She overdoes her sniffles, but Findlay buys it. After all, she’s a poor Victorian widow. It’s a wonder she hasn’t fainted by now.
I crack the door open. Then I angle myself until I can see inside. The sliver of a view is enough. Gray is unconscious on the floor. Findlay is on one knee beside him, hammer lifted to hit Gray in the head again. I can only see Isla’s skirts—she seems to be on a chair just out of sight.
“Tell me what happened at tea today,” Findlay says. “What does McCreadie know? What did that little cow tell him?”
Little cow? Is that me? Huh.
“Catriona knows nothing,” Isla says.
Findlay lifts the hammer. My breath catches, but he only holds it above Gray’s head.
“You seem to be doubting whether I’ll go through with this,” he says. “That’s unfortunate. See, the thing about repeated blows to the head is that they’re unpredictable. Your brother would tell you that, if he could. If I hit him in the same spot again, it will certainly cause brain damage. It could also kill him. And I don’t care. Is that clear, Isla? I don’t care if he dies. Just another body to add to my count.”
“Detective McCreadie has a lead on Archie Evans,” Isla blurts. “On why he may have been tortured.”
“Tortured? Who said he was tortured?”
Isla stops. Shit. How little did McCreadie share with his constable?
“I-I do not know,” Isla says. “There must have been some evidence—”
“It was her, wasn’t it? Catriona?”
“Our housemaid?” Isla voice rises in convincing incredulity.
“She’s been helping him. I know he escorted her as she played detective.”
“Perhaps, but as I said, Catriona has nothing to do with any of this.”
The hammer swings down. I see it swinging, too fast to be a feigned blow, and I throw open the door and charge at Findlay. He falls back. He might be faking it again. I don’t really care. All that matters is that his hammer is no longer on a collision course with Gray’s skull.
“You wanted to talk to me?” I say as he scrambles to his feet.
He snarls an oath.
“Is that a no?” I say, brandishing the knife. “I could swear I heard my name. Well, something like it, at least.”
He shakes off his anger, finding a sneer instead. “Typical American. I’m surprised you didn’t yell yippee-ki-yay, too.”
“I’m not American,” I say. “Didn’t you hear me apologizing for spilling that coffee? I might as well have had a maple leaf tattooed on my forehead.”
We’re in a standoff. He’s five feet away. Gray is on my one side, Isla on my other. Gray is unconscious. Isla’s bound to a chair and wisely staying quiet. Either of them makes a target, which is why I ran between the two. The imposter has his hammer, and while it isn’t a gun, I’m not about to get in its path.
“You seem eager to talk to me,” I say. “Well, to talk about me at least. A little obsessive. Kinda creepy, really. But that’s you, I’m guessing. Kinda creepy.”
I’m blathering, assessing and distracting, but something there hits an unexpected mark as he blanches. Okay, then.
“Textbook serial-killer behavior patterns,” I continue. “I’d hoped for better. More interesting, at least. Please tell me you didn’t wet the bed and torture small animals.”
That swing goes wide, as his face relaxes, sneer returning.
“So you are a police officer?” His laughter rings hyena-like with mockery. “I thought so, from the way you handled that body, all your talk about scanning the crowd for the killer.”
Shit. I forgot that. He’d been watching me so intently that day. Not confused by my actions. Studying them. That’s why he’s been questioning Isla about me. He realized I was a cop. A modern cop. That made me dangerous.
He smirks. “That must have been so embarrassing for you. A police officer murdered by a serial killer. You weren’t even chasing me. Just out for a jog. Got yourself jumped like any silly cow.”
“You know what’s really embarrassing? A time-traveling serial killer taken down by a teenage girl in this dress.” I wave at myself. “You try fighting crime as a nineteen-year-old Victorian housemaid. Way tougher than killing people as a Victorian constable. You had the inside scoop, and you still screwed up.”
He whips the hammer at me.
Isla shouts a warning, but I’m already diving out of the way. The hammer still glances off my shoulder, spinning me around. Then a shot fires. I think I’m mishearing. I must be mishearing. The bullet hole in the wall says I am not.
The imposter curses, and I wheel to see him with a revolver. It’s an antique—or it will be, in my day. Right now, it’s probably state-of-the-art. He lifts it again, reloaded, and I run, dodging and ducking, not giving him a clear shot.
“Not such a smart-mouthed little cow now, are you?” he calls as his footsteps tromp after me. “Not so brave either.”
I run past the exit door as I veer into another room. I need to get him away from Isla and Gray, easy targets for his pistol and his rage.
And then what? I’ve brought a knife to a gunfight. Damn it, where the hell did he get a gun? Wherever he could, because he’s a modern killer. He’ll arm himself with the best weapon, which is going to be a gun. I didn’t expect it, and that’s on me.
I duck around the corner. He’s taking his time, each footfall thudding as he walks into the hall.
“You didn’t run out the door?” he calls. “You really are pathetic. Let’s see. Which room could you be in? How about this one?”
He swings into the room where I’m hiding. “Now, if I were cowering in here, where would I be?”
He stops and chuckles. “I can see your boot.”
He strides into the room, heading for an old settee, where my discarded boot peeks out. I crouch behind a chair, knife in hand. One chance. I will get a split second before he realizes the trick. I tense, watching him step into the room. Another step. Just two more—
A shadow looms behind him. A sudden movement. It’s Gray, swinging the hammer with all of his might, but he’s still dazed, and he puts too much into the swing, and it hits the imposter in the shoulder instead.
The smaller man staggers, but stays on his feet, gun barrel flying up, a point-blank shot that he cannot miss. His finger is on the trigger, Gray at the other end of that barrel.
I fly from my hiding place. I stab the imposter in the back, and I aim for the heart. One chance. That’s all I’ll get. The knife slides between his ribs. I let go and grab his arm before he can fire the gun. I don’t know if he tries, but he doesn’t manage it, and the gun falls as Gray slams him backward.
The imposter starts to fall. I dive out of the way, and he goes down, thudding onto the knife handle, the knife driving through his chest. He hits the floor, his face contorted in a snarl. Then his entire body convulses, as if with a seizure. He jerks once and goes still for a moment. When his eyes open, I’m on the floor, pinning him, in case that stab wound isn’t as lethal as I expect.
He stares at me. His mouth opens.
“Catriona?”
My own heart stutters. It’s the same voice; but it is not the same person.
“Colin,” I say.
“You—you have killed me?” he says.
I lean over him. “You tried to do the same to me.”
“I-I—” His face spasms in pain, and he shudders. “It was Archie’s idea. All Archie’s. He said we had to scare you. Knock you out. Bring you to a basement near my rooms. Frighten you. Punish you.”
“You are an officer of the law,” I say. “You bring criminals to justice. You don’t deliver it yourself.”
“Archie hit you, and you did not pass out. You attacked me. I had to defend myself.”
“By strangling me?” I swallow my rage and force myself to say, “I am sorry for what I did to you, Colin, but it did not deserve that.”
“Do you forgive me?” he says, his voice an almost inaudible rasp. “You must forgive me.”
I don’t want to. But the terror in his eyes makes me grind out the words. “I understand that you did what you thought you needed to.”
His mouth opens, and I don’t hear what he says, as I suddenly realize there’s an answer here. An answer I desperately need.
“Colin?” I say. “Where were you?”