“Anna!” Andrew said firmly. “Stop this. You are not to blame.”
“Except for falling for the wrong man,” Elliott offered. Andrew glared at him.
“The heart wants what it wants, Inspector,” I said softly.
Elliott didn’t reply.
“It is late,” Andrew said a moment later. “Have a cart brought to the front door. We’ll make a show of my leaving.”
“Andrew,” I said. He closed his eyes. I was making this difficult for him.
I could not hold onto that which did not wish to be held. I stood from my seat and straightened my skirts and apron and then nodded
“I shall see to the cart,” I said and walked, chin up, back straight, from the room.
I did not hear what was said as I departed, but words were spoken softly.
I walked down the stairs and found Mrs Hardwick waiting for me.
“The men have all left, miss,” she said. “Cleaned us out of house and home, they did. I had to break into the preserves and such.”
“We’ll manage,” I offered. “Send Charlie for a cart. Inspector Kelly is leaving.”
“Leaving, miss? He’s in no fit state to travel.”
“He’s leaving,” I replied steadily. “See to the stablehand. Please,” I added, aware I was being short with the woman.
“As you wish, miss,” she said and moved to the back of the house and the mews to be found out that way.
I stood in the middle of the hall and tried to think what next to do. We knew how the device had been made, who Eliza May had employed to do it. We knew their deaths were to cover her trail and yet she leaves us breadcrumbs to follow. We knew the gentleman killed in The Northern Club was more to do with location than his person. She wished to cause trouble for Andrew. She wished to cause me harm.
He could not stay here. Not with Mina so fragile. I knew this, but it pained me.
When would this end?
A loud bang sounded out on the front door. Hardwick was nowhere to be seen; in the mews waking the stablehand no doubt. I checked my reflection in the looking-glass hanging in the hall, and then picked up my skirts and crossed to the doorway.
Superintendent Chalmers stood on my doorstep. Behind him was none other than Dr Drummond, the Chief Surgeon for the Auckland Police Force.
I would have laughed if there had been a chance it would not be hysterical.
“Gentlemen,” I greeted. “This is late for a social call.”
“You know damn well this is not a social call, Dr Cassidy,” Chalmers grumbled. “You have one of my men here. Injured.”
I could not refuse him entry; he had every right to confirm for himself how Andrew fared.
“Please,” I said demurely, “do come in.”
Chalmers barged past me with a huff of breath. Drummond peered down at me from his superior height and then his eyes focused on the door to my surgery.
“Is he in there?” he said and promptly tore across the hallway and opened the door, peering inside.
The room was empty and dark, but he did not pull back immediately. Moonlight glinted in through the abundant windows, throwing a silvery glow across my dissecting table and assortment of tools and medicines. He studied them all with narrowed eyes but said nothing.
I waited; seething quietly inside.
“Where is he then, woman?” Chalmers demanded. “What have you done to my man?”
“Superintendent Chalmers,” Inspector Elliott said from the top of the stairs, preventing me from losing my temper and soundly beating on the man.
Chalmers glared up at Elliott and growled, “Your message said he was only just now brought here. For God’s sake, man, don’t tell me she’s ensconced him in her boudoir already.”
I bristled and stepped forward.
Drummond stepped between the superintendent and me, his movements purposeful and fast. The man really needed to start drinking again; he was becoming a nuisance. His shoulder slammed into my right side. The side I had landed on when the horse had charged us. I made a small sound of distress and stepped back. Both Drummond and Chalmers ignored me. Elliott would not have heard it, standing as he was on the landing.
I rubbed my hip and arm, glaring at their backs as they ascended the stairs. I refused to be left out of the impending confrontation; this was my house, and I had more right than they did to be here. I followed behind them, my ankle tender. I couldn’t hide the limp, but as yet no one had noticed.
Elliott led them to where Andrew lay; unprepared, unprotected from what was about to happen.
My heart beat soundly inside my chest; my breath came in evermore panicked puffs. I crested the top of the stairs and crossed the landing, slipping into the room behind Drummond before he had a chance to close the door. He glared at me and then his face changed and became more of a smirk. With medical kit in hand, he pushed through Elliott’s and Chalmers’ immobile forms, intending to care for my patient at a guess.
Andrew sat on the side of the bed, dressed again, pale, but all evidence of perspiration hidden. His eyes met Chalmers directly.
“Ian,” he said.
“What is this?” Chalmers blustered. “Are you planning to eschew all laws and morals and move in with the chit?”
“Dr Cassidy tended my wounds, sir,” Andrew said.
“I just bet she did,” the man growled. “Drummond. See to him. God alone knows what quackery she’s performed on the man.”
“I am a doctor, sir,” I said through gritted teeth.
He didn’t even spare me a glance but said, “Not of policemen.”
It never failed to surprise me the lengths the man went to send that barb home. He took unnatural delight in seeing me flinch when he reminded me I had no chance of filling my father’s shoes and becoming Chief Surgeon of the Auckland Police Force. It was cruel, and for the life of me, I could not understand a man who had at one time known my father to behave in such an uncaring and hurtful manner.
What had I ever done to Superintendent Chalmers?
What had my father done, perhaps?
“I do not need Drummond’s care,” Andrew said sternly. “I have been tended and tended well, sir.”
“I’ll be the judge of that,” Drummond replied gruffly.
“Would you not rather know what we discovered this evening?” Andrew said, directing the question to Chalmers.
“Elliott can inform me. You need to be seen to and taken out of here.” Chalmers glanced around the room, perhaps noticing for the first time that this was not likely my own bedroom, and grunted. “How the bloody hell did she get you up here? The surgery is on the ground floor and would have sufficed.”
He turned to look at me finally and scowled; his long whiskers twitching with his agitation.
“And what were you doing in Freemans Bay, young lady? You have no business placing yourself in the middle of an open investigation. I could have you up on charges of obstruction of justice.”
I was sure the man was making that up.
“I am the closest physician to that area,” I told him. “I was visiting patients who were too frail to come here.”
“Nonsense. No one would call on a woman doctor and certainly not those living in the slums. What do they pay you with? Carrots and beetroot?”
“On occasion, yes.” I lifted my chin and glared at the man.
“Kelly!” he all but shouted, turning back to Andrew. Drummond had just pulled back, stethoscope in hand, having no doubt listened to Andrew’s lungs. I shook my head. As if I hadn’t done that already. “Have you found her a husband yet? This cannot go on! The woman is out of control, man.”
He stepped forward and leaned down over Andrew, his face a mask of fury.
“Get her married off, Inspector, or I will see to it personally that you are on a ship back to London by the end of the month. Am I clear?”
The room spun around me briefly. I must have swayed, because Inspector Elliott stepped up to my side and steadied me, a hand placed judiciously
under my elbow. He didn’t help me to a chair, correctly assessing that I did not wish any to know I was so affected. But he knew and thankfully said nothing.
“I am not her guardian,” Andrew said, voice low and filled with anger. “Dr Cassidy is quite able to find herself a suitor without my assistance.”
“That is not the point, and you know it! She will never marry unless made to do so. Have you no care of what Thomas asked of you?”
Andrew closed his eyes and breathed through his nose steadily. Either trying to push thoughts of my father from his mind or battling an urge to hit Superintendent Chalmers.
“I take Thomas’ last request of me to heart, sir,” Andrew finally said softly.
“Then see to it, forthwith. And think you not I have tasked you with this for other, more pressing reasons? I attempt to save your career, man. She will bring you ruin should this relationship continue.”
I shouldn’t have followed them in here, I thought. I shouldn’t be bearing witness to such a stripping down of a person by their superior. Andrew would not want this. I did not want this. My body shook with fine tremors as I battled the urge to defend myself, to defend Andrew, and make this worse.
Inspector Elliott steadied me and then quietly led me from the room. The door shut at our backs and I was unsure if the occupants even knew we had removed ourselves. Or that Inspector Elliott had done it for me. I could not have lifted a foot from those floorboards if I had tried.
And I had not tried.
“Do you need to sit?” Elliott asked.
I shook my head, not meeting the man’s eyes for some reason.
“Water?” he enquired.
“No. Thank you.”
He sighed. His hand still cupped my elbow. I had not the wherewithal to slip from his hold. My body continued to tremble, and it took all I had in me to gain control. Tears threatened my eyes, but I valiantly kept them at bay. My stomach was turning, and the thought that I may indeed be sick was forefront in my mind.
“He is right, you know,” Elliott finally said quietly. “Chalmers. The superintendent may have nary a compassionate bone in his body, but he is looking out for his man.”
“It is not only compassion he lacks, sir, but manners,” I said.
Elliott laughed. “Indeed,” he said. “However, there is much you may not be aware of.”
I turned and looked up at the man. He flicked his eyes to the still closed door of Andrew’s room. Then gripping my arm tighter, he led me back down the stairs and into the parlour. The hearth was smouldering; I thought perhaps Hardwick had kept a fire for me while I’d been gone. It needed tending now, but neither of us moved to do so. Elliott released my elbow, and I wrapped my arms about myself to ward off the chill, both in the room and in his frown.
“Inspector Kelly’s position is in jeopardy,” Elliott said. “His respect amongst the men is being undone, and the consequences of losing such favour could be deadly. One must trust their constables in our line of work.”
I was horrified to hear of such.
“He has not told me,” I said, stunned.
“Of course not, he does not wish to alarm you. But alarmed you should be. If this continues, he will lose all hope of retaining his position in Auckland and will be forced to either return to London or go elsewhere.”
He studied me. I had no words to offer. I was appalled that things had progressed to such for Andrew professionally. Personally, his life was in tatters, and now I was harming his career.
I shook my head, my heart thundering, dread filling my bones.
“Chalmers is of the mind to save him,” Elliott offered, not unkindly. “I am committed to such as well.”
I looked up at the man. “You are?”
He offered me a self-deprecating smile. “I owe my current position to him, after all,” he said.
His superior, Reid, had replaced Andrew at Leman Street Station, allowing Elliott to rise in rank. Andrew had left to chase down his wife, but he’d failed to locate Eliza May, even though he had spent a good twelve months attempting to do as much. And then, with no return course available to him in London, Andrew had chosen the Antipodes as a place to start over from.
And that had brought him to my door. To my heart.
“What do you have in mind, Inspector Elliott?” I asked.
“He needs time,” he said. “His wife is here, and this fiasco could finally be concluded. To give Kelly the time required, I suggest we distract Superintendent Chalmers with a ruse.”
“The superintendent is your superior officer, sir. I fail to see how this would help.”
“He is a superior officer, madam, but he is not mine. I answer to Superintendent Arnold of Leman Street Station, Whitechapel. And I am here at his behest and no other’s.”
Arnold’s or Reid’s behest? I studied the man quietly. Perhaps we had misjudged him.
“Jack the Ripper,” I finally said.
“Eliza May Kelly was involved,” Elliott agreed. “The hand that wielded the blade may well be dead, but the puppeteer who controlled his strings is not.”
“An unsolved crime,” I muttered.
“An incomplete solution, at the very least, and one Superintendent Arnold intends to rectify. As do I.” He stepped closer, looked down at me with intense eyes. “Andrew Kelly holds the answers; he may not yet be able to decipher them, but with time and my aid, we may have all we need to catch this woman. I aim to do just that, but I need Andrew Kelly here in Auckland City to achieve it. If Chalmers sends him away, she will be lost in the wind. And I will have to start from the very beginning.
“I do not wish to start again, Dr Cassidy. So, I propose a plan.”
“A plan,” I said, numb.
“Yes. Distract Chalmers with a false courtship. He believes you are to become another man’s problem, Kelly gets the time he needs to decipher his memories of the woman, and I get…”
“To use me as bait,” I finished for him.
He hesitated and then threw back his head and laughed.
“I see what has got the man so enamoured,” he murmured when his mirth had subsided. “You have worked it out. Bravo, Doctor! Bravo!” He reached forward and lifted my hand into his. I was not wearing gloves, and neither was he; it was all terribly inappropriate.
But that was his plan, after all. To be inappropriate.
“You are the key,” he whispered. “If I hold the key in the palm of my hand, I have the answer.”
“He will not go for this.” Andrew would rage at such an agreement. To have me courted by the protégé of the man who had stepped into his shoes at Leman Street Station; the man who had constantly butted heads against him at every turn whilst in London. Even if only a ruse to fool Chalmers and allow Andrew time to find a weakness in his wife’s armour, Andrew would rage at this.
I could not do it.
I shook my head and attempted to step back.
Elliott gripped my hand harder and held me in place.
And then the sound of a cane on wooden floorboards interrupted our tugging match, and Andrew appeared in the doorway.
I Felt A Stranger In My Own Home
Anna
“Anna?” Andrew said.
My eyes met his. He looked down at where Inspector Elliott held my hand; looked at the lack of space between us. His jaw set. His eyes shadowed. When he looked up at me again, I saw the hurt; the pain.
I opened my mouth to reassure him, and Chalmers appeared at his shoulder.
He took one look at the tableau presented and slapped Andrew on the back, making him rock unsteadily on his feet.
“Seems like you needn’t search any further, Kelly,” the man announced. “Elliott, as ever, has saved the day.”
“Congratulations,” Drummond offered, sneering at Inspector Elliott and myself. “You’ll make a fine couple.”
He stomped out of the house, and Chalmers followed. Elliott shifted to stand at my side as I faced Andrew.
“Is this what you want?” Andrew aske
d.
How could he think that?
I shook my head. A small smile coasted over his lips.
“I see,” he said and met Elliott’s eyes.
“You have your time,” Elliott announced. “Now use it.”
He turned to me and lifted my hand to his lips, offering a soft touch.
Then he walked from the room after Chalmers and the Chief Surgeon.
Andrew’s teeth gritted at the display of affection, his eyes tracking Elliott as he walked past.
“How are you standing?” I said.
“Was this Elliott’s idea?” he demanded instead of answering.
“Of course. You think I am capable of such subterfuge?”
“No,” he replied swiftly. “Watch him, Anna. He plays a dangerous game. One I have yet to understand.”
“He says he is here on Superintendent Arnold’s orders. He could help you, Andrew.”
“Or help himself to you instead.”
I shook my head. “I am merely a tool in his arsenal.”
“You are so much more, and he knows it.”
This was personal for him. A blow he was reeling from.
“It is an act,” I assured him.
“Out there,” he said, nodding to the front window, “the act will appear real. He will make it so. He may take liberties in the pursuit of justice. Do not, I beg you, allow him liberties on yourself.”
It was ironic, I mused, that to date, Andrew Kelly was the only man to have taken liberties on my person. Did he think my heart would be so easily swayed?
“You have nothing to fear,” I said softly.
“I have everything to fear,” he snapped back.
I sucked in a breath of startled air.
Andrew visibly calmed himself.
“I must make a show of leaving,” he announced. “And it would be best if I do not return until this ends. Black…” He stopped before finishing Blackmore’s name. He wanted to offer me protection, and yet his distrust of Blackie right now made that impossible. “Take care, Anna,” he said instead.
He turned and walked toward the front door. I chased after him, unwilling for this to be our parting.
He hesitated at the door, his back to me, his shoulders hunched, his head bowed.
Heartless (Scarlet Suffragette, Book 3): A Victorian Historical Romantic Suspense Series Page 11