Chapter 18 Kane
KANE
Kane had always been adept at compartmentalization.
Perhaps he was a little too adept at it.
There were things he ought to have remembered that he simply couldn’t.
Then there were the memories he played in his mind like a distant observer, feeling nothing in particular.
Half the time he felt more machine than man.
An insentient creature relying on chemical reactions and rotating gears.
From the very first day he’d met Zaria, Kane had known to be worried—he didn’t want her to bring him to life.
In the hours after he’d discovered her in his office, he had fallen asleep sitting at his desk. Then he’d dreamed of the day his parents had died.
The weeks after their deaths had been nightmarish, of course.
Both of them dispelled from the world in one fell swoop, with Kane forced to adapt to his new life in their absence.
Still, he’d managed to push it all from his mind rather quickly.
Or at least, that was how it felt looking back.
He’d clung to Alexander Ward like the kingpin was a raft in choppy waters. His parents’ faces had begun to fade.
In the dream, though, they were as clear as the day Kane had last seen them.
His mother, blue-eyed and auburn-haired, with the kind of smile that made strangers mistake her for naive.
His father, with his dark curls and equally dark gaze.
Cristian Durante’s smiles had been rare, hard-won things.
Kane didn’t quite take after either of his parents, though his coloring was closer to his father’s.
He’d almost forgotten how young they’d been at the time of their deaths.
They’d seemed so much older through the eyes of a child.
Kane hadn’t forgotten being there, though.
The way Maria and Cristian had been preparing to leave, shoving their meager belongings into sacks and murmuring to each other in soft, anxious Italian.
He hadn’t forgotten being ushered out the door at nightfall, or the men who waited outside for them, or how all the color drained from his mother’s face.
He hadn’t forgotten the three of them being led to what he realized now must have been Ward’s office.
The confrontation that ensued as his parents were forced inside, and the twin shots fired a moment later.
He remembered his mother’s blood when he was finally ushered through the door. How it pooled around her body and trickled across the uneven floor. Blood, blood, blood.
Then nothing.
When Kane awoke, the barest light of dawn slanting through his window, he had the urge to retch. He didn’t. Instead, he leaned back in his chair, breathing hard. What had his parents done?
There were so many things he should have dragged from the kingpin before pulling the trigger. So many questions Kane still needed answers to.
And it was too late.
He sat in silence as dawn bled into day, his parents’ dead faces behind his eyes and the taste of bile in his throat.
“Durante?”
Kane lifted his gaze to see Tom in the doorway. The man’s expression was unsure, and Kane wondered if it wasn’t the first time he’d tried to get his attention. “Yes?”
“Master Collins is here for you, as is Master Zhao.”
That was enough to command Kane’s focus. He lifted his gaze from Ward’s notes, frowning. “Together?”
Tom shrugged.
“Fine. Send them up.”
Fletcher appeared a moment later, Jules a step behind. They wore matching expressions of solemnity. Kane straightened, indicating for them to close the door. “Dare I even ask?”
“Have you seen The Times?” Jules demanded as Fletcher tossed the paper in question onto Kane’s desk. He grabbed it, not needing to read any farther than the headline to know why they’d come. He drew in a sharp breath, his stomach turning over.
brEAKING: TREACHERY OR TOMFOOLERY? ANOTHER MYSTERIOUS DEVICE APPEARS AT THE EXHIBITION.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“I was on my way to tell you when I saw Jules doing the same thing,” Fletcher said.
Kane looked between the two of them. “Somehow I doubt he was coming to tell me.”
“I’m not sure what difference it makes,” Jules retorted. “Seeing as I can’t seem to get Zaria away from you. Where is she, anyway?”
“I expect she’s still recovering from yesterday. You ought to have made sure she was in good health before devising a plan to blow up my shed.”
Jules blanched; Fletcher arched a brow. “What are you on about?”
“Forget it,” Kane said too casually, jabbing a finger at the newspaper. “I need to figure out what we’re going to do about this.”
The second device had been placed on the other side of India’s displays, directly across from the first one.
If London’s residents were perplexed by the appearance of the first, they were positively befuddled by the second—the article made that very clear.
Kane was surprised Jules and Fletcher had visited before Price.
The inspector was doubtless losing his mind currently.
As Kane had the thought, his gaze dropped to the bottom of the front page. Two images accompanied the article: each was a drawing of a small rectangle. His heart stuttered against his ribs as he realized what they were meant to portray.
“Yeah,” said Fletcher, following his gaze. “Apparently this so-called Curator has been leaving business cards behind. The Royal Commission decided to release them to the public in case anyone has information.”
The images were re-creations of the front and back of the business card.
Kane recognized the first one: It precisely matched what Price Senior had shown him the night they’d met up.
The Curator’s title indicated in looping font, nothing more.
The second image was also strangely familiar.
It depicted a complex shape: Two sets of parallel lines intersected to create a sort of diamond, and in the center three circles were contained within one another, like a bull’s-eye.
Another four lines connected the innermost circle to each corner of the diamond.
“What’s this supposed to be?” Kane said aloud, rotating the paper as if that might yield answers.
When neither Fletcher nor Jules answered, he rose and crossed to the door, newspaper still in hand.
The shape’s familiarity was like an itch inside his skull.
He couldn’t shake the thought that it looked similar to sketches one might see in writings about alchemology.
Fletcher tensed as if to follow him. “Where are you going?”
“To show Zaria.”
“I’m coming,” Jules said, his eyes tight with suspicion when they locked on Kane’s. “You’d best not have done anything to her, Durante.”
Kane snorted a laugh. “Do you mean because she attempted to break into my office and steal from me, or because she admitted to working with another kingpin?”
“What?” Fletcher blurted, face contorting in horror. “What other kingpin?”
“A mysterious Mister Vaughan is trying to establish himself as kingpin of Seven Dials. I’m sure Julian knows all about it.”
Jules crossed his arms. It was obvious he was attempting not to look shaken by how much Kane knew. “Vaughan threatened us. Zaria didn’t have a choice. I swear, if you—”
“Of course I didn’t harm her,” Kane snapped. “She had harmed herself well enough already. Though I would have been perfectly within my right to punish a crew member who attempted to rob me.”
“Don’t act so disgusted. Half of what you do is rob people.”
“It’s not robbing if they owe you money.”
“They owe you nothing! And neither does Zaria, for that matter.”
“As long as she’s part of my crew, she owes me her loyalty and obedience.”
Jules brought his teeth together. “You’re delusional if you believe she’ll ever truly be loyal to you.”
“And you’re a fool if you believe—for a single second—that I would ever allow harm to come to Zaria.
” Kane snarled the words, fingers digging into the wood of the doorframe.
Silence followed in the wake of his exclamation, and he faltered, swallowing.
He didn’t know what had made him say it.
Why he had allowed that inconvenient truth to leave the confines of his private thoughts.
God. The only fool here was him. He kept giving too much away.
Even last night, upon learning of Zaria’s mother, Kane had barely kept his emotions in check.
There was no reason for him to feel such fury toward a woman he’d never met, but the idea that anyone might not want someone like Zaria in their life was preposterous.
Jules looked taken aback, his glower losing some of its heat. He didn’t seem to have a reply, and Kane was relieved when Fletcher intervened.
“I’m not sure I fully understand the situation here,” his friend said dryly, “but I think it would be prudent for neither of you to kill the other until we’ve solved our mutual problems. If Kane says Zaria’s unharmed, then I’m sure she’s fine. Stop being so quarrelsome.”
Unfathomably, Jules seemed content to listen to Fletcher, though he still moved his jaw back and forth in agitation. “Let me see her.”
“Be my guest,” Kane said.
As he led the way to Zaria’s rooms, Kane found himself hesitant to knock.
He hated that he’d been right not to trust her.
Hated that she’d tried to pull one over on him again.
Most of all, though, he hated the way it had made him feel: not murderous, but hurt.
As if something within him had been crushed into jagged pieces that still remained, sending stabbing pain through his chest each time he moved.
Kane couldn’t afford to feel that kind of pain.
He needed Zaria to help him, to fear him, and then he needed her gone. There was no other option.