A Murder in Time(62)

The blue eyes sparked, then went cold. “Mayhap you know such fiends, Miss Donovan.” Her upper-class accent was so precise, it was like a slap. “I do not.”

“Actually . . . you do.”

Rebecca drew in a breath, the earlier friendliness gone. Now she looked every inch the aristocrat.

Kendra sighed, but maintained eye contact. “I think you could be very helpful to this investigation, but if you can’t handle it . . .” She shrugged.

The other woman frowned. “I can . . . handle it.”

The phrase was obviously unfamiliar to Lady Rebecca, but she’d gotten the gist of it. Kendra was beginning to like the Lady.

“Good. Otherwise . . .” She remembered what Dalton had said yesterday, and gave the other woman a speculative look. “Just how good are you at portraiture?”

The question threw Rebecca. “You want me to paint your portrait?”

“Not me—”

“Bloody hell. We already told you, that would not be proper,” Alec snapped.

Kendra ignored him. “We plan to send out a description of the girl with the Bow Street Runner. It would be much more effective to have a photo—a sketch of some kind.”

“You want me to paint the dead woman?”

“Charcoal or pastels would be faster.” She glanced at the Duke. “I’m sorry, but it’s the best way.”

“This is beyond the pale—” Alec protested.

“I’ve never known you to be such a stuffed shirt, Sutcliffe,” Rebecca interrupted him, her expression once again amused. Kendra caught the glimmer of excitement in the cornflower eyes. “I shall do it. When?”

Kendra’s lips curved with an irony her audience would never understand. “I always say there’s no time like the present.”





18

Alec grabbed Kendra’s arm before she could follow the Duke and Rebecca out of the schoolroom. The action surprised Kendra—almost as much as the electrical jolt she felt at the physical contact.

“Why are you involving Lady Rebecca in this?” he demanded.

He released her, and Kendra let out a breath. But it caught in her throat again when he put his hand up, palm flat against the wooden doorframe, and shifted his body, effectively caging her in. She was close enough to see the gold flecks around the pupils in his green eyes, close enough to smell his scent, a blend of clean linen, leather, some kind of soap, and a masculine underpinning that was unique to the man.

“Well?” he asked impatiently, when she remained silent.

She cleared her throat. “I already told you—I think she’ll be helpful to the investigation. If she can sketch the dead girl’s face, we’ll have a much better chance at identification than sending out a verbal description.” She paused, then shrugged. “And it wouldn’t hurt to bring in a woman’s perspective.”

Alec frowned. “What the devil is your perspective?”

A twenty-first-century perspective, Kendra wanted to say. Instead, she shrugged again. “A woman from the aristocracy, then. As I said before, I think we’re dealing with someone from your class, Lord Sutcliffe.”

“Exactly what is your class, Miss Donovan?” he asked softly.

He was looking at her so intently that Kendra found herself fidgeting. She forced herself to stop and gestured to the clothes she was wearing. “I’m a servant.”

“Odd. That is what I told the Duke.” He smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes, which remained a clear, cool green. “Exactly who are you, Miss Donovan?”

To Kendra, it seemed as though he were saying: What are you? But perhaps she was reading too much into that—years of being under the microscope, as it were, more science experiment than child, had left her sensitive.

She remained silent. She had no choice, really. She could hardly tell him the truth.

He straightened, stepping back. “I shall be keeping a very close eye on you.”

Not for the first time, Kendra thought that, despite his elegant clothes, upper-class accent, lithe grace, and lineage, there was something dark, almost dangerous about the marquis. “That sounds almost like a threat,” she said.

He smiled grimly. “There is no almost about it, Miss Donovan.”



Kendra was relieved when they caught up with Rebecca and the Duke on the path leading to the icehouse. Aldridge was carrying Rebecca’s art supplies. The other woman had also put on an ankle-skimming dark brown velvet coat, Kendra noticed. The gaze Rebecca turned in their direction was frankly speculative, but she didn’t ask where they’d been.

“I’ve told Lady Rebecca if she has second thoughts about doing this, she may simply inform us,” Aldridge stated.

Rebecca merely smiled. Her amusement vanished, however, when they entered the icehouse. Good, thought Kendra. She didn’t want anyone involved who viewed this as some sort of novelty.

Propriety may have been tossed out the window, but the Duke and Alec still made sure that the nude body was covered to the neck with a coarse wool blanket before Lady Rebecca was allowed to enter.

Kendra immediately scanned Jane Doe. Dalton had closed her eyes, but otherwise hadn’t touched the head. Normally, the M.E. would make an incision and pull down the scalp and cut open the skull to remove the brain, which was then weighed and measured. But this was the early nineteenth century. Maybe that wasn’t part of the normal procedure. Or maybe Dalton had decided to forgo that part of the autopsy because it was clear that the girl hadn’t died from a brain injury. Whatever the reason, it was probably for the best; Kendra doubted Lady Rebecca would’ve been allowed into the room if the girl’s head had been sliced open like a tin can.