Chapter Fifty
For a second, Jack didn’t understand, but then everything became crystal clear, and she saw the true illusion in the woman standing before her. “You never died in that house fire, did you, Lady Denton?”
The woman smiled softly and almost serenely, but the expression in her eyes was the same as her son’s… pure evil and madness, combined together. “No, I did not.”
“I told you my mother was here with us,” Thomas added, dusting off his clothes. “You just thought I was insane.”
“You are insane. Both of you,” she declared as a sense of bitter betrayal rose up in her throat like acid. She glanced over to Lady Denton, the woman who for the last three years she’d thought of as her housekeeper and her friend.
“You really had no idea, did you?” the woman said to Jack, her tone pitying, but the look in her eyes filled with glee. “Even though I gave you so many clues.”
“‘Clues’?”
“Yes, my very name too was also a clue,” she said condescendingly. “Thompson… My son being named Thomas. Did you not see the correlation?”
“No, I didn’t,” Jack replied.
“We both thought you smarter than that.” The lady shrugged. “Clearly, we overestimated you.”
“I trusted you… How could you pretend for so many years?” Jack replied, a bitter sense of treachery rising in her throat with the knowledge. “Why didn’t you just kill me in my sleep? You had the opportunity to do so, constantly.”
The woman shrugged. “I certainly could have, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as satisfying if I’d done that.
I did get a bit of a thrill knowing I could easily have ended your life at any time.
But what was even more delightful was knowing that you were coming to trust me and care for me, which ultimately makes killing you so much more satisfying.
Even now, seeing the betrayal in your eyes?
It makes these past three years spent cultivating your trust worth every single second. ”
“You were the one who stole my dagger, then?”
“Of course,” she admitted. “I was also putting a half a teaspoon of ether liquid into your nighttime cup of tea every night, to induce vivid nightmares for you. You didn’t realize that, did you?”
“No. I didn’t.” Jack’s whole chest clenched as the depths of deception to which this woman had subjected her over the past three years hit her like a sledgehammer.
That was why her nightmares had returned with a vengeance…
For a moment, she felt like an utter fool.
How had she let this woman deceive her so completely?
“You were seeking a mother figure, my dear,” the lady said, almost as if she were reading Jack’s thoughts. “It wasn’t difficult for me to gain your trust.”
“For what? To then kill me?” The very idea was beyond Jack’s comprehension.
“We’re not just going to kill you,” Thomas said.
“We’re going to finally destroy your father’s legacy.
After we’re done, his illusions will be forever linked to death and carnage.
The perfect timing, really, given it is the fifteenth year since I killed him.
Did you know I’m a big believer in timing.
Why, it was five years ago when you visited your parents’ graves on the date of their deaths that I first saw you again and realized you were still alive. ”
“You can count, how wonderful.” Jack bit out the words between her clenched teeth.
The very idea of being watched while laying flowers upon her parents’ graves enraged her while also sending a cold chill down her spine.
She remembered that day too; she’d felt a shadow of fear when she’d been at the cemetery, like a demon from the grave had been watching her.
At the time, she’d thought she had just been fanciful, but a part of her must have felt Thomas Clorren’s regard.
“You don’t understand the significance of five, do you?
” he said softly, peering at her intently.
“Life is governed by five, my dear Jack of Hearts. There are five elements: earth, air, fire, water… and that which lies beyond them and governs everything. The ancients understood it. The fifth element—the thing that gives life and takes it too.”
“There are only four elements, Thomas.” Jack raised her chin, staring boldly at him.
His eyes narrowed upon her and his hands clenched into fists.
“Calm down, my son,” Lady Denton crooned. “She’s trying to upset you.”
Thomas slowly glanced over to his mother and nodded before he took in a long, deep breath and turned back to Jack.
“There is a fifth element, and it is all around us. Why, it is the very essence of balance and is symbolized by the pentagram itself. When upright, all is in order. In balance. But when inverted…” He shrugged.
“Chaos. Disorder. Imbalance. Which cannot be allowed to continue and must be corrected.”
“You think you are restoring balance?”
The man really was insane, and Jack knew she was going to have to do something to save herself.
“I have a duty to. You see, once order is broken…” His mouth tightened.
“It must be rectified.” He blew out a breath.
“That is why the symbolism of five. Five years after your mother’s death, I killed your father, which marked the beginning.
Then, five years ago, I discovered you were alive.
Now fifteen and twenty years after your parents’ deaths will mark the return to balance. It will mark the reckoning.”
“So you’ve both been stalking me in the shadows for five years?” Her body felt like recoiling, but she tensed all her muscles and didn’t budge an inch, her stare staying steady upon the man.
“The day he saw you again was when we knew that our mission hadn’t yet been completed,” Lady Denton replied. “That we still had a great deal of work to do to ensure you joined your parents in the pits of hell.”
“It was fate. And that’s when we started our meticulous preparations,” Thomas added with a grin.
“The years I spent watching you, becoming intimately aware of your routine, why, they were mesmerizing. Indeed, planning your demise and becoming the Conjurer has brought with it some of the most fulfilling moments of my life.”
“Mine too,” Lady Denton said. “Honestly, when you advertised for a housekeeper, it was as if God were smiling down upon us.”
“God had nothing to do with it,” Jack replied, weighing up her options for how to get out.
Lady Denton was standing about six feet from the door, with Thomas beside her.
If she could distract them, she might be able to grab the dagger still on the floor and run to the door, but how to distract them both was the question.
“God had everything to do with it!” Lady Denton yelled, her calm veneer slipping for a moment before she shook her head and composed herself.
“How else can you explain you not only seeking a housekeeper, but you selecting me, despite the references that you detected were forged? God had a hand in that and in you believing my story about being an ex-spy for the government.”
“Replace God with the Devil, and I’d agree with you.”
Lady Denton’s eyes narrowed, and Jack felt the full force of the woman’s animosity towards her.
“You’re just as arrogant as your mother,” the lady spat out.
“I didn’t think you’d met my mother?” If she kept her talking, perhaps she’d think of something to distract them.
“Of course I met her.” The woman scoffed.
“I knew some woman must have entranced my husband for him to keep returning to London. Obsessed as he was with magic, I knew he was even more obsessed by someone. I followed him to London one week and as soon as I saw your mother, I knew who his obsession was. She was an obsession that destroyed my family!”
“She didn’t destroy anything! Your husband destroyed your family well enough on his own,” Jack said, jutting out her chin.
“No! Your whore of a mother was the one who destroyed my family!” Lady Denton screamed, pointing the gun at Jack with an intent that was menacing.
“Mother, don’t harm her yet,” Thomas stepped in front of Jack, shielding her from his mother with his back to Jack. “You promised I could first have my fun with her, and then we must burn her, to send her to hell. Remember?”
“You’re right, my darling boy.” Lady Denton lowered the pistol and walked over to Thomas.
With her free hand, she reached up and stroked his cheek.
“Just don’t be too long with her, as we need to set everything up to point to him.
” She glanced over to her left at the dead Dr. Patterson’s body.
“I know you’ll most likely be the one conducting his autopsy and can manipulate his time of death, but still, that inspector is very canny…
We cannot have him suspect you and jeopardize the identity you’ve spent years cultivating. ”
“I know, Mother dearest. I won’t be long with her.”
The floorboards above them creaked and some dust fell onto their heads.
“They’ve found us!” Lady Denton harshly whispered.
“Yes, we have,” Tobias’s voice said from the doorway, his pistol pointed at Thomas and his mother, who both spun around to the doorway, Lady Denton gasping, while Thomas’s body visibly jerked.
Jack had never been happier to hear or see anyone before in her life.
“How did you find us?” Thomas cried. “I didn’t leave any clues for you to follow!”
“It was the floorboards,” Tobias replied, his eyes flicking to the pistol Lady Denton was now aiming at him while he held his aimed at the lady.
“I didn’t put it together when Jack and I were here the other day, but after what happened tonight at the theater, I realized there must be a hidden subbasement here too, given the flooring of the basement above us is made of wood.
Highly unusual for a basement, is it not? ”
“Well, aren’t you the clever detective,” Thomas spat out, his eyes narrowing as he stared at Tobias.
“And you, Charles? Or should I say, ‘Thomas’? You’re the Coffin Conjurer? And Mrs. Thompson, you’re Lady Denton?”
“I’m glad you finally know the truth.” Thomas smiled, but there was a darkness in his eyes that was chilling. “You never suspected either of us, did you?”
“No,” Tobias agreed. “I took you both at face value. Particularly you, Thomas, seeing as we’ve worked together for the better part of eight years.”
“People believe what they expect to see,” Thomas said with a shrug. “I simply did my job as a doctor, making sure to keep my little hobby well hidden from everyone. You, most especially.”
“Killing others is a hobby for you?” Tobias said without any emotion, but Jack could see the betrayal in his eyes. “Are you even a doctor? Or is that all pretend too?”
“I didn’t pretend at being anything!” he screamed. “I am a trained doctor, and one of the finest in London.”
“Not for long, once people find out who you really are,” Jack added.
“I have no intention of giving up my identity of Dr. Charles Morton,” he stated unequivocally.
“You can use whatever name you want at Broadmoor,” Tobias said with a shrug of his shoulders. “I really don’t care what you call yourself there.”
Thomas laughed. A very high-pitched cackle that sounded entirely unhinged. “I have no intention of going there as a patient. Ever.”
“I suppose they could send you to the gallows instead,” Tobias replied, his eyes flicking over to Dr. Patterson’s dead body still lying on the ground. “Did you plan to frame him as being the Conjurer?”
“He will still be believed to be the Conjurer.” Lady Denton spoke, suddenly swiveling to point her gun at Jack. “Now, if you don’t want this whore shot and killed, Inspector, you will lower your weapon immediately.”
Tobias raised his brow. “If you shoot and kill her, I will shoot and kill your son, Lady Denton.”
The woman’s jaw tensed. “No, you’re bluffing. I’ve seen the way you look at her.”
“She’s dead as soon as I do put down my gun, and we both know it,” Tobias replied, holding his gun completely steady, still aimed at Lady Denton.
Out of the corner of her eye, Jack saw Thomas reach into his pocket.
“Tobias, watch out!” she yelled as Thomas’s hand left his pocket in the flash of an eye, and he threw powder towards Tobias, which sparked in the air and exploded, throwing Tobias backwards into the corridor.
Jack dove to the floor, grabbing her dagger and scooping it up in her hand, just as Thomas dove on top of her, twisting her around, the blade she was now holding accidentally penetrating through the flesh and bone of his chest with a hideous crunching sound.
A sound that would stay in her nightmares.
He looked down at her in surprise. “What have you done?” He staggered to his feet and then glanced at the blade lodged deeply in his chest. “This wasn’t part of the plan.”
“No! No, not my boy!” Lady Denton screamed, dropping her gun and rushing over to him, her hand reaching up to the hilt of the dagger.
“No, don’t remove it!” Jack yelled, but the lady wrenched out the blade and blood gushed out of Thomas’s chest like a river.
Lady Denton’s eyes went wide as she realized what she’d done. “No. No, Thomas, don’t do this!”
“Mother… I’m sorry…” Thomas spluttered as he stumbled a few steps away from Lady Denton and glanced down at his white shirt that was now crimson with his blood. “I have failed you and Father…”
“Thomas, don’t you dare leave me!” Lady Denton yelled, rushing over to him as he stumbled again, before he collapsed at her feet, his eyes staring vacantly up at the ceiling.
Jack pressed her lips tightly together as a feeling of nausea rose in her stomach. Then she glanced down at her empty hands. Hands that had killed a man.
“You did this!” Lady Denton whirled around to face Jack, the blade of the dagger she still held in her hands dripping with her son’s blood, and her eyes flashing fury, unlike Jack had ever seen. “You little whore! I am going to gut you and send you to hell!”
With a yell, Lady Denton raised her arm and ran at Jack.
And just as she felt the blade pierce her, a gunshot blasted, the sound of it ringing in the room like a cannon, and Jack watched in slow motion as Lady Denton stopped in her tracks and collapsed backwards, landing on the stone floor with a thud.
Frozen to the spot, Jack could only stare down at the woman as blood streamed out of a small hole in the left side of the lady’s head. Then she glanced down and saw the dagger protruding from the left side of her body. That wasn’t good.
“Jack, are you all right?”
She blinked and slowly turned to Tobias’s deep voice. A voice that was like a lifeline pulling her from the darkness starting to consume her. “Thank goodness you’re not hurt,” she whispered.
“But you are,” he said, rushing into the room and grabbing her as she began to fall. “Jack, stay with me, do you hear me? Stay with me.”
“I’m glad you found me.” She’d always known he would.
And as pinpricks of light danced across her vision, she knew that at least now she was safe with him, so she let the darkness take her and the last thing she saw was the fear flashing in his eyes before everything went black.