An Affair with Mr. Kennedy (23 page)

Zeno clamped his mouth shut and stared at her. Compared to Cassie, her beauty now struck him as hard. Her mouth, particularly, had taken on a cruel twist and her eyes were dark pools of ice. “I suppose that goes to motive, Miss Wells.”

“It’s missus now.”

“You married a terrorist? My congratulations.” He nodded and his brain rattled in his skull.

She stood close. Beneath her skirts, he could feel her legs press against his knees. She ran the baton in her hand over his torso and lower, along the insides of his legs. “What will your husband say, Jayne?”

“I promise not to mention it to him, or to that young widow of yours.”

A deep breath caused a sharp sting from cracked ribs. He blinked away the burn of sweat in his eyes and tamped down his rage. She reached for the buttons of his trousers. Would Jayne do a job on his lower anatomy? Her other hand held a hard leather baton. He steeled himself for either pleasure or pain.

“Miss me, Zak?” He did not want to think of their past together; just hearing her voice again conjured up an avalanche of old wounds.

“After the blast, I had to identify your ring,” he croaked. “It was all that remained of you. But you knew that would happen, you were counting on it.”

She stroked him through the rough, torn fabric of his workingman’s trousers. “Of course.”

He swallowed hard. “Did you attend your own funeral? Hidden under the cover of an umbrella? It rained the whole day, you know.”

“Can ya hear me sobbin’ for ya, Zak?” Her fingers played down the buttons of his pants.

“Don’t.”

“I think it’s time to take him out. See what kind of courage the stiff little man can muster.” She flashed a hard smile that faded with the unmistakable crack of pistol shots.

A loud grunt and thud came from the adjoining room. They both turned toward the battering and pounding—the sound of a door being kicked down. And more gunfire. Jayne crept toward the clash with her baton raised.

Zeno wasted no time with his response to the distraction. Ignoring the ropes that bit into his bruised chest, he rocked his chair forward and lunged for her. They both crashed onto the crude slatted floor. With a violent twist of his body, the full force of his weight against the chair rails smacked her in the face. There was a loud crack to her skull before she grunted and went limp. His female captor lay unconscious beneath him.

He worked feverishly to slip out of the ropes that bound his hands together. The door opened a crack and then swung wider. A wedge of bright light fanned into the room and across his face. He called out for help.

“Christ Almighty, Zak. You look like hell.”

Rafe untied his ankle bindings and helped him up from the ground. Zeno untangled the remaining ropes. “So the operation’s blown.” He rubbed his wrists to help restore circulation to stiff, lifeless hands.

“Not entirely.” Rafe removed his ankle bindings and tossed away the cords. “The Criminal Investigations Department is on the way. Melville will soon give the order to raid the other drops. There will be plenty of arrests and hundreds of pounds of explosives confiscated.”

“But none of the ringleaders.” Zeno cracked a bitter grin. A feeble groan emanated from the crumpled body on the floor. “Ah, but we have her.”

He lifted the chair and his partner turned her over. A nasty gash was above one eye, and her lids fluttered open and closed again. Rafe directed his torchlight onto the face of the unconscious woman. “Jesus, Mother Mary, and Joseph. Am I seeing things?”

He shook his head. “It’s Jayne.” Zeno caught a glimpse of movement, a sudden shift of light behind the younger Yard man. A looming, shadowed figure appeared in the doorway holding a gun. Zeno shoved Rafe aside.

The bullet ripped through his side like a red-hot poker. Zeno took a table down as he fell to the floor beside Rafe. A broken oil lamp splashed a swath of flame across plank floors and quickly traveled up the window curtains.

Rafe rolled over with his sidearm drawn and unloaded his pistol in the direction of the doorway.

“Get up.” Rafe’s voice sounded far way.

When Zeno didn’t respond, he was lifted onto his feet. He forced a gasp of breath and groaned, willing the pain away. “Jayne.”

His partner propped him against a wall. “Stay there.”

Rafe slung the dead weight of the crumpled female over his shoulder. “Ready?”

Zeno shook his head. “Go ahead. I‘ll follow.”

Rafe staggered over. “Not likely, mate.” Rafe grabbed his shirt and pulled him off the wall. Zeno willed himself to follow his partner’s grunted directives.

They stepped past two dead bodies and picked their way down steps black with rising smoke. “Christ, they’ve set fire to the building.” Rafe hacked out the words as Zeno’s legs buckled.

“Do not pass out on me, Zak. I can’t carry the both of you.”

Zeno forced all other thoughts but survival out of his head and concentrated on every movement. One leg. Then the other. One stair step after another. They descended into heavier smoke. This hell was endless. They could easily die here, blown to kingdom come inside a dynamiter’s safe house.

“We’re almost there,” Rafe urged. “Five more steps.” But he was lying. There were twenty more. And then, suddenly, they were outside. The cooler air revived. A spasm of coughs raked his chest. He hacked up soot, blindly trailing Rafe out into the street. His lungs strained for air as a throbbing sting shot through his torso.

Zeno couldn’t feel his own legs under him.

Consciousness fluttered in and out as he stumbled on. A hand reached out and dragged him across the street. Over his shoulder, he could just make out a torrent of flame licking at the windows of the boardinghouse.

The blast ripped him out of Rafe’s grasp and tossed him into the air. He hit the ground hard and rolled over cobbled pavers. Crushed by the concussion of the explosion, his eardrums buzzed and hummed as the roar of the blast faded.

Zeno rolled onto his back. A spectacular, orange-red fireball rose into the night sky. Stars crisscrossed his vision. His eyelids flickered and shut.

Silence.

Chapter Eighteen

Delivered by special messenger
:

To: Cassandra St. Cloud

10 Lyall Street

My darling daughter,

   Early this morning, Zeno Kennedy was delivered to the Harley Street surgery. He suffers multiple injuries. I have done what I can for him. Periodically, he awakes long enough to ask for you. Please come immediately.
  Father

Cassie rapped again and waited on the darkened steps of her parents’ surgery. When a bleary-eyed servant finally opened the door, she swept past the man and hurried along the corridor. Heart pounding, she turned into the last room off the hall and came to an abrupt stop. She wavered for a moment, holding on to the doorjamb as she stared at an unrecognizable face hidden beneath bruises and bandages. A thin, indistinct voice hardly identifiable as her own pleaded, “Tell me he will recover, Father.”

Venturing farther into the surgery, she went to remove a glove to feel Zeno’s forehead. Only she wore no gloves. In the early gray of morning, she’d sent Cécile out into the cold to hail a hansom while she tossed on a dress and coat. She’d forgotten to put on gloves.

He was warm. Too warm.

“It’s early yet. He’s fighting an infection, I’m afraid.” Her father’s words were delivered in the kindest, gentlest fashion, but could not stop the tears from trailing down her cheeks.

“You must tell me everything, Daddy. Is he badly off?”

He sighed. His gaze searched hers, wondering, she supposed, if she could stand the truth. “According to the young detective who brought him in, he was captured and beaten rather brutally. A broken nose, a few bruised ribs, contusions mostly. He has also sustained a gunshot wound. The bullet shattered a bit of rib—no organs are involved, but there is some internal bleeding.”

Cassie dug her fingernails into her palms. “Go on.”

Her father grasped her upper arms. “There was an explosion. He managed to survive the blast, but we found blood in his ears, which signifies—”

“A possible concussion.” Weak-kneed, she fell into her father’s comforting embrace. “You must—tell me you will save him, Daddy!”

“Your mother and I will do everything in our power, dear. The rest is up to Zak.” Father gave her a gentle pat. “He’s a hardy fellow, which gives him a fighting chance. Perhaps he shall pull through.”

Father settled her into a bedside chair. Once before she had asked for God’s help to save her eldest brother, Hank. But her prayers had come too late. Perhaps this time it would be different. Zeno had a fighting chance, that’s what Daddy said.

The dark purple and blue contusions on his face made her shiver.

She hadn’t expected to like him quite so much. She had become enamored with the idea of taking a lover. Sophisticated, yes. Naughty, hopefully. Romantic, why not? But she hadn’t foreseen this sinking pit in her stomach. Or the unanticipated tears that even now blurred her vision.

She took the offer of her father’s handkerchief. “Chin up, Cass. I don’t want him waking up to a glum face. I have seen it more times than I care to admit. A person will pull through the most dire of injuries given a bit of hope.”

FOR THE FIRST few days, she and Mother and the irrepressible Mrs. Woolsley kept a constant watch. Zeno burned with fever so virulent his bed linens were soaked with sweat. Every few hours, a nurse would change the sheets and bandages and take care of his personal needs. Cassie stood by the side of the bed and bit her lip. His delirium worried her as much as or more than the infection. When he did wake, he was rarely coherent. During the small hours of the night, he would often wake in a heated fury, accusing his captors or calling for her.

She would nestle close and wrap her arms around him. These late vigils afforded her plenty of time to analyze the depth of sentiment and strength of affection she felt for this brave man. The truth of it was, Zeno cared more for her happiness and pleasure than Thomas ever had. For the briefest of moments, that revelation scared her more than the labored, wheezing rise and fall of his chest.

On the fourth day the fever subsided. By the morning of the fifth, her hopes rose with the sun. She had fallen asleep, tucked into a comfortable old armchair Father had placed beside the bed.

“YOU WANT ME to piss in that?”

Behind a screen, Zeno concentrated on the task at hand, urinating into a cup on demand.

To one side of his surgery bed, Nurse Mary Eunice intoned with practiced efficiency, “Mr. Kennedy, imagine you are standing under a waterfall, having a good shower—”

A trickle of urine turned into a torrential stream.

“Bollocks.”

Gingerly, he handed off the glass beaker.

Cassie’s father held the container up to the window light. “Good clarity, light in color—no more visible blood.”

Could the good doctor’s medical chatter be any more mortifying? Even though she pretended disinterest, he knew Cassie sat behind the partition and listened to every word. Without a grumble, he would put up with as much medical prying and probing as necessary to convince her he was on the mend. Perhaps then she would not worry quite so much.

“Let’s get you to sit all the way up.”

With the help of his very capable nurse, he righted himself enough so she could unwind the cloth tape around his ribs. A gentle prod to a bruise forced a sharp intake of air. “Take a slow, deep breath for me.” Henry Erskine placed his stethoscope in his ears and listened. “Again.” He moved the ice-cold metal cone to the other side of Zeno’s chest. With each deep breath he grimaced. “Sorry, Zak.”

The doctor stepped away and folded back the screen, beaming. “This is cracking indeed, lungs are clear as well. Your Yard man shall live to defend crown and country another day, Cassie.”

“Saints’ glory, sir.” Ever the chipper one, Zeno’s housekeeper entered the room and hugged Dr. Erskine.

“Yes, Mrs. Woolsley, I believe it is time to send him packing.” Cassie’s father reached for his pocket watch. “In fact, I find him fit enough to return home in your good care. I should think Cassie will want to look in on him as well.” He patted the anxious housekeeper on the shoulder and gave his daughter a wink. “I want both of you to watch Nurse as she wraps those ribs. We’ll keep him taped up for a few more days.”

Mary Eunice unwrapped several rolls of knitted fabric and Cassie rose from her chair to join Mrs. Woolsley at his bedside. Her cool hand stroked his forehead and jawline. “Good morning, Zak.” Her smile made everything right in his world.

If it weren’t for a mending bullet hole in his side and the damned bruised ribs, he would have pulled her into his arms in front of everyone, including Nurse.

“I must say a healthy body heals itself without much interference from the marvels of modern medicine.” Cassie’s father picked up a clipboard. “All the doctor prescribes is a few additional days of rest and he should soon be fit enough for service.”