“Are you certain that is what’s happening here, Inspector? Are you quite sure it is I who am playing right into your hands?” Blackwell’s demeanor remained unperturbed, but Farah noted that his wide shoulders were tense beneath his fine tailored jacket, and little rivulets of sweat beaded at his temple and behind his jaw.
“I know it is,” Morley said.
The hollow sound of amusement Blackwell produced yet again reminded Farah of the dark jaguar. “Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.”
The man quoted Confucius? How unfair that a man such as he could be so clever, dangerous, rich, powerful, and well read. Farah stifled a sigh, then, alarmed by her reaction to him, straightened her spine and took up her quill, ready to swipe the efficient shorthand across her paper.
“Enough of this.” Morley crossed to her. “Are you ready for the interrogation to begin, Mrs. Mackenzie?”
Her name seemed to zing about the room like an errant insect, hurling itself against the steel and stone and echoing back to the man chained in the middle.
“Mackenzie.” Farah couldn’t be certain, but she thought the word may have been absorbed by Blackwell and then uttered by him. But as she glanced through her lashes at a scowling Morley, she noted that he hadn’t seemed to detect it.
“Of course,” she murmured, and made a show of dipping her pen.
Morley turned back to Blackwell, his square face set with grim determination. “Tell me what you did with Justice Cranmer. And don’t bother denying it was you, Blackwell; I know he was the magistrate that sentenced you to Newgate fifteen years hence.”
“So he was.” Blackwell didn’t so much as twitch a muscle.
Fifteen years ago at Newgate? Farah’s head snapped up, her pen creating a loud scratch against the table. It couldn’t be that he was there at the same time as—
“And those missing guards,” Morley continued, his voice louder now, more desperate. “They were assigned to your ward during your stay there.”
“Were they?”
“You bloody well know they were!”
Blackwell lifted a shoulder in a helpless gesture that seemed to say, I would help you if I could, which enraged Morley to no end. “All you bobbies look the same to me. Those ridiculous mustaches and unflattering hats. It’s almost impossible to tell you apart, even if I wanted to.”
“It’s too much coincidence for the courts to ignore this time!” Morley said victoriously. “It’s only a matter of time before you’re dancing at the end of a rope from the gallows in front of Newgate, the very hole from which you slithered.”
“Confirm one shred of evidence in your possession.” Blackwell’s soft challenge was threaded with steel. “Better yet, produce one witness who would dare speak against me.”
Morley maneuvered around that pitfall. “The whole of London knows your penchant for swift and fierce vengeance. I could pick any half-wit off the street and they’d raise their hand to God and swear you’d done in the judge who’d sentenced you to seven years in prison.”
“You and I both know that it will take more than heresy and reputation to convict one such as I, Morley,” Blackwell scoffed. Craning his neck to look at Farah with his good eye, he addressed her directly, which caused her stomach to clench and her hands to tremble with even more violence. “Add my solemn, official confession to the records, Mrs. Mackenzie, and note that I swear by its absolute truth.”
Farah said nothing, as always demonstrating her professionalism to the prisoner by ignoring him. Of course, though, he had her absolute undivided attention. That face. That savage, masculine face. All angles and intrigue and darkness. Handsome, but for the scar and the startlingly blue eye, which she found both repellent and compelling.
“I, Dorian Everett Blackwell, never have had any emotional antipathy toward High Court Justice Lord Roland Phillip Cranmer the Third. I was guilty of the crime of petty theft, for which he sentenced me to seven years in Newgate Prison, and I solemnly swear that I have learned my lesson.” This was said, of course, in that ironic way that made one doubt the veracity of every word.
Farah could only stare at him, completely absorbed, trying to unravel the message burning at her from his one good eye with a foreign and alarming desperation. She felt as though the very devil was both toying with her and warning her. “You understand, don’t you, Mrs. Mackenzie?” Blackwell murmured, his hard mouth barely moving as the intensity of his regard pinned her to her seat. “The deeds of a willful youth.”
A thrill of danger kissed her spine.
“Horseshit!” Morley roared.
Dorian turned back to face him, and Farah was able to let out a breath she hadn’t been aware she’d been holding as the black spell he’d woven over her suddenly dissipated.
“For shame, Morley,” he mockingly chided. “Such language in front of a lady?”
“She is my employee,” Sir Morley gritted through clenched teeth. “And I’ll thank you not to bother about her if you want to keep the vision in the eye you have left.”
“I can hardly help myself. She’s such a ripe piece of skirt.”
“Bite. Your. Tongue.”
Farah had never seen Sir Morley so angry. His lips pulled back from his teeth. A vein pulsed in his forehead. This was a man she’d never met before.
“Tell me, Morley,” Blackwell calmly but ruthlessly persisted. “How much time does she spend at her own desk, as opposed to beneath yours, with her lips affixed to your—”