“Why turn Pierce into a crawler?” Mary asked. “If his blood is so valuable? Why kill the raptor disguised as Pierce, for that matter? When all it served to do was alert us to the abduction?”
Talent’s eyes narrowed as if he was annoyed at her question. “We cannot yet say with any authority that whoever killed the raptor also made Pierce a crawler.” The muscle along his jaw bunched. “You do realize that Pierce might have been sold on the black market for experiments.”
On that pleasant thought, the room fell silent.
“I do not know if it is of any significance,” said Mary, “but we found this at the scene in Trafalgar Square.” She pulled the feather out of her pocket and handed it to Mrs. Lane. Even that small contact sent a zing of power down her fingers.
Mrs. Lane’s straight brows lifted. “An angel’s feather.” She held the thing with care, touching only the very base with her fingertips. “Extraordinary.”
“Angel?” Mary took back the proffered feather and carefully tucked it away. “Are you quite sure?” An angel hadn’t been sighted in London since 1666, during the Great Fire of London. That catastrophe had apparently occurred when a fallen angel decided to set London ablaze in an attempt to cripple England during its war with the Dutch.
“Quite,” Mrs. Lane said smartly. “Can you not feel the power in it?” Her pale lips flattened. “Dark and disturbed. I would guess that particular plumage belongs to a fallen.”
“Christ,” said Talent. “That is just what we need, an incalculably strong, and likely mad, immortal to add to the mix.”
“Why do you assume mad?” Mary asked.
His expression turned cold. “The older ones usually are. And fallen are older than dirt.”
Poppy nodded in an absent sort of way. “Sometimes they are mad. And there will be times when a fallen will be standing right in front of you, and you will never know it because they appear so human.” She gave a brief, small smile. “They aren’t inclined to reveal their true nature to anyone other than one of their own kind. Nor are they inclined to mix with other immortals.”
“Someone would have seen a fallen flying about,” said Talent. “Can’t mistake something that big for a bloody bird.”
Mary almost laughed but caught herself at the last moment. “Yes, but how many people ever look up? And there is our lovely London fog to hide in, is there not?”
Poppy shook her head. “Perhaps you two are unaware of this, but a fallen can shift his appearance as well as you can. Likely even better. A person might very well see a bird when one flies overhead.” With a sigh Mrs. Lane sat back once more and idly tapped her lip with her forefinger. “So, we have an identity stolen, dead shifters and raptors, shadow crawlers running amok, and now possibly a fallen interfering. What a bloody mess.” She turned then, her dark gaze sharp and waiting. “What is the connection?”
The real question was, how was it all linked to Jack Talent? Mary might have considered him guilty of killing raptors, but to kidnap a fellow shifter? Make a shadow crawler? She couldn’t fathom it. Mercer had to have been lying to her. But why?
“It is impossible to tell,” Talent answered before Mary could. “With this shift in his pattern, it will be difficult to track the killer at the moment.”
“Not entirely,” Mrs. Lane said. “As it appears he has a new taste for shifters, we’ll have to find a way to catch him in the act.” Her legs swung down as she sat upright and pulled a sheet of paper from a file. “The list of remaining shifters,” she said, handing it to Mary. “One of whom is in America at the moment, visiting relatives.”
Mary read over the list, aware that Talent hadn’t moved to take it from her or even read the thing. “That leaves a Jonathan Deermont, tenth Earl of Darby and…” Mary trailed off as she read the name.
Mrs. Lane’s hard gaze flashed to Talent just as Mary’s did. “Master Talent,” said Mrs. Lane, finishing for her.
Mary’s blood ran cold. Was he a target? Or simply making himself the last shifter left in London? Her head throbbed.
Talent’s sneer was chilling, but a certain dark humor dwelled within his gaze. “Perhaps I should just offer myself up at Trafalgar Square and be done with it.” He did not appear to mind the prospect.
A wry smile tilted Mrs. Lane’s lips. “My sources tell me Lord Darby has arrived from Hampshire this afternoon. We shall make arrangements to watch him. After that, we’ll see if you need to be offered up for bait.”
Holly Evernight loved her job. It was what she’d been born to do. Inventing was in her blood: from her grandfather Eamon to her cousins, the Evernights viewed the world differently. Possibility. Potential. Life was filled with them. One did not look at a gun and ask, How do I refine it? One looked at a gun and asked, How do I make it extraordinary? A thing was not defined by its limits, but by its potential to reach beyond them. Holly often thought people would do well to subscribe to the same practice and reach beyond society’s expectations. Which was precisely why she loved the SOS, for it never set limits.
Yet even the most dedicated worker must at some point rest. A fact Holly could concede a few hours after her meeting with Mary and Talent. She rubbed her dry eyes and set down her propelling pencil. The design she worked on wavered before her, a sure sign to call it a day. Or night rather. The lofty space of her workshop was quiet and still, wide shafts of blue moonlight pouring in clean lines through the big windows. For a moment she simply stared at the geometric grid the moonbeams made upon the marble floor, then shook herself out of the trance.
Cleanup took but a moment. Locking away her drafts, Holly moved on limbs that had gone as stiff as cooled India rubber. Outside, in the main halls of the SOS, regulators drifted around. Their natural, free-flowing conversations pinged like brittle tin against Holly’s ears. She was not accustomed to social interaction. Indeed, it drained her and took time away from better things, such as the next invention. But she tried to offer a smile in return for the ones given her.
Heading toward the tunnels and the way out, Holly came to a halt when the massive iron doors swung open, and a pair of fellows came in pushing a trolley between them. Beneath a black pall was the lumpy form of a body. One man caught her gaze, and his hooded eyes lowered as if he hadn’t the right to look at her. It was a ridiculous notion but one that baggers tended to stick to, for few of their colleagues wanted anything to do with them.
Baggers had the inglorious job of prowling the streets for bodies. Should they find any of a supernatural nature, they picked them up and brought them in for inspection and disposal. A grim bunch. Regardless, Holly understood death as a natural progression of life. And so she gave the man a decided nod. “Good morning, Mr. Kane. Or evening rather.” Her smile felt awkward. “I tend to muddle the time.”
His black brows lifted a fraction, but he nodded back. “Mistress Evernight.” His voice was a deep burr, rough as broken glass, but welcoming enough. Not that he paused. He and his partner, a stocky fellow whose name eluded her at the moment, walked on, his partner giving her the side eye as if he wondered over her sanity because she had talked to them. But he nodded as well and gave a curt “Miss.”
Holly, however, caught the distinct acrid scent of an electrical fire. That it was mixed with the unfortunate aroma of roasted flesh did not stop her from stepping forward. “A moment, gentlemen.”
They paused, the large Mr. Kane lifting those thick brows of his once again. But he did not speak.
“Has this poor person been burned by electrical shock?”
Now his partner joined him in raised brows. “It isn’t anything you’ll be wanting to see, miss.”
“I gather not,” she agreed. “However, as my current specialty is electrical devices, I may be asked to give my opinion regardless.” She motioned to the body. “If I could take a look.”
The man bristled but Kane lifted back the pall. The sight was gruesome. Melted flesh, black singed clothes, and a gaping hole where the fellow’s chest ought to be. Most definitely death
by electrical shock. Holly swallowed sharply, then leaned closer. There in that bloody, gory cavity were the remnants of metal. “He was a GIM,” she said, peering at the network of finely wrought valves that were attached to the various arteries and veins.
The sheet flicked back over the body, and Holly gave a start. Coal-black eyes met hers. “As you say, miss,” Kane murmured before pushing off without so much as a by-your-leave. Holly stared after the silent pair, the squeaking wheels of the trolley echoing in the dim space. With a suppressed sigh, she left for the tunnels.
Outside, the air was icy and sharp, and she sucked in a good lungful, trying to refresh her sluggish brain. To her right lay the Palace of Westminster, looming so high and proud that it blocked the moon. Coaches rattled by, and the sounds of the city filled the void. Holly moved toward the hack stand where an SOS guard stood in disguise, his job to keep watch over all comings and goings from this particularly busy entrance. But before she could take another step, something slammed into her, and a hard hand clamped over her mouth.
Holly had no time to swing a fist before she was dragged back into the shadows. She thought she heard someone shout her name, but the sound was muffled. From the periphery came a glimpse of pale hair and the flashing of green eyes. The hand pressed so hard that tears prickled her eyes, just as a pinch at her neck sent a jolt of pain and the welcoming oblivion of darkness.
Chapter Eleven
How is it that an earl is a shifter?” Mary asked as she and Talent danced around the earl’s elegant ballroom. Conversation was necessary. Having been dispatched to watch over the Earl of Darby, the last remaining shifter in London—aside from Talent—they’d been obliged to dance, as the activity brought them closer to their mark. It also brought them into close contact with each other. A notion that had glared like scorching sunlight upon Mary when Talent gruffly took her hand and led her out to the dance floor.
The first touch of his hand upon her waist had brought her into stiff resistance. And for the first few notes of the waltz, they’d stumbled around the floor in awkward, mutual reluctance, any sense of grace destroyed by their attempts to remain at a distance.
But now Talent leaned in a touch, and his warmth enveloped her. “It runs in his family. He is one of the few who chose not to hide himself in another life.”
“I suppose the fact that he holds a title is a good motive to remain as he is,” Mary murmured.
In the golden, hazy candlelight of the ballroom, Talent’s eyes glinted as he scanned the crowd, his features arranged in a scowl of concentration and vague disapproval. Dressed in fine evening kit, his hair tamed for once and his cheeks clean-shaven, Talent certainly appeared the part of an entitled gentleman, if one overlooked the frenetic strength emanating from him. He stood a head taller than she, his large body buffering her from the writhing sea of people who ebbed and flowed in the swirling turns of the dance.
“You being the other shifter who lives out in the open.” Mary spoke her mind without forethought, but instantly cursed herself for her words.
His perusal of the room halted, and he lowered his gaze to her. “And me.” Darkness flickered in his eyes, and she knew that he was thinking the same thing she was, of the demons who had held him because of his blood. And because Jack Talent had never hidden who he was, they’d known to take him.
Cursing inwardly once more, Mary resumed studying their mark. Lord Darby was a well-made piece, glossy and fine-featured, save for the bump along the thin blade of his nose. A flaw that only served to enhance his devil-may-care facade. Brightly handsome in the way of Lucien Stone, he seemed to reflect the light about him, drawing ladies and gentlemen toward him to flutter like moths about his luminescence. The man turned to greet yet another coyly smiling lady, and the candlelight caught the bronze highlights in his hair.
In some ways the Earl of Darby made an ideal mark. Wealthy and known for his libidinous ways, he was constantly in the public eye and was thus easy to follow without drawing much notice. Should he be cut down, however, it would cause an uproar in London.
Without warning, Talent’s low voice was at her ear, a pleasant, flinty vibration along her bones. “Do you find him pretty, Chase? Perhaps we ought to consider a close-contact assignment.” She needn’t look to know he studied Darby as she did. His voice grew colder, harder. “A willing bed partner who could watch him day and night.”
Anger coursed along her spine like a bolt of electricity, but she merely turned her head slightly, causing her hair to brush along Talent’s face. But she smiled—her pretty, false, party smile—and set her eyes on the room while she set him down. “Do not attempt to whore me, Talent. That would make you a panderer. Roles that give neither of us the credit we deserve.”
She expected a harsh rebuttal, but he lowered his lashes, his cheeks going ruddy. “You are correct. I apologize.” His fingers pressed into her back, a light touch but one that she felt far too keenly for comfort. “I shall rephrase,” he said, as he guided them around the perimeter of the room. “Perhaps a dance with Darby might bring us some clue as to what he does or does not know.” For Darby could be either prey or the predator they sought.
“A good plan,” she admitted, “but I am not the one to entice Darby.” Years of watching her mother work had given Mary insight into men’s preferences. She’d been taught to calculate them at a glance.
Talent snorted. “Then you must suffer delusions, madam.”
The absolute certainty of his tone had her nearly bumbling a step. “A woman is not going to charm secrets from him.” She focused her attention back to the spectacle of Darby and his women. “He’s surrounded by them all the time. Thus he is accustomed to their wiles.”
Talent frowned slightly as he looked to her and then Darby. “I think you’re blind to your charms, Chase. Perhaps you are correct, but Darby just might be fickle enough if you gave him a good challenge.”
She laughed shortly and kept her gaze resolutely just beyond Talent’s broad shoulder. “All men want a challenge, Talent. That much I do know.”
They executed a sweeping turn, Talent’s wide palm pressing firmly against the small of her back, guiding her, supporting her, and a tingle of warmth spread along that spot. “Perhaps they do. But I’ll let you in on a secret.” He leaned infinitesimally closer. “We also need to know that there is some hope of getting what we want.”
She glanced at his face. He hadn’t expected her to look up at him—it was clear in the way he flinched slightly, as though caught—and she realized he’d been staring. At her. She was not foolish enough to think he wanted her, not when anger and resentment colored nearly all of their encounters. But she found herself wondering, what was it Jack Talent wanted and could not have? She looked away, unaccountably flustered.
They grew silent, deferring to the music and the light sounds of their not-so-steady breathing. It was far too easy to let her thoughts slip to the fact that he was holding her, not in anger or strife, but carefully and with skill. Too easy to soak in the warmth of his mouth near her temple and the crisp scent of his skin. A heavy stillness fell between them, as if he too became overly aware. His movements grew more deliberate, a gentle glide, an arcing turn that seemed to hang in time, forcing her to feel the strength in his large body and what it was capable of doing.
“You dance well,” she murmured, desperate for something to say, if only to break the spell he wove.
Talent let the words drift off before answering, his voice sun-warmed slate now. “There are many things I do well.”
He could not possibly be flirting. Mary turned her head toward him. A mistake, for his blunt chin brushed against her temple, and a sizzle of sensation licked along her skin. His warm breath touched her ear, a teasing lilt in his voice. “A four-in-hand knot, the one-punch knockout, ham-and-mustard sandwiches…”
Mary found herself smiling, and the crest of her cheek grazed his lower lip. A hitch caught in her chest. “I do not believe that last one can be counted. How difficult can
it be for one to excel at sandwich-making?”
A soft rumble vibrated along his frame and into hers. Talent chuckling. She could barely fathom it, and then his lips were a hairsbreadth away from the sensitive spot just before her earlobe. “Shows what you know, Chase. A multitude of catastrophes can occur when constructing a sandwich. Too much mustard”—he spun her around, making her dizzy—“uneven bread. Not enough ham. No, Chase, you cannot approach the task willy-nilly.”
Despite the confusing heat that thrummed through her limbs, a light laugh left her. “Willy-nilly, shilly-shally, your vocabulary veers toward shocking frivolity, Master Talent.”
He paused a beat, and then she could feel him smile. “Mmm,” he murmured warmly, “and yet why do I suspect that pleases you, Mistress Chase?”
His hand upon her back eased up an inch, a smooth, subtle move, and her lids fluttered closed, her fingertips sliding just beneath his silk lapel. And all the delicious muscles along his shoulders tensed.
“Does it?” she whispered. Her voice betrayed her, for God help her, she did like this version of Jack Talent.
And as if he’d realized this startling fact as well, he drew back, just enough to look down at her. “Does it?”
Heartbeat thundering in her breast, she slowly raised her gaze to his face. He’d said it lightly, a quip, and yet a certain wistfulness tainted his words. The moment drew close. Long enough for her to count the light scattering of freckles at the edges of his bottle-green eyes. Four on the left. Six on the right. A honey dust that was only noticeable up close. As if unable to bear her study, he lowered his lids, and his gaze settled on her mouth. A mistake too, for now she felt the throb inside her lips, as though they needed to be touched.
“Chase…” The rough, almost awkward intensity of his voice had her breath stopping altogether, but then his gaze flickered up as if some movement beyond caught his eye, and his expression hardened, even as he slowed and took a step back. Then he let go.
Shadowdance: The Darkest London Series: Book 4 Page 11