Unfortunately she had to admit to herself that the tavern afforded a level of anonymity they would not receive at headquarters. Too many regulators took it upon themselves to make a study of Talent and Mary. She feared there might even be a betting pool going on about just when and how they’d kill each other.
Lousy, busybody rotters. True, tempers between her and Talent were strained. But they were partners, like it or not, and she intended to behave in a sensible manner from here on out. She would not think of breathless, voyeuristic pleasures, or near kisses, or nighttime vigils.
It did not help matters when Talent suddenly gave her a slow perusal, lingering along the length of her bodice where the satin lay smooth and tight over her torso. Heat prickled along her skin, and she bristled. He could not look at her in this manner. Not if she wanted to get through the day.
As if he was annoyed, his mouth turned down at one corner. “You’re looking rather turned out today, Mistress Chase.” His low voice turned into a drawl. “Why do I suspect I will not like the reason?”
“I could not fathom.” Mary ordered her papers into a neat stack and was quite proud that her hands did not shake.
“Do not tell me you’re dressing to impress that popinjay Darby.” Talent’s scowl grew sour, his nostrils flaring.
They were slated to watch Darby later this evening. A prospect Mary did not find remotely appealing. Even so, she could only shake her head slightly at Talent’s absurd accusation. “Perhaps I dressed for you.”
She said it to unnerve, and his open mouth and flushed cheeks had her fighting a grin, but she hid it and stuck to the business at hand. “I took a look at Mr. Pierce’s financial situation—”
Her plate of barely touched fish pie was pushed in front of her. “Eat,” said Talent, who had clearly recovered from her parry.
“I’m not hungry. Now about Pierce—”
“I’ll be damned if I have to hold back because you’ve made yourself weak due to stubbornness.” His blunt chin lifted. “You eat. I’ll read.” Taking the report from her, he gave the plate an encouraging nudge farther in her direction.
Mary narrowed her eyes but he merely stared back. Unmovable. Grumbling, she picked up her spoon. Warm, creamy sauce and tender morsels of fish filled her mouth. Immediately she wanted another bite.
Talent gave a grunt of satisfaction, then ignored her as he read over her notes. “This is new information on Pierce.” When he glanced up again, creases deepened around his mouth. “You do not sleep enough.”
Well, he ought to know, since he’d been watching her house all night. She refrained from saying so, only because bringing the fact out in the open would lead to questions she wasn’t sure she wanted answers to. “I don’t need much sleep, and the report needed to be done.”
“You’ll be no good without sleep either,” he snapped before his gaze dropped once more. “Keep eating.”
Glaring, she took an exaggerated bite, which was lost on him, as he did not look up. Worse, a sense of well-being filled her with each blasted bite. Blasted Talent. “Did you know Mr. Pierce was a clockmaker?”
“No.” Talent scanned the pages. “I assume it’s important.”
“Well, it’s rather odd, when one considers his main employer.”
His brow furrowed as his big body hunched over the papers. Talent’s reading expression, it seemed. So very serious. Mary could not fathom why it made her want to smile.
“Worked for the Archbishop of Canterbury, did he?” Talent’s head lifted so quickly he almost caught her smile. He, however, was far from amused. His golden complexion ebbed to pasty white. “Can’t imagine why the archbishop would need a clockmaker in his employ.”
“Do you…” Mary was about ask if he knew the archbishop, but that would be a stretch. The clergyman took tea with the Queen. “As you can see,” she said instead, “Pierce received regular payments from Lambeth Palace. I believe it would do us well to speak to the archbishop. In that vein—”
“We don’t need to question him.” Talent’s big hands crumpled the pages.
“Of course we do.” Mary pried the papers from his clenched hands and smoothed them out before organizing them into a neat stack. “I’ve already made the arrangements.”
“What?” His chair screeched as he lurched to his feet. “When?”
Mary stood as well. “We had a bit of luck there. I sent a note of inquiry to the palace—”
“You contacted Lambeth Palace?” Ire snapped in his eyes, his lips forming a flat line as though he was trying not to shout.
Mary tucked the report into her working bag. “If you’d let me finish—”
“There isn’t anything to finish, Chase.” Talent’s hard, masculine jaw clenched. “You do not decide who we interview. I do. This is my case. You are assisting me.”
Was there any answer for that nonsense? Mary rather thought not. “Calm yourself. You’re drawing unwanted attention.”
Conversation had petered out, with more than a few patrons giving them a speculative glance. Talent only had eyes for her. His shoulders bunched beneath his dingy coat.
“Look here, Chase.” He pointed a finger in her general direction. “You do not manage me.” He took a step closer, looming, his breath sawing. “Am I understood?”
Yes. At the very least, this Talent she understood well. She had to tilt her neck to meet his eyes. “Are you under some misapprehension that I do not speak English, Master Talent?”
The broad planes of his cheeks colored as his eyes narrowed. She did not give him a chance to respond. “I understood every word you’ve stated thus far, ridiculous drivel that it was.” Her skirts brushed the tips of his battered boots as their glares clashed and warred. “As you stated, we are partners. Which means equals. And if you want me to cease ‘managing you,’ as you call it, then I suggest you learn to keep your temper under control. Now would be a fine time to start, thank you.”
His mouth opened, the glitter in his eyes growing dangerous, but she held up a hand. “Save yourself the trouble of shouting again. I am through speaking with you.” She gathered her skirts and turned toward the exit. But she paused and looked over her shoulder at him. “Unless you’d like to tell me what has you so upset over the idea of interviewing the archbishop?”
For she had to wonder if this little outburst was his attempt at diversion. As if he read her suspicion, his jaw snapped shut with an audible click. Oh, but his nostrils flared, his close-cropped hair sticking out wildly.
“No?” she said when he merely stood there, baring his teeth at her like a madman. She shrugged. “Then we shall be conducting that interview.”
She took one step farther, when his terse response lashed out. “We are not.”
“We are.”
Jack would have liked to say that his instinct for trouble had always been well honed. Unfortunately, his education in that arena had been painful and hard-earned. But earn it he had, and thus he knew he ought to have listened to his instinct and stayed away this day. Pierce worked for the bloody Archbishop of Canterbury? Jesus, this was a cock-up. This doppelgänger killer knew too much. Jack’s underbelly was exposed, revealing a wound that had never truly stopped bleeding.
He was aware he’d been an ass of the first order to Chase. He had not been able to control it. Bloody, bloody arch-bloody-bishop. An old rage boiled to the surface, one that cried out for release, to tear into something. Jack gritted his teeth as he walked alongside her. She was too quick by half. Something, in normal circumstances, he’d appreciate. Save he had little recourse when she dug her heels in, nor did he know how he was to conceal certain facts without getting caught.
They had walked halfway down the road when a runner caught up with them and ordered their immediate return to headquarters. Wilde wanted to meet with them.
Thankfully, Wilde cut straight to business as soon as they arrived in his dark and dreary office.
“Lord Darby called on me this morning.”
“Really,” Jack drawled, “I’m surprised. I’d have thought him fast asleep given his proclivities.” He’d had to watch the bloody bastard go at it for hours the other night. Shifter stamina was an impressive thing. Regretfully so, at times.
He could all but feel Chase squirm beside him. Good. He was in a foul mood. And she made up the greater half of it.
Wilde’s mouth pitched to the side, an odd half-twitch. Sitting calm and tall in his chair at the head of the table, he merely rested his hands upon the glossy surface and continued. “He appears to find Mistress Honeychurch and Master Evans preferable escorts and has requested that you, Master Talent and Mistress Chase, be taken off guard duty rotation. In short”—Wilde’s cool, black gaze bore into them—“he wants nothing further to do with you.”
“I suggest you tell him to piss off.” Frankly, Jack was glad to be rid of Darby. He knew that path led to a dead end and had not been looking forward to tonight’s guard. But the request was a slight against him, and Chase. God knew Chase didn’t deserve it.
Wilde’s brows rose. “Oh, certainly. I shall ignore the fact that he donates hundreds of thousands of pounds to SOS operations and tell the earl to ‘piss off’ because his reasonable demand has sent my regulator into a fit of pique.”
Chase’s skirts rustled. Jack caught a flash of wine satin before jerking his attention back to Wilde. Jack crossed one leg over the other. “I was under the impression that our organization looked beyond money and title.”
“Are you also under the impression that our employees work for free?” Wilde inquired smoothly. “For that can be arranged.”
He was about to retort, but Chase’s smooth voice cut in. “I agree with my partner. Kowtowing to a man solely because he pays the bills is folly.”
Damn, but Jack liked her too well. Just as he’d feared he would. Lust was one thing. It burned off quickly. “Like” was decidedly dicey. “Like” could grow, lead to other unfortunate “L”-words that did not bear thinking of. Of course there were words to offer a fine distraction, such as “lick,” “linger,” “luxuriate,” or the more-obscure-but-rife-with-possibilities “lingua.”
Jack ran his lingua along the backs of his teeth, then promptly bit down on it to focus. “Lummox” was another word he would do well to remember. “It is badly done of the SOS,” he added, just to dig in, because there was something fun about joining with Chase.
Wilde’s pale skin grew ruddy, the pinch about his mouth more pronounced, but it all eased in a blink. “Lord Darby will still be watched. Just not by the two of you.” Wilde shook his head, looking weary and slightly bemused. “I don’t know what you did to annoy him, Master Talent—”
“I merely talked to him.”
“Apparently,” Wilde murmured, “that is enough to annoy anyone.”
A gurgling sound came from somewhere in Chase’s vicinity. Jack refused to look.
Wilde stood, meeting over, discussion done. “Do not pin your focus on something you cannot change.” He smiled briefly. “Pieces shift on the board. It is the end game that counts.”
As though she’d been waiting for it, Chase took the moment to speak up. “I’ve heard from the Archbishop of Canterbury’s staff.”
Jack went utterly cold. Slowly he turned toward her. Chase’s cameo-smooth skin glowed in the dingy office light as she looked up at Wilde. Perfectly composed. As though she weren’t driving a stake under his chin. Traitor! Outmaneuvering miss. Through a hollow tunnel of sound he heard her. “The Archbishop of Canterbury has agreed to meet with us. This afternoon, in fact.”
Bloody f**king hell.
He might have cursed out loud, for Wilde and Chase both turned with twin expressions of surprise mixed with censure. Jack cleared his throat. “Do either of you honestly believe that the Archbishop of Canterbury is murdering shifters?”
He was surprised he could speak at all, given that his heart was thundering in his throat and his insides had turned watery. He could not go back there. He could not. The ringing in his ears grew louder. “He is one of the most powerful men in the realm. Nor is he likely to even believe in supernaturals, much less know of their existence.”
“That is hardly the point,” said Chase. “He might have information, however innocuous it might seem on the surface. Never mind the fact that, as investigators, it is our duty to leave no stone unturned.”
“How very diligent of you,” Jack muttered. But he was trapped. Wilde was studying him as though he were a particularly interesting insect, and Chase was just waiting for him to further object. He did not doubt she had a store of volleys waiting to be lobbed back at him.
“It is a delicate situation,” Wilde said. “No, he does not know of our kind. Nor will he.” The fact was so implicit that Wilde did not bother phrasing it as a threat. “But since he has agreed to speak with you both, so you shall.”
Chapter Twenty
He was in a nightmare of his own making. Jack had never felt that truth more keenly than now, when bloody Mary Chase had marched them into Lambeth Palace, never mind his protests that this was all for naught. After giving him the brisk order to “go the bloody hell home if you’re so against it,” she’d ignored him.
The very idea of sending Chase in here alone curdled his insides. Cold sweat dripped down his spine and tickled the backs of his ears as they were led into a murky drawing room. The last time he’d paid the palace a visit, he’d been huddled on the stone-cold floor of the crypts, hugging that dank ground as if it were his salvation. Looking back, he could not fathom why he’d had the faith to seek sanctuary here. Nothing in his young life ought to have given him that hope. Yet he’d come. And John Michael Talent had been destroyed that dark day.