Page 9 of Courier of Death
Confusion swirled all afternoon at the Yard about Lloyd’s hidden connections to Clan na Gael and the Irish Republican Brotherhood. They’d all been on edge, waiting for more reports of bombs exploding throughout the city, as the letter had warned months ago when it arrived. But no additional blasts had occurred.
Arriving at the Adelphi, Jasper strove to push the chaos of the day to the back of his mind and focus on the young woman he’d been courting for nearly six months. It wasn’t easy, especially when they settled into their seats, and Constance had yet to inquire about the bombing. Employed atThe Timesas a typist for the society pages, she would have almost certainly been privy to the news. Or perhaps she hadn’t been paying any attention beyond the gossip columns.
Her seeming lack of acknowledgement, however, grated on him, and he’d grown more discomfited as the first act, then the second played out on stage. At last, after the final curtain, they hired a cab to return Constance to her lodgings. Once they’d settled into the enclosed bench seat, the driver perched high behind them, Jasper at last broached the subject.
“Did you hear about the bombing at Scotland Yard today?” He tried to keep his tone conversational.
She twisted in the seat next to him as the small cab bore them away from the busy street outside the theatre. She was strikingly pretty, with blonde hair, large and expressive blue eyes, and a figure that turned men’s heads. As the daughter of a viscount’s younger brother, she wasn’t titled, but she was still an aristocrat. She was also Oliver Hayes’s cousin, which was how Jasper had been introduced to her back in the autumn. Oliver, the Viscount Hayes, and Jasper and Constance often went out on the town together. It was easy to sit back and let the two of them do all the talking—all the laughing and socializing too.
Constance’s lips popped open, but instead of noticing the rosy fullness of them, he noted how she suddenly appeared remorseful.
“Oh, yes, I had heard. A man was killed, wasn’t he?”
It wasn’t the answer he’d wanted. An aloof claim to this being the first she’d heard of it wouldn’t have fallen through him ashollowly. She’d known about the attack, that a fellow officer had died, and yet she hadn’t thought to ask him about any of it.
“A police constable, yes,” he replied solemnly.
Constance slipped her arm through his. “Is it true that he was trying to bring the bomb into your building?”
“Allegedly.”
The remnants of the suitcase Lloyd had been carrying, which Leo had been certain belonged to a woman, had been inspected by Her Majesty’s Inspector of Explosives, Colonel Derring Majendie. Highly esteemed as the country’s best bomb analyst, he’d been called to the Yard to investigate the remains of the leather case. Jasper had gotten it from Lewis, who’d heard from Detective Sergeant LaChance, that the case did appear to belong to a woman. Some of the pink and white striped silk interior cloth remained on the strips of leather after the blast, and when pieced together, it was embellished with floral embroidery, along with a partial monogram: GL.
“Well then, I’m not sorry he’s dead,” Constance said. “If he intended to kill other officers, he deserves what happened to him.”
Jasper stiffened at the unfeeling, pejorative comment. It wasn’t the first of its kind that she’d made to him. The more he’d come to know her, the more she’d begun to express them. While she was usually merry and brisk with a laugh or observation, there were times when she appeared to lack deeper feeling or concern. He’d been brushing off these moments for a few months now, explaining them away as a product of her privileged and sheltered upbringing. But they were becoming more and more difficult to dismiss.
She laid her head against his shoulder. “I’m glad you weren’t injured.”
While he appreciated the belated remark, no inquiry was made about other possible victims or injuries. Leo came to mind.
All day, he’d bristled with stifled fury when he thought of how close she had been to Lloyd when the bomb detonated. Had Jasper not detained her in the lobby and kept her from leaving for another minute, she might have been right next to the constable at the time of the blast. She might have been killed.
Jasper had wanted to stop by the morgue on his way home to be sure she was recovering well. But after some vacillating, he decided to stay away. She had made it clear she didn’t want to see him or accept his help.
Leo had always claimed to have no recollection of the awful night when her family had been slain. She’d certainly never revealed that she’d received help during the ordeal. But Jasper always suspected that it was a lie. She had a perfect memory, and yet the night of February 16, 1867, as well as much of her life before then, was a blur to her. Jasper had been left to wonder what would happen if she ever did work out that it had beenhimin the attic. That he was related to her family’s killers. He’d assumed it would be total excommunication, and he’d been correct. A part of him had also questioned if she would be angry enough to reveal who he truly was to other people—Scotland Yard, specifically. But so far, she hadn’t.
Constance’s hand settled upon his, lifting him from his thoughts. She wove her fingers through his. Softly, she said, “Why don’t you tell the cabbie to take us to Charles Street instead of my boardinghouse?”
Jasper went rigid in his seat. When the urge to remove her hand from his struck, he knew the problems he’d been acknowledging lately, then dismissing, could no longer be ignored.
“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” he replied.
This last month, she’d become more forward in her affections, and with some guilt, he’d willingly received them. More ardent kisses, a few salacious explorations with her hands.Nothing so bold that she would be ruined or debased, but these moments certainly all pointed toward an official betrothal in the near future. In two weeks, her parents and younger brother were due to arrive in London, and though she hadn’t expressly said it, Constance expected Jasper to ask her father for her hand in marriage.
The man Jasper thought of as his father, Gregory Reid, had married well above his station too. The Honorable Emmaline Cowper, the daughter of a viscount, had gone against her family’s wishes and married a police inspector.
Given his own career at Scotland Yard and his courtship with a lady of status, Jasper seemed to be walking in his father’s footsteps. But there was a significant difference between them, one that Jasper could no longer deny. Gregory Reid had been desperately in love with Emmaline. Jasper simply did not feel the same way for Constance.
“You know I am a thoroughly modern woman,” she said with a small laugh. “So modern, in fact, that I plan to tell my parents all about my job at the paper. I no longer care what they will do. I am a woman who makes her own decisions.”
And her decision that they should go to his home on Charles Street wasn’t something that could be misconstrued. As much as he’d enjoy a tumble in bed—it had been a hell of a long time since he’d been with a woman—he couldn’t do it. After that, he’d have no choice but to propose. He’d have to marry her.
Hell.
“I’ve been needing to speak to you about something, Constance,” he said, haltingly. “I should have long before now.”
He’d been selfish to allow their relationship to go on. Part of him had hoped that with time, the certainty that she was right for him would come. It hadn’t. And he could no longer pretend that it would.
