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“You have no idea.” Leo released Mary’s hand, and the woman instantly tried to sit up. She didn’t get far and only groaned in pain. Leo, however, got to her feet, nearly overturning the chair in the process.

Mr. Castelan, who stood between her and the partially open door, remained docile. She measured at least three strides between them. Now that she knew exactly what he had done, those three strides were perilously close.

“You and Samuel Edwards partnered to trick wealthy spinsters with no family into marriage. Mr. Edwards would lace their food or drink with arsenic and then, when the women began to fall ill, you swooped in as Mr. Gray and convinced them—and their servants—that they were dying of some incurable disease. With Victoria Herrington, it worked,” Leo said. “As her widower, Mr. Edwards collected the inheritance due to him. A fortune, which the two of you then split. Or perhaps the three of you,” she said, thinking of Mary.

Mr. Castelan released a dismal laugh. “It was hardly a fortune.”

The subtle, but clear admission changed things instantly. He was finished pretending. And he had no plans of letting Leo leave this room so that she could repeat what she’d discovered about him.

“Is that why you enacted the scheme again? This time with Augusta Lawlor?” she asked, wanting to keep him talking. Jasper was supposed to send a warder to Mary’s room; he might be nearly here. “You’d investigated a suitor for her a few years before. You knew of her wealth. And you probably knew her last living relative had died.”

Mr. Castelan formed a cold smile. “I underestimated your abilities, Miss Spencer. It seems all of Scotland Yard has.”

As he spoke, her peripheral vision roved the room for something—anything—that might be used as a weapon for protection. On the bedside table, there was an empty metal kidney bowl. But that was all. She was sorely outmatched.

“I do not want your compliments,” she said. “What I want are answers.”

“I don’t see the point. You won’t have the opportunity to share them with anyone.”

His intent, and his sheer lack of remorse, chilled her.

“You have made things more difficult for me, Miss Spencer, but the mess is nothing I cannot manage,” he continued.

Resolved as she was on keeping him locked in a stare, Leo had failed to see his hand reach into his coat pocket. There was a glint of metal—a blade. Her heart lurched into her throat.

Mary Keating struggled to sit up and wailed stridently, “No!”

Mr. Castelan lunged forward, and Leo reached for the paltry kidney bowl.

“Stop where you are, Castelan.”

Jasper’s commanding voice resonated through the room as he kicked the door open fully and came in, his Webley drawn and aimed. The private detective stumbled to a halt. His face contorted with thwarted fury and desperation. He tried to slip the knife back into his pocket.

“Toss the blade onto the floor,” Jasper ordered.

For several seconds, Leo could not read Mr. Castelan’s stony grimace…whether he intended to do as instructed, or if he planned to resist.

“Do not make the mistake of thinking I won’t shoot you in the back,” Jasper growled after an interminable stretch of seconds. “After what you’ve done, it would give me great pleasure. Drop the knife.”

The private detective opened his hands, and the knife—a small slip joint blade—clattered onto the tile floor. Mr. Castelan raised his arms in defeat.

Jasper came forward, his revolver still raised and kicked the blade aside. “Claude, fetch a warder. Constables should be here any moment. Meet them in the lobby and direct them here.”

Her uncle’s name caused Leo’s heart to lurch yet again. She spied him standing within the open doorway, and as Jasper holstered his weapon and grasped Mr. Castelan’s hands behind his back, Claude’s expression fixed into one she had never seen him wear: loathing. He directed it at Mr. Castelan’s back.

Claude’s gaze softened as he met her eyes briefly. He then left with his orders.

“Are you harmed, Leo?” Jasper asked, assessing her as he locked the private detective’s wrists into a pair of handcuffs.

She shook her head. “His name is Paul,” she told Jasper, still quivering though her pulse had started to regulate. “Mary wasn’t trying to say Palmer.”

Jasper spared a glance toward the hospital bed. The woman lying in it whimpered. She’d gone slack, her face leeched of all color. “I stopped to tell Claude where you were and decided to walk him here. I overheard your conversation at the door.”

Leo exhaled shakily. It had been simple luck that had brought Jasper back here in time.

“Paul Castelan, I’m arresting you for conspiracy to kill Victoria Herrington and Augusta Lawlor, the murder of Samuel Edwards, and the attempted murder of Mary Keating.” He forced Mr. Castelan’s bound wrists up toward the center of his back at a painful angle. The private detective grunted and swore. “And if there is a charge I can bring against you for pulling a deadly weapon on Miss Spencer, I will gladly add it to the list.”

Chapter Twenty