations that Fergus was absent from her bed for part of the night. A shame she’s at Castle Kilmaine.”
“Oh, she won’t be,” Connie said. “If Fergus is here, then Lady Tarlington will be, too.”
“She travels with him often?”
“Lately, yes, always.” Connie opened the menu in front of her. “Odd, considering I didn’t think she was all that fond of Fergus in the first place.”
Alec cocked an eyebrow. “What woman is ever particularly fond of her paramour?”
She peeked over the menu at him. “Yes, women sleep with men for many reasons, and rarely does it have to do with love.”
Briefly, he wondered if she was referring to their encounter last night. The thought didn’t sit particularly well with him, though he didn’t know why. Especially as love was the last thing he wanted to think of when it came to Connie. Not when each day he seemed to be lusting after her more and more.
And he’d never been like this, not even when he’d been infatuated with Elise. It was a worrying behavior and one he needed to put a stop to. The women in his life had always betrayed or left him. He had to remember that.
If only his body would listen.
…
The acidic smell of blood was thick in the air as deep red pools of the stuff covered the floor, oozing in a wet mess underneath the body of Dr. Howlett. The man had died with a slash to his neck, which had prevented him from calling out, yet he would have been starkly aware that his lifeblood was slowly draining out of him.
A horrible way to die for a doctor.
Sergeant Jarrod Clemmings rose from where he was crouched beside the body and motioned the coroner’s assistant over to him. “Any ideas on when he died?”
Doctor Latham’s blue eyes looked enormous behind the thick lenses of his spectacles, and there was a definite glimmer of fascinated interest as the man peered down and inspected the body. Latham was an odd duck, in Jarrod’s opinion, often exhibiting an overly enthusiastic approach to his profession, though that was probably required in a man training to be the next coroner. And unlike the current coroner, who often displayed a decided lack of enthusiasm, Latham was always thorough and had a keen eye for detail, which was of great assistance in Jarrod’s investigations.
“Given the rigidity of his limbs, which look to be rather stiff,” Latham began, “it would appear that rigor mortis is at its peak, so if I had to guess a time frame for his death, I’d say anywhere between ten to fourteen hours ago. Though it is rather cold in here, so it could be closer to the fourteen-hour mark. Cold does tend to slow down the process somewhat, you see.”
Yes, Jarrod did see. And the room was cold, given the chill wind whipping in from the open window above the examination table on the far side of the wall. Probably how the killer had gotten into and out of the surgery, considering the front and back entrances had been locked up tight when the receptionist arrived this morning and made the grim discovery. “So sometime between six o’clock and ten last night?”
The doctor nodded, his thin neck looking as if it barely supported his head. “Yes, indeed. And probably closer to the six o’clock mark, I’d say.” He pushed his glasses farther up his nose. “A horrible way to die, though, isn’t it? Particularly for a medical professional who would have known the wound was fatal but been unable to do anything about it.”
Jarrod rather thought any manner of murder was a horrible way to die, at least for the victim, though he had to agree with the doctor in this case. “Did it take long for him to bleed out?” Doctor Howlett had been tied with his hands behind his back, presumably before his throat was slashed, so the man had literally been helpless to do anything to staunch the flow of blood, let alone even call out for help. Whoever had killed him had wanted him to suffer. That much was clear.
“Not long,” Latham answered. “At least once his throat had been cut. But I believe he may have been tortured for a little bit beforehand.”
“Tortured?” Jarrod’s eyes searched Latham’s. “What do you mean, tortured?” As far as Jarrod could tell there were no signs of torture on the doctor’s body, though
the entire front of his shirt was covered in too much blood to be certain.
“Well, there are several small stab wounds to the man’s chest.” Latham pointed to a few tiny tears in Howlett’s shirt.
Jarrod peered closer to where the doctor was pointing, and with surprise realized that Latham was right. There were very small cut marks in the fabric, which Jarrod hadn’t even noticed. But now that they’d been pointed out, they were hard to miss. “They’re too small for a dagger, aren’t they?”
Latham rubbed his chin. “Yes. I don’t think it was a dagger at all. Perhaps a letter opener or a small pen knife? Until I conduct the autopsy, though, I won’t know for certain.”
“How do you know, then, that the man was tortured?” Jarrod asked him.
“There are probably a good twenty of those cuts, and none would have caused the man to die.” Latham shrugged. “They were inflicted before the slash across his neck, which I presume, at least from an outward examination, was the fatal wound. So why bother stabbing him twenty times unless it was to inflict pain before the finale?”
Jarrod nodded and shifted his weight from the balls of his heels to the toes. What Doctor Latham said made sense, though why anyone would want to torture the doctor was a question to be answered.
“Excuse me, Sergeant?”
Jarrod turned to face Constable Henry Hammond, a young officer who was assisting him. Henry was a good lad, who had a keen eye and an even better ability to make strangers feel at ease. All handy traits to have when trying to elicit information out of witnesses and suspects alike. Which was why Jarrod had set him with the task of taking a statement from the previously hysterical receptionist who had found her employer dead.
As soon as the boy had started chatting with the lady, she’d instantly calmed down, enough so that Hammond had been able to lead her out into the reception area and away from the body to take a notebook statement from her. “What is it, Hammond? Has the lady remembered anything of use?”
Hammond looked slightly perturbed. “I’m not certain, but when I asked her if anything unusual occurred yesterday, she mentioned two things.” The young constable glanced briefly over at the assistant coroner, who was still busily inspecting the body, then he lowered his voice to a whisper. “You remember the telegraph we received from Inspector Johnson late yesterday?”
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