Daffin’s eyes clouded. “The constable came. He barely even scanned the scene before declaring my mother’s death an accident. But I knew it wasn’t.”
Regina wiped away her tears with the backs of her hands. “How did you know?”
“The way her body was angled at the bottom of the stairs. It made no sense that she’d fallen. She wouldn’t have landed that way. And she had marks on her neck that the constable entirely ignored.”
Regina could only imagine how that moment had made Daffin want to become an investigator one day. “What happened to you after that?”
“My father sent me off to boarding school. I didn’t return to London to live again until I was a grown man.”
Regina searched his profile. “You didn’t see your father on holidays? School breaks?”
“No.” His voice was clipped. “I wasn’t welcome in my father’s home.”
“That’s awful,” Regina said. No wonder he thought his father was hideous. “And when you were grown… you managed to prove your mother had been killed and find her murderer?”
Daffin’s features were stony in the firelight, but his hands clenched and unclenched in his lap. “I hunted him for years, beginning when I was a teen. I worked with the night watch. I waited outside the homes of great men to get sponsorship. I talked to constables, asked them questions, investigated every detail, every possible angle. I earned a reputation at it. Later, certain men of means came looking for me to help them solve crimes. When I was old enough, I went to Fielding, asked him if I could join Runners. He told me he’d been looking forme. He asked me to be a part of the team.”
“And doing all that you eventually found your mother’s murderer?”
“Yes.” Daffin shook his head as if banishing the painful memories he’d uncovered, and turned back to face her. “I was able to prove he was in the house that day from a scrap of paper with aQon it he’d left behind near my mother’s body. Arrogant bastard. I wrung a confession out of him. Took all I had not to wring his neck. He rotted in gaol for years.”
Regina dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief she’d retrieved from the bedside table drawer. “How did he get out?”
Daffin shook his head. “I wish I knew. After half a dozen years, I was told he was killed by another prisoner. I went to his burial and spat on his grave.”
“I don’t blame you,” she said. “I would have done thesame. But if he died in prison, how could Quinton Knowles be the one?”
Daffin’s expression softened as he reached to touch her cheek. He let his fingertips trace its curve, and she shuddered at the tenderness in the wake of such a brutal account of his past. “I’ve seen the worst of people doing what I do, Regina. I suspect he staged his own death, and money changed hands somewhere.”
Regina nodded, even as her heart thundered in her chest at the lingering touch of his hand. “I can… only imagine.” She took a deep breath. “Butwhydid Knowles kill your mother? Did you ever find out?”
“For the same reason he kidnapped you. Someone paid him.”
Regina sucked in her breath. “Who?”
“My father.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Daffin shut the door to Regina’s bedchamber behind him and paused, momentarily unable to acknowledge Nicole’s presence beside him as he struggled with myriad realizations. She seemed to sense his need to gather himself and didn’t try to engage him while he lingered outside Regina’s door, one hand covering his eyes.
He’d admitted the truth to Regina about his father hiring his mother’s murderer. He’d never divulged it to anyone before. Never told a soul. He’d been ashamed. For more than one reason. But he and Regina had a special connection. It was undeniable. The days when he’d wondered if he’d ever get the chance to see her again had been hell. The moment he’d laid eyes on her in the hired hackney a few nights ago, he couldn’t breathe he’d been so filled with relief. He never wanted to feel that sort of fear again.
Nicole finally cleared her throat. “She doesn’t blame you, you know?”
Daffin rubbed a hand across his forehead as they walked together down the corridor toward the staircase. “I know. But she should.”
“No she shouldn’t.”
He clenched his fingers into a fist. “I am going to rip that son of a bitch apart when I find him.”
Nicole patted his arm. “Settle down. Your anger won’t help. Come with me to the study. We’re going to discuss the next plan.”
They stopped at the head of the staircase.
“I’ll be there in a bit,” he told her.
Nicole’s eyes sparkled with mischief. “I must say I was disappointed you didn’t try to steal a kiss while you were in there with Regina.”
