Fearless (Scarlet Suffragette, Book 1): A Victorian Historical Romantic Suspense Series (37 page)

Kelly?

She wanted me to ask. I knew it. Ethel stood there smiling, patiently waiting, not offering a morsel more.

Could I believe her? Did it matter? I was about to die trying to take a murderer with me.

No more Suffragettes would face this kind of death.

“Out with it, Mrs Poynton. You know you want to. This is your grand finale,” I said, holding a hand out to indicate the grimy, dank space around us. “A fitting place for a confession.”

“I have no need to confess; you and I both know my crimes,” Ethel replied easily. “But his?” Andrew’s. My heart sank. “Hers?” She added, shaking her head, still smiling.

Hers. “Eliza May Kelly,” I guessed.

Ethel’s smile broadened. “But who is she, Miss Cassidy? She lives. She does exist. Have you figured it out?”

No. I hadn’t. And I suddenly realised I wasn’t sure that I wanted to either.

We stared at each other, the knife forgotten, my imminent death put to the side. This was Ethel’s show. Her moment. And there was nothing I could do to stop her from saying it. To stop her from unleashing the secret and changing my world.

Because I was certain, that sadness I’d seen in Andrew’s eyes, when he’d talked of telling me what the flower meant, was a sadness for the pain he’d cause me, not just himself.

Out with it
, I begged inside my mind.
Out with it, damn you!

“No guesses?” Ethel asked. “Well then, I’ll just have to give you this one, on the house.”

Silence for a beat, and then she gripped the knife more firmly, pointed the tip at my chest, and said, “His wife.”

The light glinted off the shiny metal, as it toppled blade over hilt through the still air. I didn’t feel it going in; my heart was already shattered.

Andrew Kelly hadn’t asked me to marry him. Because he already had a wife.

Thirty-One

There Were Things Far Worse Than The Ripper

Inspector Kelly

I watched the blade fly through the air towards Anna. Still too far away to stop it sinking in. My heart all but pounded out of my chest, as my leg screamed in agony the harder I pushed it. Boots fell behind me; Blackmore, Chalmers, Mackey, God only knew who else. I didn’t care, nothing mattered.

Mrs Ethel Poynton,
a bloody Suffragette
, had just thrown a knife at Anna.

Several things flicked through my mind all at once. It didn’t surprise me that the most prevalent was utter terror at Anna’s demise. But underneath the panic and rage and heartache was a cool calmness that should have shocked.

Entrican had denied everything. And had failed to have a mark upon his body from Margaret Thorley’s well placed nails. He wasn’t our man, and when we’d realised that and looked for Anna, finding her missing, trepidation had unfurled and claimed us with its claws.

No, Entrican was not our murderer.
Here
lay our murderer, pulling another blade out of her cloak and moving in to finish the job. She didn’t hear us approach, even though we were making a clatter. Shoes pounding pavement, harsh breaths disturbing the air, even Blackmore yelling out a warning from behind me; I would have to, but my heart was in my throat and breathing had become a challenge.

In slow motion, I watched the leader of the Suffragettes approach Anna’s fallen body, a sneer painted on her lips, her gait not that of a lady. She lifted the knife, flicked amused and crazed eyes towards us -
oh, God no
! - and then began to bring the blade down towards Anna’s pale throat.

“Stop!” I yelled, the world closing in and darkening. “Get back!” I shouted.

But blood sprayed, so thick, so red, painting the small alleyway in scarlet.

I threw my cane, hoping it would reach the blasted woman before I could. It only clattered off a brick wall and landed ignominiously in a puddle.

And then Poynton collapsed; her leg giving out underneath her, as though unable to hold her own weight. She cried out a pained sound, her hand moving to the back of her ankle, the knife I hadn’t realised she still held, falling to the ground beside Anna.

Anna reached out and picked it up, then scrambled to her feet as though uninjured.

My eyes flicked between them, the pool of blood expanding ever larger, Poynton swearing any number of unlady-like curses, and Anna holding the woman’s blade before her like an avenging angel.

I rushed towards her, as Blackmore and Chalmers swooped down on Poynton, and Mackey made for Anna’s cousin. My trembling arms wrapped around Anna’s precious body, crushing her to my chest, and then I pulled back, fingers thick with dread, as I ran them over her face and neck, and delicate throat and body.

She swallowed under my touch, her pulse fluttering, but no blood smeared my hands. My eyes came up to hers; shock, astonishment, confusion claiming me. And then she took a step back. Leaving me shaking and breathless and my heart damn near cracking.

“I’m fine, Inspector,” she advised and turned towards the melee ensuing on the ground. “It’s her Achilles tendon,” she supplied. “I should think I severed it quite successfully.” She glanced down at the knife she held and then opened her hand and dropped it.

I watched as she stared at her blood soaked glove, utterly amazed at the tenacity of this woman.

“She threw her knife at you,” I said, unable to form any more coherent a sentence. My heart still pounded, my head throbbed with its insistent beat. My leg screamed in agony. I deserved it and so much more. I hadn’t been there for her.

She’d almost been killed.

I took a step forward; involuntary, natural. Anna shifted away.

I paused.

“Anna? She threw a knife at you.”

“She threw it blade first,” Anna advised. “The weight of the hilt superseded the weight of the blade. All I received was a bruise for her efforts.”

My chest burst with pride. Anna’s fearlessness truly never failed to amaze me.

“So,” I said, turning my attention to the trussed up Suffragette leader. “Our murderer.” This really did
not
make any sense.

I glanced down at the last body in the alley, realising with a start that it was Drummond.

“What the hell is
he
doing here?”

“A pawn, much like we were,” Anna supplied. “I dare say she intended for him to take the blame for her actions.”

But still she would not step any closer.

Instead she moved toward her cousin, who was smiling, somewhat dazedly, up at Constable Mackey.

“Sweeting,” Anna murmured. “Where does it hurt?”

I shouldn’t have felt pain at her indifference; her cousin was indeed injured. Anna
should
have gone to her and offered aid. But my stomach was twisted in knots and my heart felt as if it was breaking, and I couldn’t understand why.

I turned towards Ethel Poynton, and gave her the full force of my rage.

“You’ll hang for this, Mrs Poynton. And where you’re going, knives will be the least of your concerns.”

“And yet, your concerns are just beginning, Inspector,” the woman offered.

“On the contrary,” I replied. “They end here.”

“Take her away!” Chalmers growled. “I can’t bear to look at her.” He huffed out an unamused sound. “A blasted woman! Who would have thought?”

“A blasted woman with close connections to Jack the Ripper,” Anna supplied quietly, from her crouched position next to her cousin.

Silence filled the alleyway, until Ethel Poynton began to laugh; an unhinged sound that left chills coating my entire body.

I stared at the woman, suspended between Blackmore and Mackey’s hold, while shocked and horrifying memories scraped over my skin as though they were crushed glass.

“Jack the Ripper?” Chalmers sneered, disbelieving of Anna’s statement.

But I didn’t doubt her. This was Anna. My eyes swept from her still crouched form back to the Ripper’s acquaintance.

“How connected?” I asked, my voice low and threatening.

Ethel began to laugh again, a hollow sound that felt more chilled than her last effort.

“You should call me, my lady,” she said between cackles.

Anna stood, her dark gaze raking over her former colleague.

“Bastards don’t get a title,” she murmured, stunning the entire audience into silence.

“Bastards?” Chalmers queried.

My eyes met Anna’s; only briefly before she looked back to her cousin. But I didn’t need her to confirm who it had been.

We’d had several suspects. None of them had panned out. But I knew exactly who it was now.

Sir William Withey Gull.

So much loss and heartache. So much horror and death. And this woman, this unassuming Suffragette leader, had sought to bring us more.
Not here. Not in my sanctuary. Not near my Anna.

“Take her away,” I growled, my hands fisted, the ache in my leg choosing right then to remind me that not all my adversaries had been dealt with.

“Right you are, sir,” Blackie offered, Mackey only swallowed and bobbed his head.

They dragged Poynton off, but somehow the alleyway still seemed dark and dangerous, as if another enemy would emerge from the brick walls themselves at any given moment.

“Bloody hell, Kelly,” Chalmers groused. “A woman. And related to the Ripper.”

“A man who died just this past year,” I pointed out. I’d kept tabs on all the suspects. But I’d failed to spot a bastard daughter.

“That’s irrelevant and you know it. This will be sensational. The newspapers will riot.”

“Not for the better of our city,” I growled.

“We stopped her,” he argued. “Three deaths is not entirely unexpected given the root of the cause. No one could have suspected a woman.”

“Anna did.” Well, at least, Anna had caught her. Faced her.

What the devil had Drummond done while Anna dealt with a murderer?

Chalmers offered a glare and then looked across the way to where Anna tended her cousin. Still not looking at me. Still giving me her back.

It left me entirely too uneasy.

“I won’t have her in my station,” the superintendent declared gruffly. “This changes nothing,” he added, and then straightened his shirt sleeves and walked away.

I had the strange sensation that everything
had
changed. And it had nothing to do with Jack the Ripper.

Stretchers appeared then, from out of nowhere, carried by constables in plain clothes. One for a now rousing chief surgeon. And one for Wilhelmina, who looked a little worse for wear. My heart contracted. We’d promised to keep the girls safe. Our sting had failed miserably, we’d let both Anna and her cousin down, but the outcome, at very least, was acceptable, I forcefully told myself.

No more Suffragette deaths tonight.

Then why did I feel so distraught?

I watched on silently as Anna supervised the placement of her cousin on the bed, and then they were up and off, moving out of the alley, after Drummond’s supine body. I stepped toward her, my hand outstretched to halt her in her tracks. For a moment I thought perhaps Anna would bypass me. But she hesitated and then lifted tired eyes to my face.

God, she was beautiful. Hauntingly so.

And not mine.

“You know,” I said softly, my body barely holding itself upright under the weight of my grief as I realised the truth in those words.

“I know,” she replied just as softly, her shoulders drooping, her eyes filling with tears.

“I do not love her,” I offered; a paltry gift.

“But she’s your wife,” Anna said sadly, and then moved to walk past.

I let her. My heart aching. My throat so sore I couldn’t breathe.

“Anna,” I whispered, a sob almost letting loose. I fisted my hand, brought it down on my thigh as hard as I could, and stilled the tears.

A blood soaked glove wrapped around my wrist and prevented me from repeating the action. I sucked in a breath of air and turned to look down at her.

“I’m sorry,” I said, my voice cracking. “I couldn’t tell you.”

“Couldn’t?” she asked, eyes searching my face.

“The less you knew, the better.” Why did everything sound so weak, so little? Not nearly enough.

“It was your secret to tell,” Anna said. “Not Ethel’s. You should have told me. I would never…”

My hand reached up and cupped her cheek. A bruise was swelling, making my heart break even more.

“A dream,” I whispered, my voice rasping with emotion, “even if only dreamt for an instant, is still a very precious thing.”

She held my gaze, her eyes deep pools of grey. When she blinked, a tear ran down her cheek soaking into my glove.

“
Dédoublement
,” she said, confusing me. “Double consciousness. Two awarenesses in one.” What? “She wrote the letters while in a somnambulistic state.” Oh. Poynton.

The disappointment I felt in that instant was consuming. Anna couldn’t even talk to be about this. About us.