“It’s always been one last time. Every time. We lead dangerous lives.”
He was a man of deft and dexterous hands, yet he was awkward with the simple task of removing his waistcoat. The button of his collar also eluded him.
“We will not play games, you and I. Let me.” She slipped the button of his collar free.
“They can see in through the window, if anyone comes by.”
“We are hidden well enough by the back of this bench. I will blow the lantern out in a moment. Then I will seduce you for a while.”
“Unnecessary.” He laughed a little. “Why, Owl? Why’d you change your mind?”
This was the Hawker she knew, asking such questions. Awake and alive behind his eyes. Tough, cynical, unsentimental. The lover who was hard stone and hungry fire.
“We are friends.”
“I don’t need to bounce the mattress with my friends. Neither do you.”
She told him a little more. “I am afraid.”
Hawker’s knives dropped to the table beside her gun, convenient in case there was need of them. He began to unstrap the sheaths. “Afraid of what?”
“I am overwhelmed by a knowledge of mortality tonight. We dance upon the edge of the abyss, and tonight, I cannot stop myself from looking down.”
“Damn. You’re being philosophical. That’s a mistake.”
They were both thinking of the agent Paxton, in the dark, alone, running through the streets of Paris. If worse came to worst, all his strength and skill would not save him from death.
She said, “I am a fool to lie with you. It is disaster upon disaster if we are caught. This morning, I was resolved to set you aside and be wise. It seems I am not that wise.”
Hawker disentangled himself from the last knife harness. He pulled his shirt over his head. He wore a silver chain around his neck with a medal of Saint Christopher upon it. A gift from Séverine. She had received the twin to it.
His bare chest made cogent arguments up and down her nerves. It always did. But tonight, when she looked upon him, she knew that even Hawker could die. This perfect machinery of his body, this warm muscle and bone that contained him, was not invulnerable.
“I will not be prudent,” she whispered. “Death comes to us all. I will not go to meet it with small, cautious steps.”
“You’re not going to die.” Hawker leaned over and blew out the lantern. “You stop thinking that. There is just a myriad of things it doesn’t do any good to let into your head. That’s the first of them.”
“I cannot help it. I have seen your Paxton fall so quickly, so completely.” The darkness was not absolute. She could see his outline. See the shape of his features. In some ways, it was easier to talk when she could not see him clearly. “I feel disaster flapping over us like a great bird. If Napoleon dies at the hands of an Englishman, we will be at war in a week. You and I will meet on opposite sides of a battlefield one day. It is not impossible we will be forced to—”
“Hey.” He took her hand and lifted it. Turned it. Kissed the palm. “Not tonight. Forget that for tonight.”
Such thin skin lay at the cup of the hand. The little touch there, and she was struck with heat between her legs. She glowed there. Ached there.
He kissed her palm again and closed her hand over it and held her hand in both of his. “Take that. Put it away and save it for later.”
He was dim and colorless. Speaking to him was like speaking to the night itself.
“I am too fond of you,” she said.
“The complaint of women from one side of Europe to another. Come to bed, love.” She knew that in the dark he gave an Adrian smile. A Hawker smile. Challenge. Madness. A promise of earthly delights. An elegant depravity.
She left her shoes behind on the floor, untied her garters as she walked and let her stockings drop, pulled her skirt up, and crawled beside him.
“Lie down. I want to . . . Ah. That’s good.” His lips sucked three, four, five kisses at her throat. “Did I ever tell you your skin cools off when you sleep? You’re like silk. Cool when you touch it.”
“You may compare me to silk all night long.”
He threaded her hair back from her forehead, bit by bit, then kissed there too. He was in no hurry. Hawker was never in a hurry, not even when she buzzed and twitched with wanting him.
She found the texture of his lips. “You are unbearable enticement and temptation.”
“I try. In my modest way, I try.” He played with one strand of her hair, tugging it so slightly she could barely feel the tiny pulse. Waiting for her. He had the cunning of a mathematics text and the patience of a tree growing.
Desire for him clenched inside her. Grabbed her breath. Streaked in lines of heat between her legs. Folded around her like lightning. Overcame her.
She muttered, “We are stupid, stupid, stupid . . .” She rolled and straddled him. He pulled her dress aside so it would not be between them. She kissed his mouth altogether thoroughly.
She heard him say, “I have to have you,” in a voice naked as clear glass.
His need made him clumsy, so she pushed his hand aside and undid the buttons of his trousers herself, fumbling her way from button to button. It took her a while to get them all loose. He didn’t seem to mind.
Thirty-four
IN THE NIGHT, THE VAST GARDEN AT THE HEART OF the Palais Royale was empty. The shops under the arcades were closed. The last patrons of the opera had eaten their toast and paté at a restaurant and wandered home. On the upper floor, behind closed doors, men gambled and whored, but only a shadow of sound spilled into the night.
The man who still thought of himself as Thomas Paxton stood alone in the middle of the garden, looking up. The moon rode over Paris. Over London too, and Bonn, and the cities of the New World. Lots of world out there. Dozens of places he could hide.
He stretched his arm full length and measured the angle of moon above the horizon against the width of his hand, a rough sextant. Two and a half hours to moonset, which made this about three in morning. Hawker would be staying in the café till morning, giving him a good long head start.
It was August, but the nights had been chilly lately. There was no warmth in moonlight.
He’d have been outside tonight anyway. The meteor showers in the constellation Perseus were at their peak. Only happened once a year.
There. That was one. A streak of white on the sky. He held his breath to the end of it. It seemed worthwhile to tilt his head back and tell the sky, “The abyss of endless time swallows it all.” Marcus Aurelius said that.
In the morning, he’d take Hawk with him when he went to Carruthers.
He didn’t have a decision to make. If you were Service and you blotted your copybook, you reported to the Head of Section for judgment. He was Service. He’d made his choice a good long time ago.
Thirty-five
SHE WOKE. LIGHT CAME THROUGH THE WINDOWS OF the café. What woke her, though, was the scritch of broom on pavement and the clatter of pails. The sweepers were out, raking up the fallen leaves, making the Palais Royale fit for another day.
Happiness rested in the small of her stomach, like coals in a hand warmer. I have been unwise again. With Hawker.
It felt very good. When she woke up after having been with him, she felt clean. She felt as if he had touched every part of her and burned it clean with fire.
Sometime in the night Hawker had raised himself to sitting and eased her head into his lap. She had slept so deeply she had not noticed. Or if she woke momentarily, it was with the knowledge she was safe and she let herself slip into sleep again.
She opened her eyes and looked up at him. They had not undressed altogether last night, but Hawker was half naked. She had kissed his chest again and again, following the lines of his muscles.