However, when Ash reclaimed his memory, he saw no great need to reclaim his name from his good friend, as his life with Lorelai Weatherstoke was the epitome of his happy ending.
When all was said and done, both Ash and Dorian decided to live with names they’d adopted instead of the ones they’d been born with.
Only Morley and Argent were the wiser. And all the more befuddled for it.
However, since Morley also lived under an assumed name, he could hardly cast aspersions.
People in glass houses and all that.
Dorian strode up alongside Ash with his hands resting comfortably in his pockets. He bumped the pirate with his elbow in a show of camaraderie. An extraordinary thing, as Dorian famously hated to be touched by all but his wife, Farah.
Though the Blackheart Brothers looked much alike as young men, time had separated them somewhat. Standing side by side as they were, it was easy to tell them apart. Ash wore his hair close-cropped, and his skin was swarthy and weathered by years at sea. The grooves branching from his eyes and the brackets of his mouth were carved deeper into features more savage than Dorian’s pale, satirical visage.
Despite his eyepatch, Dorian remained as handsome as the very devil. He displayed more spirit and mirth than his piratical counterpart, wore his hair down to his collar, and outweighed Ash by perhaps half a stone.
“Here’s trouble,” Dorian greeted Argent with a slap to the shoulder as the amber-haired man strode in holding a coffee and a paper.
Argent cast his previous employer a congenial nod. He at least, turned to shut the door behind him, cutting their conclave of reprobates off from an increasingly curious detective branch.
“Christ, almighty,” Morley said by way of salutation. “I’ve no time for trouble if you’ve brought it to my doorstep. Not today.”
“Well, considering the exsanguinated Earl you’ve cooling in your morgue, I’d say we’ve arrived in the nick of time,” Ash went to the window and opened the drapes onto Whitehall Place, uncovering an unfettered view of the spires of Parliament. “We’d meant to discuss Commissioner Goode with you after the wedding, but it seems that needs must.”
Morley’s lips compressed. “What about him?”
“Something is rotten in the State of Denmark,” Dorian quoted significantly. “And the closer we come to the Yard, the more it stinks to high heaven.”
“Out with it, both of you,” Morley barked. “I don’t have time for your cryptic dramatics today.”
“No time for corruption in your own department?” Ash’s black brow arched, and he speared Morley with a meaningful look.
“We’ve information that the ironically named ‘Goode’ needs a bit of moral direction,” Dorian informed him with no small amount of smugness. “Who did we think of but your august self, Morley? This place is your life and your wife, and the shadows of justice your mistress. Goode’s the perfect man to ruin, especially for your career. You could rise and take his place.”
Morley shook his head, rejecting the very idea. On today of all days? Could he not escape the name Goode? “Why would I do such a thing? What have you heard?”
Ash turned from the window. The light reflected off the lye burn scars that crawled up his neck and clawed at his jaw. When he spoke, it was with a great deal less inflection than his more demonstrative counterpart. “Goode’s nobility was built hundreds of years ago on the import of lumber to our little island, but I have it on good authority that his shipping company is smuggling more than just wood. There’s a plant being hailed in the Americas as the new drug of the century.”
“The coca plant,” Morley nodded. “I’ve heard of it. It’s not exactly illegal to ship it here, and it’s widely used therapeutically.”
Dorian made a disgusted noise. “It is illegal if the substance isn’t declared at customs, and if it’s not being delivered to doctors, but instead distributed to obsessed ghouls by coppers who are little better than bookies handing out beatings if they’re not paid on time.”
Morley looked from Dorian’s one good eye, to Ash, and then to Argent, who studied the dark-haired men intently from where he held up the far wall with his leaning shoulders. “You’re sure of this?” he asked.
Ash nodded. “I’m certain the plants are coming from his ships. Though where it’s being refined into cocaine, I couldn’t tell you.”
“And I’m certain the drug is being leaked onto the streets by your officers,” Dorian insisted. “In the poor and