Page 37 of The Duke's Mysterious Lover
Just like that, Bull’s smile flashed. “Aye, likely. They’ll no’ hear it from me, though.”
“Griffin Calderbank…” Fawkes repeated slowly. “The new Duke of Peasgoode. He was an agent, aye?”
Thorne knew his cousin had heard the names, but understanding all the history could become confusing. “When Blackrose began to eliminate his agents in preparation for an escape from the country—”
“Covering his tracks,” Bull interrupted, “so nae one could trace his evil deeds to him.”
Thorne nodded. Bit theatrical, but essentially accurate. “Blackrose gave Calderbank an assignment to kill a fellow agent, and after doing so—although no’ really, since it turned out that fellow agent, Wilson, just needed a chance to disappear since he was still loyal to Blackrose—”
“Wilson was Olivia’s stepbrother,” Bull interrupted again. “She’s married to the Duke of Effinghell—that’s how they got involved.”
“Do ye want to tell this story?” Thorne snapped, temper immediately rising.
Bull waved the cigar. “Ye’re doing a fine job.”
“Where was I?”
“Calderbank no’ killing Wilson,” Fawkes supplied.
“Aye, well, Calderbank packed up his children and fled to America, where they were hiding until we—Ye ken Sophia, Rourke’s wife, stole all the evidence from Blackrose? Well, when we realized which agents had likely survived the purge, we tracked them down. It took some doing, but I convincedCalderbank it was safe to return to London. Mainly because we needed his help.”
Bull was staring at the end of his cigar. “Ye forgot the important part,” he said quietly. “Why Griffin left.”
Frowning, Thorne exchanged a glance with Fawkes. “I dinnae ken…?”
Bull took a deep breath and sat up straighter, his somber gaze going unerringly to Fawkes. “Griffin packed up Marcia and wee Rupert and dragged them to America in the dead of night with only a few trunks of belongings, hours after he buried his first wife.”
Fawkes shook his head, still frowning. “His children had already been through so much…”
“Dinnae judge him,” Bull spat, suddenly darting forward to snub the cigar against the glass tray on the desk. He stared at the smoldering mess for a long moment, the only sound in the room his harsh inhale before he spoke again. “Griffin told Blackrose he wanted out. He didnae even realize the bastard wasnae working for the Crown at that point. He just kenned he wanted nothing to do with a supervisor who commanded he kill fellow agents.”
Fawkes glanced at Thorne, as if he might understand where this was going. And Thorne, horrible suspicion growing in his mind, grimaced.
“Blackrose didnae take the news well.” Bull’s fingers, never still, ground the cigar into the tray, back and forth, back and forth, until there was no chance of an ember escaping. “He threatened Griffin’s family. The next day, his wife Mary began to grow ill. A stomach ailment.” He swallowed and looked up, meeting Fawkes’s eyes. “The symptoms were consistent with arsenic poisoning.”
Fawkes’s eyes widened.
Thorne cursed quietly. “Taking his children to America was his way of protectingthemfrom Blackrose.”
“Nay, no’ Blackrose,” Bull said quietly, still pinning Fawkes with his serious gray gaze. “Blackrose’s poisoner. The Duke of Death.”
Fawkes’s sharp inhale proved he suddenly understood. “Ye thinkI—” He clamped down on the words, studying the young man in the other chair. “Ye do.”
“It’s in the past, Fawkes,” Thorne said quietly, remembering the thingshe’ddone at Blackrose’s campaign. “None of us are innocents.”
“Mary was,” Bull said tightly.
“Aye…she was,” Fawkes began slowly, as if picking his way through the sentence, trying to see the end of it. He held Bull’s gaze. “And if Blackrose had killed her—ifIhad killed her merely to punish Calderbank, I would be even further damned.If.”
Bull exhaled, and it wasn’t until Thorne echoed it that he realized he’d been holding his breath as well.
“Swear it,” the young man demanded, tilting his chin down. “Swear ye didnae poison Mary Calderbank.”
“On my daughter’s soul,” Fawkes promptly agreed.
Bull seemed to understand the sanctity of such a vow.
Still holding the lad’s gaze, Fawkes continued. “As far as I ken, I was Blackrose’s only poisoner. He took great delight in telling me who each dosage was for, kenning I could no’ defy him. He never spoke of Calderbank, nor his wife. I never gave him arsenic, and I never administered it either.”
