Sophia James – A Night Of Secret Surrender (страница 3)
The darkness. The silence. Closing her eyes in relief, she retraced her journey the way she always did, every single night of her return.
No one had followed her. The shadows from the lanterns had remained unbroken and the narrow arches of Les Halles, with the circular Halle aux Blés at its western edge, had been empty of threat. The smaller throughways had held no detected dangers, nor had the brighter Rue de Louvre.
This was her home now, this small part of Paris, and she knew it like the back of her hand—every face, every stone, every sound of every moving entity. Such knowledge afforded her protection and brought with it an inevitable isolation, but she was used to being alone.
Inside her rooms there was very little. It was how she liked it. It was how she had lived for all those weeks and months and years since her father had been murdered. It was the way she had survived after being thrown into chaos.
She should not have whispered such a word, but underneath it was another truth that had wound across a shallow vanity and shown itself. She’d seen the flicker of it in his eyes.
In her dreams she’d known it, too.
What could Shayborne do with such information anyway, for he had only a matter of days to leave? Celeste held her breath with the shock of seeing him. None save Jules, her contact in the War Office, had figured out just who he was yet, but it was only a matter of making connections and those agents trying to find Shayborne would see all that they had missed.
She’d paid Jules well to buy his silence for forty-eight hours, but realistically she could expect no more than twenty-four. Such a secret was worth a small fortune and the agent would be weighing allegiances against cold, hard cash. Perhaps even twelve hours might be asking too much?
McPherson was a suspect, too, the old Scottish jeweller trawling to ascertain the truth of Napoleon’s movements in a way that did not raise suspicion at first...
Put them together and anyone would have him, Lord Summerley Anthony William Shayborne. Summer. She had called him that. The name rolled across her tongue and she swallowed away the taste of it. He was no longer hers. They had both been dealt hands that had torn them apart for ever, changing them beyond recognition from the innocents they’d once been.
Opening the curtain, she slipped out on to the balcony, making certain to stay against the wall. She seldom stood in the open any more for it was dangerous to be caught in the light. There was always something firm at her back, something solid and thick and protective.
With care, she undid her cloak and loosened the ties of her bodice, letting the night caress her skin. Her nipples stood proud at their release and she laid her head back and closed her eyes.
Remembering.
The feel of him against her, his care and his heat, taut and solid. She had thought of these things after her father had died and she had been taken. Then, only the memory of Shayborne’s goodness and honour had saved her, for the way he had said her name in the night under the softer stars of Sussex had felt like music and the feel of him inside her like a song. She’d always sensed the danger in him, too, honed by a civic duty, but crouching close. The violence and the stillness, side by side, a heady combination that had drawn her to him. He was a man who might triumph over every obstacle thrown his way and live.
The age-old words of the Lord’s Prayer soothed her and she fumbled in her pocket for her father’s rosary, fingers sliding over polished amber with easy practice.
Lying with Summer was one action she had never regretted, not then and not now. She could remember the girl she’d been, the innocence as well as the arrogance. Did all young, beautiful women behave in such a dreadfully entitled fashion, or was it just her? Well, no longer, at least.
She looked down and saw the scars on her left wrist, pale white and faded. One finger traced the lines, the numbness there still surprising. This was who she had become, this damaged person who understood the true extent of terror and who had survived. Just.
She wished she had not cut her hair so short. The bluntness of the shorn ends made it prickle around her face.
Lifting up the glass of fine Pouilly-Fumé, she swallowed the lot and helped herself to another, her anxieties lessening.
* * *
Shay closed the curtains before lighting two other candles and placing them on each side of the mantel.
He was tired of Paris, tired of its subterfuge and its darkness. He’d realised who his visitor was within minutes of her leaving.
Celeste Fournier. It had been eight years since he had seen her last in England. She’d been lauded for her beauty by all who had met her, but it was the broken pieces that he had loved the most, the vulnerable parts she’d hidden under a smile.
Another knock at the door had him turning. Could she have come back? Unlocking the bolts, he found Richard Cunningham on his step and shut the door quickly behind him, Celeste’s recent warning ringing in his head.
‘You look like you have seen a ghost, Rick?’
‘Perhaps I have.’ The newcomer could not quite keep the worry from his words as he crossed over to the table and helped himself to a drink. Brandy and his best bottle. Cunningham’s taste was impeccable even under duress.
‘There are problems afoot, Shay. A fracas yesterday has ripped apart the private world of Parisian intelligence and each office is blaming the others in their various bids for more power. As a result, it is now every man for himself and a dagger in the back is a very real concern.’
‘You are speaking of the murder of the Dubois family?’
‘You’ve heard of it, then? From whom?’ His friend’s dark eyes widened. ‘Word on the street has it that Napoleon’s agencies are exterminating anyone who fails to agree with the Emperor’s vision for France. That includes the families of those who might have the temerity to criticise a regime that many know is tainted. They were said to be in receipt of incriminating documents, papers which raised questions about their loyalty to France. Napoleon has gone mad with his greed for power!’
‘Threads,’ Shay returned, ‘threads bound and winding into the foolish hope of greatness. Conquer Russia and nobody will be able to stop Bonaparte from ruling the world.’
‘It will be winter that brings him to his knees, mark my words. There are thousands and thousands of miles between here and Moscow.’
‘So you are leaving? Getting out?’ Shay’s eyes dropped to a bag near the door.
‘I am. Tonight. Come with me. It’s the only option that makes sense.’
Fifteen minutes ago Shay thought he might have done just that. A quarter of an hour ago, he might have packed his bag summarily and left the city, his reports completed, his duties done.
But now he shook his head. ‘There is something I still have to finish.’
He thought of Celeste. He thought of her gift to him in the hay barn at Langley, the winter sun slanting through the dirty glass of a cracked window. Long limbed, perfect and sad.
‘Does James McPherson know of the danger?’ There were others to be considered, too.
‘If he doesn’t, the channels of his intelligence are failing him. It’s over here, don’t you see? There is nothing left that could make a difference to the outcome of a war that defies every tenet of sense. If the Little General wants to cut his own throat, then who are we to hang around and bathe in the blood of it?’
‘Which way are you headed?’
‘To the coast in the north. There are fishermen whom I wager would place gold above the sway of politics if given the chance and will transport me across the channel.’
‘Then I wish you good luck and God speed.’
‘You won’t come?’
‘I think you will have a better chance of safety without me. My cover here has been blown. I heard of this today.’
‘God. Then why the hell are you staying?’
‘It’s just for a little while. I will leave tomorrow night.’
‘Find another uniform, then. I’ve heard rumours that every American envoy of President Madison will be searched.’
‘I have already heard that warning, but thank you.’
‘There’s a brandy waiting for you in a London pub when you make it home.’
‘I’ll hold you to it.’
‘You’re a hero, Shay, in Spain and in England, but be mindful that you only live once.’
‘And die once?’
‘That, too.’
When he was gone, Shay crossed the room and finished the cognac that Cunningham had poured himself. Blowing out the candles, he opened the curtains and sat to watch the moon’s outline barely visible against the tufts of gathering cloud.
One more day and it would be over. His war. Intelligence. Freedom. He could not even imagine going home to Luxford and being content.
* * *
Guy Bernard was waiting for her early the next morning as Celeste sidled into the busy marketplace at Les Halles, bread and buns in the basket on her back. If she’d been paying more attention, she could have simply avoided him, but as they’d come nearly face-to-face she had no way of pushing past. The colour in his cheeks was high and there was a certain set to his shoulders that she recognised.