Gregori’s indifferent gaze fixed on her awkwardly held arm. He turned back inside, leaving the door wide open and revealing a large space with tables running the length of the room.
She looked at Renard, who shrugged and brought her across the threshold and into a cluttered but well-maintained workshop.
Camille’s mind switched on, taking in the room’s dimensions, window count, and secondary door at the back of the space before cataloging the contents on the tables: hammers, microscopes, wiring, precision knives. There were pieces she didn’t recognize as well. If those tools weren’t going to bepotentially used on her, she’d have been intrigued. It didn’t take a genius to realize the man was a skilled man of science, but shewasa genius.
She pinched Renard in the arm, her wrist aching.
“Ow!” he said. “What was that for?”
“He’s an engineer,” she said.
“He’s a doctor.”
“Not amedicaldoctor.”
“So?”
She blew hair out of her face. “The specialties are not the same.” Really, were all gentlemen idiots?
His smirk was all teeth. “They’re essentially the same. One works with the mechanics of the body. The other with inanimate objects.”
“They’re completely different.”
“No, they’re not.”
“He’s not touching me!”
They turned at the same time, finding Gregori studying them.
“Well?” Renard said.
Gregori nodded to Camille. “She is right.”
“You can’t set a dislocated bone?”
“I can,” Gregori said.
“But you said she was right.”
“She is.”
“What the hell?”
The younger man didn’t use four words when two would do.
He was an engineer. Up close, she saw the mechanism on his head was a handless monocle with a collection of lenses on a rotating gear, the lenses each a different strength and magnification by the thickness of the glass. He worked with fine and intricate designs, something to do with eyepieces, judging by the stock of specialty wire and soldering.
But the man claimed he could set a bone, and more than one of the tools laid out were identical to those found on a surgeon’s table.
“You studied anatomy and medicine,” she said. His confidence said he’d studied under a bonesetter as well.
He glanced her way, his brown eyes alert despite the dark circles underneath. “I did.”
“I can’t vouch for his bedside manner.”
Renard’s earlier words clicked into place. The man didn’t make time for petty emotions or desire to explain his thoughts when others couldn’t keep up.
Given her own circumstances, she understood completely.
