Broken Promises (9 page)

“Nothing,” she said. Of course, it was a lie. Her voice sounded choked, but her green eye was clear of tears. She squared her chin and hastily looked away, toward the window where the landscape rushed by.

A wave of disappointment flooded him. He wanted to force the issue. Instead, he nodded slowly. “You would tell me if something was wrong?”

“Of course.” She didn’t meet his eyes.

* * *

Callie must have fallen asleep, because she awoke with a start, lurching to a sitting position to find that she was alone in the train compartment. Her forehead was cold from leaning against the window and she rubbed it absently.

Her hand trembled.

The tremors had gotten much worse. In only twelve hours she’d gone from experiencing a momentary twitch, perhaps once or twice a day, to an almost constant shudder. Unfortunately, that wasn’t all. In the past twelve hours she’d also noticed an increase in the momentary lapses of her vision. Flashes of intense light followed by very short periods of blindness. Seconds only, but enough to make her worried.

And although she’d blamed her earlier headache on the veil, she was starting to wonder whether it was, in fact, related to the rest.

It could be nothing.

But Callie knew—she
knew
—otherwise. Was it a
good
thing
the doctor had told her she would never bear a child? What if the degeneration was worse than she thought? Affecting her more deeply than she’d suspected? More than just a twitch in her hand, or a stiff leg. What if it was affecting her mind?

She still hadn’t mentioned a word to Jasper. She told herself it was only because there hadn’t been any time, they hadn’t had any privacy. But that argument was flimsy. He’d asked her straight out to tell him what was wrong. Now she was not only keeping secrets, but actively lying…and she still couldn’t tell him. This was something she had to keep to herself, at least until she spoke to Dr. Helmholtz.

As for the other, the…baby…she just wasn’t ready to voice it aloud. Then it would be real, and her failure would be complete. She couldn’t be the woman he had married. She was no longer an accomplished dancer. She wasn’t beautiful. She couldn’t bear him children.

What reason would he have to stay with her?

This. This mission. It was the only thing left, the only way to prove she still had some value. He would see how well she handled herself and realize she would be an asset at his side.

Good Lord.
Sitting in here alone was
not
helpful to her peace of mind.

Jasper and Patrick had probably gone to the dining car for something to eat. Her stomach rumbled at the thought. Standing, she reached for her veil. She wasn’t looking forward to the headache wearing it would give her, but it was either that or have people stare. When she found them, she would again suggest to Jasper that they conduct a once-over of the train. The memory of the stranger on the platform was still bothering her.

Sliding open the door and stepping over the slight lip into the hallway, she looked to the left and gasped. At the end of the car, Jasper stood with a strange woman. Their heads were close together, whispering, before he leaned in and kissed her!

Callie shoved up the netting of her veil, desperate to see that she’d made some mistake. Her head was pounding, but she shook it off. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except the nightmare unfolding before her. The woman was beautiful with long, dark hair like she herself used to have. Even from this distance her breasts looked overly…abundant…as they pushed out the chest of a crisp and very feminine-looking traveling outfit. She no doubt had perfect, shapely legs too.

Had he gone to the tart with his seed still wet on
her
thighs? Did they know each other? Or, even worse, maybe they’d just met.

Callie couldn’t tear her gaze from the pair as their kiss grew deeper, almost frantic. Jasper’s hand lifted to cup the weight of a breast and she even saw him tweak the woman’s nipple through the fabric of her dress. They kissed as if they could barely restrain themselves from tearing each other’s clothing off right there in the hallway, heedless of whether others looked on.

His wife, for example.

She bit the fleshy side of her hand to stifle the sob that fought to come forth as the woman fumbled with the door to the last compartment at that end of the car. She pushed it open and stepped inside, smiling up at Jasper and crooking her finger for him to join her.

Without a second’s hesitation, he followed.

Callie finally spun around and ran in the opposite direction. Unused to skirts after so long, and half-blinded by tears, she stumbled down the narrow corridor.

Shaking off the shiver that traveled up her spine as she relived the horrible scene, she reached out to the heavy metal door connecting to the next train car, but it slid open before she could touch it. The rush of chilly fresh air from outdoors flooded inside and tore at her clothing. Callie blinked and took an instinctive step back to make room for whoever was trying to come through.

She looked right into the light colored eyes of the man from the platform.

“You,” she gasped.

For a split second, he seemed just as startled to see her standing there, but then he leaped forward, rushing her in the corridor, shoving her against the wall. Instinct took over and she raised her arm to block as he swung for her face. She ducked and twisted. His fist smacked the paneling where her head had just been and she slipped out of his grasp.

She started in the other direction. If she could get back and bar herself inside her compartment, she might buy enough time to rummage through Jasper’s bag for a weapon.

The man gripped her shoulder and roughly jerked her back around. She lost her footing and stumbled, giving him the opportunity to throw her up against the wall again, his fingers biting hard into her upper arms.

“I’ll kill you if I have to.” His Scottish accent was evident even in his snarl. He must have been consciously disguising it when they met him back on the airship. “I won’t let anyone stop me. Understand?”

“It is you, isn’t it…Captain Dunsmoor?” How had he done it? The faces he’d worn, they weren’t masks. She could see from here, they couldn’t have—

He growled and wrapped his fingers around her neck, squeezing. Her throat closed and her mouth opened, gulping for air but unable to draw any. Her heart hammered and she clawed with her gloved fingers, which simply slipped off his bulging forearms. The oxygen drained from her cells with every quickly passing moment, making her weak. She might still have enough strength to—she pushed out, shoving at his chest.

He let her go and Callie took a swing of her own, catching him on the edge of the jaw with her iron fist. He pitched to the side and dropped his head. When he looked back up she started and shrank back. The skin under his cheekbone swelled and retreated down and across his jaw like a wave in the water, or the way an earthworm slipped through black earth. As if there was
something
in his face just beneath the surface, something
moving.

He saw her horror and snarled at her, then shook his head. She used the split second of time she’d been given to make another dash for the cabin.

She’d taken three steps when Dunsmoor called after her. “I knew you were one of his monsters. A monster like me.”

She gasped and looked over her shoulder, but it was only his voice chasing her. His body remained hunched over, leaning against the wall of the train car hallway while he rubbed his jaw. Not for long. He straightened and started for her again, his cold gaze spearing her until she couldn’t breathe.

A gun. There had to be a gun in Jasper’s pack. She was halfway there. If she hurried, she might be able hold it on him until someone came.

The door at the opposite end of the train car slid open with an audible rush of air.

“Callie, what—”

“Jasper! It’s him! It’s Dunsmoor!” she called.

* * *

Jasper took in the scene in the space of a heartbeat. Callie’s terrified gaze, the man following her who halted midstride on seeing him.

And then he was running. “Patrick, stay with Lady Carlisle!” he ordered.

His prey reeled around and sped away down the corridor. With less distance between him and the far doorway, Dunsmoor slid it open and threw himself onto the steel-railed platform outside before Jasper even reached it. The collar of Dunsmoor’s coat started flapping in the wind but then he forced open the door to the next car and kept going.

Jasper rushed after him, entering the other private passenger car, moving as fast as he could. Dunsmoor was quick, but Jasper was gaining.

By the time the man reached the next exit, Jasper was almost able to grab him, but instead of proceeding into a third car, when Dunsmoor climbed outside onto the steel platform connecting the train cars, he turned to watch through the thick glass before he glanced down. Jasper couldn’t see for sure, but he knew Dunsmoor was doing something to brace the door shut.

“No, damn it!” Jasper yelled, lunging the last few feet. It wasn’t enough. When he barreled to a stop at the end of the corridor, he yanked at the handle but couldn’t slide the metal door open.

He kicked it and yelled. Dunsmoor grinned up at him and gave him a sharp, mocking salute before spinning around and disappearing into the last train car.

Jasper managed to message a train attendant through the interphone system to come and get the car door open, but by the time he was able to continue his pursuit, Dunsmoor was, of course, nowhere to be found. He looked in each room, in every seat, and even in the service cars, but the man had either jumped the train or adopted another disguise and disappeared into the crowd.

An hour later he was finally forced to give up and returned to Callie and Patrick, a simmering pot of rage. He asked Patrick to inform the engineer that there was a wanted military fugitive loose among the passengers. “Give him a description, but you should also warn him that Dunsmoor is able to alter his appearance.” He paused. “We have to put the train staff on guard, but I don’t think we’ll see any more of Dunsmoor until Manchester. He’ll probably keep a low profile for the rest of the trip.”

“Why do you think so?”

Callie spoke up. “Because I think I hurt him when I punched him. There was something wrong with his face.”

Jasper nodded. He’d seen the strange flux that seemed to distort Dunsmoor’s features.

“I don’t think it’s a disguise,” Callie continued.

“Are you certain it was Dunsmoor, then?” Patrick asked. “This didn’t look like the same man we saw boarding the airship.”

Her gaze shifted away and she clutched her hands together, but when she looked at Jasper she nodded. “I know it didn’t look like him, but I’m almost positive it was. And it wasn’t a mask. He wasn’t wearing makeup. I think he can change his appearance.” Her voice pleaded with him to believe her. “Jasper, you should have seen…” She shuddered. “He believes that Dr. Helmholtz made him into a monster. Like me.”

“Don’t—”

She shook her head. “After I hit him, his face moved, like I’d knocked something loose and everything beneath the skin had to realign itself. Maybe the biomechanical organisms are shifting his features whenever he suffers a trauma to the face. If the doctor had to rebuild—”

He held up a hand. “I know where you’re going with this, but it’s too strange…”

“I know, but don’t you think it’s plausible?”

“Perhaps, but I’d rather wait and hear the doctor’s theory. The idea that Dunsmoor is out there still, he could be
anyone
and we wouldn’t even know, it is too dangerous to consider.”

Patrick slid the cabin door shut behind him as he left and Jasper drew Callie close, indulging the need to feel her solid and sure against him in the aftermath of violence. “That was much too—” He shook his head.
Too close
.

She abruptly pushed him away and turned out of his arms.

“What is it?” he asked. “Are you worried about Dunsmoor? We’ll catch him, don’t worry.”

“I saw you.” Her words were a sharp accusation.

“Saw me where?”

“I saw you kissing that woman.”

His mouth dropped open. “
What?
What are you talking about?”

“When I woke up earlier and you were gone. That’s why I left the compartment, to look for you. And imagine my surprise to see you inhaling another woman’s tongue and manhandling her breast.”

“I haven’t kissed or manhandled anyone on this train—or anywhere else for that matter—besides you.” He stepped toward her, needing to touch. He couldn’t stand the look in her eyes, making him feel guilty and dirty even though he hadn’t done what she was accusing him of. “Where did you get such an absurd notion?”

She took a corresponding step back and crossed her arms.

He sighed. “Callie, you know I haven’t even looked at another woman since the moment we met.”

“Part of me understands.” Her voice broke. “It can’t be easy for you to be with me when I look like this.”

“
Enough.
” He strode forward and she kept moving backward, but he gave no quarter until her back hit the wall and she could go no farther. “See the truth in my face,” he barked. “Being with you is the easiest, most natural thing I’ve ever done.”

She tried to look away, but he gripped her chin and held her still.

“I don’t know who you saw or what you think you witnessed, but it wasn’t me.”

“I saw—”

“It was someone else.”

Indecision played across her face.

“Callie, I’ll always tell you the truth,” he pressed. “I promised you that. And I promise you now. It. Wasn’t. Me.”

* * *

Manchester looked the same as the day she’d left it, even though the last of the snow had long ago melted away and the deep chill was gone from the air, having been replaced with a cool spring breeze that carried the promise of warm rains.

But breezes and rain wouldn’t wash away the stench that lingered here. Spring, summer, winter or autumn, underneath it all this city would always have the same air of gritty survival and ruthless determination. This was especially apparent as their hired carriage rolled past the outskirts of Old Town, which reminded her of an aging, dirty-fighting pugilist who’d spent his life in the ring and would use any trick to come out on top.