Free The Scot and I by Elizabeth Thornton Page B

instructions to report only to him.”
    The colonel beamed at him. “Oh, that’s very good, Hepburn, but not good enough. We have a witness, you see.”
    “A witness to what?” Alex kept his tone polite.
    “To the murder of Chief Inspector Dickens,” replied the colonel.
    “ What? ”
    Foster repeated what he’d said.
    Alex stared at the other man without really seeing him. His mind was numb with horror. He was remembering how much he liked and trusted Dickens. He had risen through the ranks of the police on merit alone. In another year, he was going to retire with his wife and live the life of a country gentleman.
    As his mind began to clear, he looked at Foster and wanted to choke him. He was in charge for now, and he was relishing his newfound powers.
    “Tell me how it happened,” he said, breaking into Foster’s harangue.
    “Don’t play games, Hepburn. You know how it happened. You and your brother are in this together. He stabbed Dickens in the back with a letter opener that he found on Dickens’s desk, then you helped your brother escape. But we caught him, and now we’ve caught you.”
    “ My brother? ” Alex demanded angrily. “My brother doesn’t even know Dickens. Why would he want to kill him?”
    The colonel slapped his beefy hands on the flat of the desk. His eyes were bulging, and he was breathing hard. “Because he was part of the plot to kill the queen. I presume Dickens became suspicious, whatever, and your brother killed him. We have witnesses, so don’t think you can argue your way out of this. He murdered Dickens, then you procured horses to spirit him away. That makes you an accomplice, Hepburn.”
    Alex gave a mirthless laugh and shook his head. “You’ve got it all wrong. My brother was assisting me. Where is he? What have you done with him?”
    The colonel linked his fingers and squeezed them tightly together, a very telling sign, in Alex’s opinion. Rage was turning Foster’s face purple. “Your brother,” he said, “is in solitary confinement. Why don’t you make things easy for him and easier for yourself? Tell us what we want to know, and we’ll leave him alone. Until we hang him, of course.”
    Alex resisted the urge to spring at the other man and break his neck. He steepled his fingers and forced a superior smile. “You’re getting ahead of yourself, Foster,” he said. “I don’t report to you. Commander Durward is my chief. I’ll report to him and to no one else. I presume you have sent a telegram to Whitehall informing them of our situation?”
    “I’m in charge here!” roared Foster. He was sucking air through his teeth. “You got away with insubordination with Durward, but you damn well won’t get away with it with me.”
    He squeezed his linked fingers till they showed white. “This is what I think happened,” he said. “Your brother was part of a plot to murder the queen. He didn’t know about our decoy queen. His shot went wild and hit one of the guests, a Mr. Ramsey, to be exact. Maybe you knew what your brother was going to do and maybe you didn’t, but from the moment he fired that shot, you chose him over us. You made up a story about a blond-haired woman. However, when I talked to Mr. Ramsey this morning, he said that he did not see her. I don’t believe she exists. Dickens became suspicious. Your brother stabbed him to death, then you made your escape.”
    Alex’s voice was terse with anger. “You’re out of your mind!”
    Foster suddenly thumped the flat of the desk with his clenched hand. “So tell me, Agent Hepburn, where in hell have you been? And don’t waste my time with fairy tales. There was no blond woman taking potshots at the queen. You didn’t pursue her, as your brother wants us to believe. You were running away.”
    Alex kept his mouth shut.
    He didn’t want the girl to fall into the hands of this unscrupulous opportunist who didn’t care whom he crushed to get to the top. Foster wouldn’t make allowances for