Starting to rise, Jack froze as he spied a tiny triangle of white peeking out from under the apex of the man’s arm. It was a piece of paper. Jack swallowed hard and opened the tightly folded paper. Lines of blood ink came into view: “Luke 15:29–30.”
It had been years since Jack had thought about the Bible, much less read it. But every word was burned into his memory. His parents had made certain of that. He said the words now by rote, not even pausing to think. “ ‘And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf.’ ”
Jack rubbed a hand over his eyes. “Bloody hell but I hate riddles.”
It wasn’t until Mary closed the door to Pierce’s bedroom and walked a ways down the hall that she could take a proper breath. God, the stench. The mangled body. Mary swallowed hard, even as she cursed herself blue. It appeared that she would never get past her inability to stand death. Worse still, Talent had noticed her weakness.
Frowning, she paused by a little hall table poised beneath a gilded mirror. The woman frowning back at her through the glass appeared pale and drawn. Sweet Lord, but she looked a fright. That in itself did not bother Mary. No, what perplexed her was Talent’s reaction to her obvious distress. He’d been kind, gentle with her. When she’d expected sarcasm, sneering, ridicule. He had the perfect excuse to see her off the case. If she could not confront death, study the victims, she could not do her duties. Perhaps he’d taunt her later, but she still could not account for the way he’d helped her now.
The jangle of the housekeeper’s keys, accompanied by the starchy march of crinolines, pulled Mary’s attention away from the mirror and the quagmire of her thoughts.
“Mrs. White,” she said as the woman drew near, “I should like to ask you a—” She sucked in a sharp breath, for Mrs. White had moved into the shadows and Mary caught a glimmer of spirit about her physical form. It was a flicker of light but enough, and quite distinctive. She hadn’t paid proper attention to the housekeeper. She did now and heard the steady click and whir of a clockwork heart.
As for Mrs. White, she halted, her frame tensing. Her dull blue eyes began to glow as her gaze darted about for an exit.
“Why didn’t you identify yourself as a GIM?” Mary asked, slipping the baton strapped to her forearm down into her grasp.
“None of your business, is it?” Mrs. White snapped.
“I am SOS,” Mary said. “Any supernatural lingering around the scene of a crime is my business.”
A bead of sweat trickled down the woman’s temple, and the sound of her working heart grew louder.
“Why are you nervous?” Mary did not move, but she was ready, her body poised for a fight. She considered calling for Talent, but rejected the idea. The woman might bolt, and Mary could manage one GIM.
“What do you want with me?” Mrs. White’s fingers clenched and unclenched. Fight or flight. Which one would the GIM pick?
“Tell me about the body in Pierce’s room,” Mary said. “You had to know he was a demon. Where is the real Pierce?”
At that moment the door to Mr. Pierce’s bedroom opened, and Talent came into the hall. He took one look at Mary and Mrs. White facing off. In an instant his demeanor moved from an investigator’s to a predator’s, and the very air seemed to crackle about him.
Like an animal cornered, Mrs. White launched forward, her arm raised. Talent leapt toward them, trying to intervene, but Mary was closer, and the GIM was coming at her. She sidestepped the woman and swung her baton deftly against Mrs. White’s wrist. The bone snapped, and Mrs. White screeched but she didn’t stop and fight as Mary had expected; she ran.
Narrowly missing Talent’s grasping hand, Mrs. White threw a potted palm at them as she darted into the servant’s stairwell, slamming the door behind her. Talent was a beat behind. With a mighty kick he smashed the door inward and stepped through the wreckage.
Mary was on his heels. The stairwell was empty. A GIM could move on silent feet if needed, and not a sound came from the dark corridor.
A wild light lit Talent’s eyes, and small fangs grew in his mouth. “Up or down?”
“You go up, I’ll go down,” Mary said.
His heavy tread boomed up the stairs as Mary flew down them. A glimpse of black skirts on the ground floor landing had her shouting, “Talent! She went down!”
Not waiting for her partner, Mary picked up her skirts and ran faster, her feet barely touching the treads as she descended into the humid air of the subterranean kitchens.
Startled cries and the crash of dishes rang out as Mrs. White scattered servants in her wake.
Mary leapt over a toppled breakfast tray and burst into the kitchen. In the next instant a shadow flickered in the periphery of her vision, and she ducked as something whizzed by her cheek. Baton in hand, Mary straightened and found Mrs. White poised between the stoves and the massive butcher-block table in the center of the kitchen. A side of beef lay upon the table and, before it, a row of gleaming knives.
Bloody hell.
Mrs. White’s eyes lit with evil intent. And then she reached for the next knife.
One, two, three, the knives hissed through the air in a blur. Mary swung, using her baton like a bat. With a clink, clank, clunk, she knocked the knives down. Her arm vibrated, her hand sore from the force of the hits. When the last knife clattered to the kitchen floor, she glared at the irate GIM. “Finished?”
Mrs. White snarled, the cry echoing against the stone. She grabbed the remaining cleaver and rushed forward. Mary braced, baton at the ready. But from out of nowhere Talent smashed into the GIM, blindsiding her and taking her down with a grunt. They tumbled in a twist of legs and crinoline, Talent landing on top and the cleaver skidding across the stone floor.
Nose to nose, Talent grasped the woman’s bodice with a massive fist, and that wild light in his eyes grew more unhinged. “You dare pull a knife on her?”
The GIM merely laughed. “Aye. An’ I’d have sunk it into her pretty neck too. What shall you do about that, Regulator?” Her eyes began to glow. “Rip my heart out? I hear you like the kill better than the hunt.”
Fangs snapped down with an audible click, and Talent grew an alarming shade of red.
“Talent, I had it in hand.” Mary moved close, touching his arm, but he ignored her.
“Did you kill Pierce?” he demanded.
Inches from Talent’s fangs, the GIM glared back in defiance. “The Bishop did that, didn’t he? Or don’t you know?”
Talent gave her a hard shake. “Who do you work for?”
Mrs. White did not answer. She went grey, her eyes rolling back in her head. And then Mary heard it, Mrs. White’s clockwork heart grinding to a halt. The GIM began to convulse, spit foaming at the sides of her mouth.
“Hell. Talent, let her go.” Mary tugged on his arm and tried to wrench the woman free. “She’s stopping her heart.”
On a curse, Talent dropped the woman to the floor. “She can do that?”
“Yes. It is a closely held secret, however. For if someone has control over her soul, it is the simplest way to destroy a GIM.” Helpless to do anything other than watch, Mary knelt next to the cold GIM. “It isn’t Adam or Lucien. They do not allow suicide, nor do they kill in that manner.” Adam created every GIM, but Lucien managed all those who lived in London. Unless the GIM had earned her freedom, she would be under their control.
“Piss and shit.” Talent briskly slapped the woman’s cheek. But she was gone. Dull blue eyes stared up at the yellowed ceiling. “Who the bloody hell would have control over a GIM if not Adam or Lucien?”
A glimmer of grey about the woman’s neck caught Mary’s eye. She leaned in close and pulled down the edge of Mrs. White’s collar. Tattooed into the dead woman’s skin was a chain collar. A slave. At some point Mrs. White had given her free will to another. Mary met Talent’s annoyed gaze. “Her new master, apparently.”
Few things could dissuade Jack from working. But tonight was Daisy Ranulf’s birthday ball. Daisy was the only woman of his acquaintance who would demand a ball to celebrate. As if knowing he would find a way to back out of going, his boss Poppy Lane had cornered him early this morning and told him to get his “dodgy arse” to the ball tonight or she’d tack him to the common room wall by his cods. Lovely woman. Truly.
So he’d gone, and was now surrounded by his adopted kith and kin in the Ranulf House ballroom, which had been festooned with so many candles that the air had turned hot and hazy, smelling of melting wax and hothouse flowers. Despite the slaps on the shoulder and shouts of welcome he received as he made his way through the room, he felt as he always did, alone, apart. Because a part of him never eased, never shed the feeling that any good fortune to fall into his life could just as quickly be snatched away.
Leaning against one of the onyx pillars that held up the gilded ceiling, Jack watched the dancers. Most were familiar, but there was no one with whom he wanted to engage. The lines of the Bible verse repeated in Jack’s head as they had all day. The story of the Prodigal Son. Was the killer sending a message to Jack? Or referring to himself?
Across the way was Ian Ranulf, decked out in the Ranulf kilt, a fine black dress coat, and a white lace jabot at his neck. Antiquated attire, but expected of the lycan king, and certainly put together well enough, though his shoes could do with a bit more glossing.
There were days when Jack missed being Ian’s valet, and the simplicity of it. He knew most people wouldn’t understand, but the work had been soothing. By happenstance or fate, Jack—a half-starved lad, battered and beaten to within an inch of his life for daring to defy his crime bosses—had fallen on Ian Ranulf’s doorstep, unable to go any farther. And Ian had taken him in. It had been Jack’s pleasure to take care of the man who’d given him a home, and it had been the only way he could think of to properly repay Ian.