Any Other Name (26 page)

The child nodded. “I didn’t do anything. Cathy, can you play with me now?”

But Cathy wasn’t looking at her. Sam followed her gaze to a figure approaching them wearing a grey coat with a half cape about its shoulders. It looked like something out of a film to Sam, or something worn by a student with aspirations to be a modern-day dandy. The man’s face was unremarkable, his brown hair long enough to be tied back in a ponytail. Eyes fixed on Cathy, he undid the top three buttons, partially revealing an embroidered waistcoat. Cathy stood up.

“I don’t like this, he’s a Fae-touched,” she had time to say, just before the man drew out a stiletto dagger.

“Fuck!” Sam jumped to his feet too.

“Sophia, run!” Cathy yelled and the child bolted for nearby bushes.

Sam didn’t move for a second, watching the man cross the park as if he were watching a film; it felt too unreal to spur him into action.

A terrible high-pitched screech came from the child. Sam spun around to see her tangled in rose briars reaching out of the ground like the tentacles of a sea monster. Sam gawped as the thorns tore into the girl’s legs, piercing her coat and reaching for her throat.

Cathy sprinted over to her, grabbed the creepers that were about to choke the child and held them off, blood blooming on her pale-blue gloves. The man was heading straight for her. The sight of the knife being raised into the air kickstarted something deep in Sam’s instincts and he threw himself into the attacker’s path, brandishing his left hand in front of him.

“I’m protected by Lord Iron!” he yelled.

The man shook his head, as if Sam were nothing but a stupid child. “Always where you should not be,” he muttered, and grasped him by the neck with his left hand. There was a brief and terrible crushing sensation and before he fully registered he was in the air, Sam landed a few feet away on his side.

The moment after he landed Sam felt a horrific pain in his left arm and chest. Then he fell sideways like he’d been rolled off something moving beneath him. As he tried to look, his head hit one of the uprights in the iron railings marking the edge of the play area. He felt blood running down his arm and saw it dripping onto what looked like one of the iron bars, which seemed to have been bent beneath him. Then he heard Cathy cry out.

She was crouched between the attacker and the child, whose high-pitched scream sounded more like a football referee’s whistle. The man had just slashed at Cathy but she’d brought up her arms to defend herself and the girl. There was a gash in her gloves, which were now more deep red than pale blue.

Not even thinking about what he was doing, Sam reached down with his right hand and grasped the iron bar. It felt warm and malleable and broke away from its point in the railings easily. The metal was slick with his blood. Its finial was shaped like an arrowhead and with every passing moment it felt more like a spear.

The assailant kicked Cathy under the chin, sending her sprawling into the tangle of thorns, and made a swift downward strike. Sam threw the spear at the same moment as he heard the sickening thud of the attacker’s hand hitting her chest after the dagger was plunged in up to its hilt.

The spear curved slightly in the air and struck the man in the side, knocking him over and leaving the stiletto embedded in Cathy’s chest. The man pulled out the spear but when he struggled to his feet he looked completely different. And horribly familiar. He was one of the brothers who had carried the body out of the museum that night when it all started. His limbs were far too long and thin. Thorn looked at Sam for a second, long enough for him to see the black almond eyes, then fled into the undergrowth.

Cathy wasn’t moving and Sam wasn’t sure he could either. Sweat prickled across his face. It was hard to breathe and he felt cold. His phone was lying in reach so he dialled 999, asked for an ambulance and police. In between short painful gasps he explained he’d been attacked, a woman had been stabbed and a child was hurt. As he gave their location he fought the urge to just close his eyes and drift off. When he was reassured help was on the way Sam hung up, planning to call Leanne and leave her a message. His hand was barely able to keep a grip on the phone and his thumb had become putty.

He let his arm drop. The girl was now calling Cathy’s name with a gut-wrenching desperation. “It’s all right,” he wanted to say, but his lips felt like rubber and his voice was nothing but a pathetic wheeze. Cathy still wasn’t moving.

His phone started to vibrate. Sam managed to lift it enough to see Leanne’s name on the caller ID as his vision tunnelled to black.

 

23

 

Will kissed the inside of Amelia’s thigh in a cave of lacy petticoat layers. He enjoyed the way she squirmed beneath his fingertips, the little gasps as his kisses moved higher and higher up her leg. He should have been at Black’s, or at home, solving the problems that plagued him, but she had been irresistible. He just had to have her, then and there, before he could think clearly again.

The brief pain in his left hand made him prod the wedding ring with his thumb as he teased her, thinking his slightly awkward position had caused the skin to be pinched by the band. A few kisses later and it felt like it was constricting. It rapidly became too painful to ignore.

He emerged from her skirts to inspect his hand. The band looked no different but his finger throbbed.

“What’s wrong?” Amelia propped herself up on her elbows. Her cheeks were deliciously flushed and her hair was a pleasant tumble around her face.

Will twisted the ring and it tingled at his touch. “I don’t know.” He wondered where Cathy was and whether she was feeling the same. He looked down at Amelia, her toe playfully exploring his belly button, and feared the ring was reacting to his infidelity. Was that even possible? Why was it happening now and not all the other times he’d been with Amelia?

Then he realised it was the first time he’d bedded her since he and Cathy had consummated the marriage. His lust evaporated.

“William.” Amelia beckoned to him.

But Will was distracted by the sudden racing of his heart and a sense of panic that had burst into his awareness out of nowhere. “Something’s not right.” He flattened down her petticoats and climbed off the bed. He pulled on his underwear and breeches hurriedly, fearing a summons from his patron any minute. Why hadn’t his father warned him of this?

“Will!” Amelia groaned. “I’ve only just got those off you!”

He took a breath to speak but a sudden, terrible pain filled his chest, making him fall back against the dressing table in his surprise. It was excruciating, stealing the air from his lungs and making blue pinpricks of light appear at the edge of his vision.

“Will!” Amelia cried, frantically tying a robe over her chemise and petticoats. “What’s wrong?”

Will squeezed his eyes shut, not daring to speak until the worst of the pain had passed. He looked down at his bare chest, expecting to see a wound, but his skin was unharmed. Just as quickly, the pain faded.

There was a loud pop and the faerie that had spoken to him in the carriage appeared in front of him. “What are you doing here?” it squealed. “You need to be with your wife! She’s dying!”

“What?” Will felt like his stomach was falling through the floor.

“She hasn’t had a child yet. How could you be so careless!”

“What are you talking about? Where is she?”

“In a green place in Mundanus.”

Will threw his shirt over his head and fumbled with the sleeves, feeling sick. His sword was at home. What was Cathy doing in… then he remembered Sophia. “Take me to her.”

“No, Will!” Amelia said. “It’s not safe. What if it’s a plot to draw you out and kill you!”

Sobered, Will nodded. “Find out where she is, and whether anyone is helping her,” he ordered the faerie and it disappeared in a shower of iris petals. Will pulled on his socks and shoes.

“Oh, my goodness, this is so awful,” Amelia gasped, clutching a sheet in front of her mouth.

“I shouldn’t have stayed, I knew I should have gone home,” he muttered. “If she dies… my God, she can’t die, she can’t die.” He imagined Lord Iris’s wrath, feared for Sophia who must have been with her. A ‘green place in Mundanus’ was probably St James’s Park as that was the closest to home.

The faerie reappeared. “There are mundanes there, lots of them, filthy men all around her and it’s so noisy.”

Will remembered what he’d seen of the emergency services on his Grand Tour. “Are there lots of blue flashing lights?” When the faerie nodded he realised Cathy was probably getting exactly the kind of care she needed. “Is she still alive?”

“You wouldn’t be here if she was dead,” the faerie said. “You’d be in Exilium, begging for forgiveness. My lord is furious.”

“So am I!”

“And now those mundanes have her.” The faerie flitted about his head.

“Tell Lord Iris I’m doing everything in my power to make sure Cathy will be safe.”

“I’ll tell him you will be now, but if you hadn’t been distracted–”

“Just go!” he yelled, making it scowl and then disappear with a pop.

Amelia ran to the door and called for Cornelius. “What are you going to do?” she asked.

Now he knew Cathy was being helped and that, if Sophia was with her, she’d be cared for too, he could think clearly. “She’ll be taken to a hospital. I need to contact the Agency.” As head of a household, he’d had a pack of information sent to him detailing other services the Agency provided outside of common knowledge. He was thankful he’d taken the time to read it. In return for a small fortune, they would extract Cathy from Mundanus, remove any mention of the incident in the relevant records and Charm any mundanes involved to forget she’d been there. It was complex and difficult, but worth it. “They’ll help me clear up the mess. When I know my family is safe I’ll find out who did this.”

“And then what?” She was pale, still clinging to the sheet as Cornelius arrived.

“Then I’ll destroy them.”

 

“The bar was just lying next to you?”

“Under me,” Sam said to the policewoman. His voice was so hoarse it sounded alien. “I landed on the railings. I think I broke them.”

She made a note and then looked him up and down. “You’re not the heaviest man, Mr Westonville. The assailant must have thrown you with some force.”

He pointed at the bruising on his neck. “He nearly choked me to death one-handed. He was strong.”

“So you picked up the bar…”

“Yeah, and I looked over and he stabbed the woman.” A wave of nausea made him suck in a breath. “There was a horrible sound, when it hit her chest I suppose, and I just threw the bar at him.”

“And you hit him square on.”

“Yeah.”

“From ten metres away, when you were injured and bleeding.”

He frowned. “Don’t you believe me?”

“I’m just making sure I have all the details, sir.”

“If I hadn’t hit him he would have stabbed her again.”

She just nodded. “And then what happened?”

“I called 999 and I passed out.”

“The doctor tells me you’re very lucky.”

Sam looked down at the two iron chunks beside him. The nurse had told him they’d pulled one out of his arm, one out of his side. Apparently they’d formed rudimentary plugs in his wounds. The nurse said they’d never seen anything like it and offered the plugs to him as morbid souvenirs. They were thicker than the railings had been, the policewoman had pointed out, and she wanted to know how they’d got that way. Sam had a working theory it was something to do with Lord Iron and the wedding ring. He couldn’t say anything about it though.

“I’ve got a cracked rib and a couple of small holes in me apparently. And bruising.”

He wondered how Cathy and the girl were. The police officer had been professionally vague, saying Cathy was in surgery and the girl was being cared for in A & E. He’d pretended he didn’t know who they were, saying he’d gone to the park to get some fresh air in the midst of a marital crisis and he was passing as the man attacked.

He needed to speak to Cathy as soon as she woke and warn her that one of the Fae were after her – one of the Thorn brothers, no less. But he’d have to wait until the police had finished taking notes and she was out of surgery.

“The woman who was attacked will be OK, won’t she?” he asked.

“I’m afraid I don’t know. It was a serious attack. She’s lucky you were there.” The police officer stood and put her hat back on. “Thanks for the details. You’ll need to make a formal statement when you’re feeling better. We’re doing all we can to catch him.”

Sam just gave a weak smile, knowing there was no way in hell anyone would find Thorn. He lay back against the pillow, glad to be in a room alone thanks to the need for an interview with the police. The bandages were tight around his torso and arm and he still felt shaky but the nurse had told him that was normal.

He’d asked them to contact Leanne as his next of kin. He hoped she would at least come and make sure he was OK. She hadn’t left a message and it was driving him mad that the one time she’d called him he hadn’t been able to answer the phone. He felt worn out but every time he tried to relax he thought about the attack.

There was a brisk knock on the door and a man entered. He wasn’t wearing a white coat nor any medical accoutrements, just a smart suit with a light jacket over it. Sam didn’t recognise him.

He was carrying a clipboard and an air of importance like that of a hospital administrator or manager. “Mr Samuel Westonville?”

Something about the way he said it made the hairs on the back of Sam’s neck prickle. “Yeah.”

“I just need to clarify a few details about the case with you.”

“Who are you?”

“DI Taylor.”

“I just spoke to your constable.”

“And she highlighted some details I wanted to check myself.”

“Can I see some ID, please?”

The man smiled affably, plucked an ID wallet from his pocket and flipped it open. “I understand you interrupted the attack.”

Sam nodded but the ID hadn’t calmed the sense of there being something dangerous about the man. He thought about how Thorn had disguised himself and wondered if this was him coming to kill off a key witness. Sam’s mouth went dry.

“Could you explain to me how the railings broke?”

“I landed on them. Look, I told the policewoman everything and I’m feeling rough. Could we talk about this tomorrow?”

“I understand. Could I just take a look at the bruising on your neck?”

“I was telling the truth. He picked me up and threw me.” Sam nervously reached up to his throat. Now he was more concerned they disbelieved him and were going to start seeing him as a suspect.

The man’s smile became false and froze rictus-like on his face when he saw the wedding ring. He shuddered and took a step back as he made a show of peering at the injury. “Yes, I can see the marks quite well from here. Well, thank you, Mr Westonville. As you said, I should let you rest.”

The man left quickly. Sam looked at the ring and twisted it nervously on his finger. As soon as the doctor gave him the all-clear he was going to get out of there and go somewhere safe.