The Likelihood of Lucy (Regency Reformers Book 2)

by Jenny Holiday

  “You’re turning out to have quite the knack for this, Miss Greenleaf,” Blackstone said with a wry smile.

  “Well, he’s not exactly being subtle, is he?”

  “Once you saw him visiting the grave and we were able to draw connections between the dead, it seems unsubtle,” Blackstone said. “But he can’t have expected anyone to follow him to that grave and to know about his dead family. And it seems he has passed over some of the top officers in the Battle of Copenhagen. Many of them who didn’t die in the war later are alive and well today.”

  “You’re suggesting he avoided the most high-profile targets? To avoid detection, perhaps?” she asked.

  “That is my theory,” Blackstone said.

  “The challenge,” Trevor said, “is that we stumbled on the grave visit. It was an accident. We know of two dead officers. We have seen one grave, and we’ve heard him plot one more murder. That’s four.”

  “Yes,” said Blackstone, “and assuming he is committing a murder to avenge each of the deaths in his family, how do we know where he is on his list?”

  “We know,” Lucy said, “because I heard him say this was the last one. This one was for someone he called Margit. And if you look at the inscriptions in the bible, she was the baby. He must be going in order. So that means there is one more we don’t know about.”

  “That’s what I wanted to confirm with you,” Blackstone said. “You definitely heard him say this was the last one?”

  “Yes. And he said he wanted to do it himself. It seemed as if the other man—Gunst—had actually committed the previous killings. When they established that Jespersen wanted to be the agent of this one, Gunst suggested a gift, which seemed odd.”

  Blackstone reached over to a side table on which an open book rested. He handed it to her, his finger drawing her attention to a particular spot on the page. It was a dictionary—a Danish-English one.

  “Poison!” she exclaimed. “Gift means poison.”

  “Probably not a word you would have learned or read in your studies,” Trevor said.

  “You reported that he rejected this idea of Gunst’s,” the earl said.

  She nodded, horror digging its talons a little more deeply into her gut. “Yes. He said it was too slow. He wanted to watch Hammond die himself.”

  “So we now know the men were unambiguously discussing the method they would employ to commit the murder,” Trevor said.

  “Can we not go to the police?” she asked. “Bow Street?”

  “We could,” said Blackstone. “But it would be better if we had hard evidence of Jespersen’s connection to the other murders—the ones we know about, anyway. More than just us seeing him at Clark’s grave. That’s what we really need now. As it stands, all we have is Miss Greenleaf’s report on the plot she overheard. And the word of a woman who has been…”

  “Accused of loose morals is worth nothing,” Lucy finished when the earl trailed off. She was starting to panic, thinking of a calculating killer in the hotel. Lord Blackstone was right: all they had was a sighting of Jespersen at a grave and the testimony of a woman with scandal attached to her—a woman claiming to understand Danish, at that. “But isn’t the bible with the death dates worth something? And how can we wait? What if he kills again while we look for more evidence?”

  “The bible is not insignificant, but we have time to look for more,” Blackstone said. “We need to take another, closer look at Jespersen’s shop first, and then, at the first opportunity, turn room 203 upside down. We must find something more concrete.”

  “How do you know we have time?” She heard her own frantic tone but was unable to tamp it down.

  Trevor slipped his hand into hers and squeezed. “Because it’s only August 31.”

  “Oh dear God.” How daft she was not to have made the connection. Tears pricked behind her eyelids as she clutched Trevor’s hand, grateful for the warmth she found there. “He’s going to kill John Hammond on September 3.”

  “I’ll go to Jespersen’s shop,” Trevor said, willing Blackstone not to argue with him as he watched the door close behind Lucy, whom he’d sent to her rooms. She was upset, which was to be expected. He’d spent so long in espionage—and at war—that he sometimes forgot how hardened he was. But normal people grew agitated when faced with evil. “I’ll leave right now.”

  He glanced at the door again, wondering if Lucy had gone right upstairs. And I’ll be making two stops.

  “Isn’t the more promising avenue to search his room here? Thoroughly, I mean. Miss Greenleaf has poked around, but she hasn’t been systematic. We need to take the place utterly apart. We should do that first. The shop can wait.”

  “She’s not doing it.” Trevor didn’t bother to temper the growl in his voice as he braced for battle. Earl or no, comrade or no—he wasn’t standing down this time.

  “Agreed. The situation has become too dangerous. And Miss Greenleaf’s fluency in Danish will be no advantage, unless we find something written.”

  “In which case I will copy it, and she can translate from the safety of my apartment.”

  “Fine. Get started, and report to me as soon as you can.”

  “I can’t. He’s in his room at the moment.”

  It was an outright lie, and Trevor had never lied to Blackstone. He had no idea if Jespersen was in the hotel, having spent the two hours that had elapsed since he and Lucy got home from the park fantasizing about the crack of his fist against Galsmith’s nose.

  He had also never plotted murder before, so it was a day for new experiences.

  “We have time,” he added. “You just said so yourself. It’s only July 31st.”

  Blackstone stared at Trevor for a long time, then nodded curtly. “May I trust that after you return from his shop, you will search Jespersen’s room at the first available opportunity?”

  “Yes.”

  Dismissed by the spymaster, Trevor dressed quickly in a nondescript black cloak headed downstairs. It would take him thirty minutes to get to the viscount’s house. He pulled out his pocket watch. It would be another hour after that until darkness fell, enough time for him to watch the house and get a sense of what was happening inside. He remembered Galsmith’s daughters from his previous visit. If possible, he preferred they not witness anything.

  Reflexively, he started to put his timepiece—the one he’d shown Lucy earlier—back in his pocket, but he stopped. What a bitter coincidence. He remembered the day he’s strolled into that shop. Little had he known he’d purchased a watch made by a man who was methodically murdering English officers. The kitchen staff looked up as he passed through, bowing or dropping quick curtsies but otherwise ignoring him.

  You wanted to forget, but you wanted to remember. He heard her voice in his head, as he always did, but this time it sounded like an exhortation. She’d been talking, on the surface, about his tattoos. But she’d hit on a deeper truth. He was the coarse boy from Seven Dials. He would always be the coarse boy from Seven Dials. And tonight, he was glad of it.

  Once outside, he pitched the watch into the gutter. Maybe a boy like he’d been would find it and sell it. Then he pulled his hood over his head and walked into the twilight to do what needed to be done.

  He had almost accomplished it when a hand came down on his shoulder. He’d just been waiting for the twilight to become full darkness, fantasizing about his hands around Galsmith’s throat, when Blackstone appeared, manifesting beside him like a spirit. Trevor hated that the man could sneak up on him. Normally, his senses, having been honed on the battlefield and in the years afterward—not to mention in Seven Dials—could be relied on utterly. But Blackstone was the master. Bloody, meddling Blackstone. Though Trevor had always exempted the earl from his condemnations of the aristocracy, the earl did have the arrogance and sense of entitlement characteristic of his class. He assumed the world would bend to his will.

  Well, not this time.

  He shook off the hand. “You’re going to have to kill me if you want me
to stand down.”

  “We’re after a murderer,” Blackstone said calmly. “And now you’re going to become one, too?”

  “I’ve killed before.”

  “It’s not the same thing, and you know it.”

  Damn Blackstone, he did. Killing on the battlefield had been a matter of survival. In theory, they had been fighting for their country. But in the moment there had been no country, no patriotism, just kill or be killed. It had changed him—how could it not? He’d always counted himself lucky that, unlike Blackstone, he had never had to kill an enemy during one of their spying missions. The earl had taught him never to kill unnecessarily. To be a spy, he’d said, was to believe urgently in a cause, but to be dispassionate in fighting for it. So the spymaster tolerated no casual violence. No revenge killing. The respectful treatment of apprehended enemies. Lethal force only when absolutely necessary.

  Trevor knew all this. He had been well trained. He even believed all of it—most of the time.

  But tonight was different. Tonight had nothing to do with honor or rules. This was about survival as surely as any battlefield killing had been. Kill or be killed. Just because it was Lucy’s survival and not his made no difference.

  “Do you remember the night Manning came to the estate during the Le Cafard mission?” Blackstone lowered himself to sit beside Trevor, who was crouched near an oak tree in Galsmith’s garden. “He came to say that he was leaving for Bristol, and that we would have to meet the boats without him.”

  “Yes,” said Trevor, thinking back to their conversation that night with the man who was smuggling France’s top spy back and forth across the channel.

  “I wanted to kill him that night. I very nearly did.”

  “Don’t try to reason with me, man. It isn’t the same.”

  “It’s exactly the same.” Blackstone sighed and ran a hand through his hair, obviously frustrated. “I never told you this, but I had learned that he…harmed Emily.”

  Trevor raised his eyebrows. He’d thought at the time that there was more to that mission than met the eye, and that it had something to do with Blackstone’s now-countess.

  “It took everything I had not to kill Manning in cold blood right then. My very being shook with the effort of holding myself back.”

  “We needed him alive for the mission to succeed,” Trevor said. “You couldn’t have killed him.”

  “Yes,” said Blackstone. “But in the heat of the moment, I didn’t care about the mission.”

  Trevor had to mask his shock. The Blackstone of those days had been so single-minded, so utterly devoted to the cause, that Trevor would have wagered the man would have done anything to protect the outcome of a mission. “So why didn’t you kill him then?”

  “When you kill like this”—Blackstone nodded at Galsmith’s house—“it changes you. You’re not in control anymore. You become a different sort of man.”

  “I don’t care.” And he didn’t. He had done what was necessary to ensure he and Lucy made it out of Seven Dials. That they survived. He sure as hell wasn’t going to stop now.

  “You stop being the sort of man she deserves.”

  He gasped, the wind knocked out of him as surely as if the spymaster had struck him.

  When he could control his voice again, he said, “That doesn’t matter because I never have been.”

  Blackstone stood and brushed off his breeches, as if preparing to depart. “Why don’t you let her be the judge of that before you go and ruin everything?”

  Chapter Tweny-Three

  “It’s rather late to be making a call, I know,” said Mr. Lloyd. “I hope you will forgive me.”

  Lucy handed him a cup of tea. Eight o’clock was late, and she wondered what could be so important that it couldn’t wait until a more conventional time to call. “There’s no apology required, Mr. Lloyd. I’m delighted to see you.”

  It wasn’t strictly true. She was beside herself with anxiety over the revelations about the murders. But Trevor had gone out, left without a word, according to the kitchen staff, and there was nothing to do but sit around and worry. So although she couldn’t truthfully say she was delighted to see Mr. Lloyd—the only thing that would truly delight her right now would be the successful apprehension of Mr. Jespersen—the unexpected visitor did, at least, provide distraction.

  “I should have waited for the morning, but I couldn’t make myself.” Mr. Lloyd leaned forward in his chair and clasped his hands together. “Once I set my mind to something, I cannot rest until it’s accomplished.”

  “I know exactly what you mean. Just this morning, I was contemplating a problem with my accounts. It was a small error, and I had a great many more important matters to attend to, but I could not be easy until I had uncovered and corrected my mistake.”

  It was a good thing there wasn’t a prize for London’s most boring conversationalist, for surely she would win it.

  But Mr. Lloyd was undeterred. If anything, he seemed fascinated by the mundane story, for he leaned forward even farther, his eyes sparking. “And what was your error?”

  “I forgot to carry a two.”

  He clapped his hands, delighted with this pronouncement. “And you found it.”

  “I did.”

  “An example of your thoroughness, Miss Greenleaf.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Lloyd.”

  “Thoroughness is exactly the quality one needs in running any venture, be it a hotel or a household.”

  She tilted her head, considering. “I don’t disagree, but surely there are other traits equally, if not more, important.”

  “Aha!” He clapped his hands again. “Pray, tell me what other qualities are important if one is to run a household effectively?”

  What an odd conversation. It was the first she’d had with him that wasn’t about political philosophy. “Well, let’s see. I think economy is also important in running a household. Not for its own sake, mind you, but it is a good idea to be prudent with the resources one deploys, be they financial or otherwise.”

  “Yes!” Mr. Lloyd agreed. “I suppose intelligence helps.”

  “Yes, as it likely does in all endeavors, but I don’t think it’s a necessary precondition.” She smiled, warming to the parlor game they seemed to be playing. “There are a great many idiots in the world, are there not? And most of them manage to run households of one sort or another.”

  “Indeed, they do! What about a quick wit and a warm smile?”

  What a curious man Mr. Lloyd was turning out to be outside of his salon! She was trying to think how best to tell him those qualities had nothing whatsoever to do with success or lack thereof in running a household when he moved to sit next to her on the settee.

  For some reason, the image of Lady Theodora, smiling and talking at one of Mr. Lloyd’s meetings, popped into her head.

  “Listen to me.” He angled himself so he was sitting sideways to face her. “I sound like I’m hiring a housekeeper. I’ve botched this entirely.”

  “Botched what?” Lucy whispered, though she suddenly knew full well what was coming.

  “Miss Greenleaf, I’ve come here this evening because now that I’ve made up my mind, I simply cannot wait another day to ask you to be my wife.”

  She blinked rapidly as a fluttery, unsettled feeling unspooled in her chest. Was it panic? Admiration?

  “I’ve surprised you,” he said.

  She nodded. That much was decidedly true, though she could see now, in retrospect, that Mrs. Murray had been correct. There had been hints in his solicitousness, his compliments. Perhaps even in his selection of Wollstonecraft for the group to read last week.

  “I’m sorry,” he went on. “I intended to introduce this topic by reiterating what I said at the last meeting, which is how much I admire you. One imagines finding a wife who excels at household management, who has the skills and traits we discussed just now. But to find a potential spouse who has all these things and a keen philosophical mind? Well, one doesn’t ignore an opp
ortunity like that!”

  “What about Lady Theodora?” she whispered.

  It was his turn to blink. “What about her?”

  “Does she not possess all these qualities?”

  His brow furrowed. “I suppose she does. But in matters of the heart, there is also an element of…well, not chance, exactly.”

  She knew what he meant. “Some things are not reducible to their constituent parts. Some things are beyond logic.” God help her, she was thinking of the tattoos again.

  “Yes, as much as I hate to admit it!” He took her hands in his. “But you understand.”

  She did, but not in the way he was hoping. She gave his hands a squeeze before extricating her own. “It’s just that I always assumed I would never marry. It has never been in my plans.”

  “Why not?”

  How to explain? She could hardly say that she was modeling her choices on the life of a dead woman she’d never met. “I don’t like the idea of giving up my independence.” She thought back to her recent discussion with Trevor about revolution. “Marriage is so…disruptive.”

  “You’re thinking of Mrs. Wollstonecraft, aren’t you?”

  “No!” she said, a little too vehemently. It was just that she’d been startled. She’d been thinking that Mr. Lloyd hardly knew her—she had been about to protest as much. But perhaps he understood her better than she realized.

  “Well, if you were, don’t forget that her last marriage was—seemingly—quite a happy one, if less passionate than her relationship with Mr. Imlay. My point is that marriage need not be disruptive, to use your word. It can be a calm, rational coming together of two people who esteem each other.”

  She could make no argument there. The way he described it, it didn’t sound like the awful, oppressive thing she’d always vowed to resist.

  “Don’t you want a family?” he asked. “Children?”