“Tomorrow.” Not tonight. Let me give her one night, before I have to do this to her.
Adrian was flipping angrily through the second folder, page by page. “Twenty years of lies. We haven’t left you a rag against the wind, have we, ma pauvre?”
“It was wrong.” Doyle rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t care how valuable she was to us. This was wrong. And we did it.”
Maggie wasn’t familiar with Service files. It took her longer to read notations and decipher the story. “I cannot believe this. How could a woman do such a thing to her child? They were close, Annique and her mother?”
“Very close,” Doyle said.
“You will hurt her unbearably. With her mother newly dead…”
“I know, Maggie luv. It’s bad enough what we’re doing to that girl. Now we kick her in the guts with this.”
“We’re not going to drop it in her lap and yell, ‘Surprise!’ We’ll go slow…” Adrian, for once, looked unsure. “We’ll…we’ll what? How do you say something like this?”
“She will not believe you,” Maggie said. “Even before you hurt her so badly, you must convince her.”
“The proof’s in her own mind,” Doyle said. “Her mother must have slipped up once or twice in all those years.”
Once she was told, Annique would remember. She’d lie awake at night and remember every lie she’d been told.
And he had to decide how to tell her. “Maggie’s right. We have to convince her that it’s true.” He took the file Adrian was looking at and extracted a single sheet. He smoothed it flat for everyone to see. “Here. We start at the beginning. Tomorrow we take her to St. Odran’s and show her the original of this in the parish record. Can we do that with Leblanc loose?”
Doyle hesitated, then nodded. “It’s a small risk. But we have enough men to keep her safe for that long.”
“Good. We show her the parish record, then bring her back and give her the files. We explain.” He looked up. Galba’s shrewd, deep-set eyes met his. “You explain. I sure as hell can’t.”
“I have been considering the proper words for ten years. Perhaps I’ll find them tomorrow.”
Twenty-nine
ANNIQUE WAS WAITING FOR HIM IN HIS BEDROOM, on his bed, on her belly. She was on top of the covers, reading a book. She was naked.
She looked at him through her eyelashes. “I am glad you were not devoured by that animal which has draped itself across the doorway. What is it, that thing?”
In all England, all France, all the world, there was no other woman for him. Only Annique. He had her naked in his bed. One of life’s perfect moments.
“We think it’s part wolfhound. Doyle found it down by the docks, likely off some ship or other.”
“I would say it is rather wolf and possibly also part elephant. It does not like me.”
“Good. Then you won’t go wandering around the halls after dark. Maggie brought some nightclothes.”
“I saw them. They are very lovely, of course, but I thought you would prefer to see that I am totally harmless when you approach me. It is necessary, as I understand these things, that a man not be nervous at such times.” She propped herself up, her breasts just brushing the crimson leather cover. Her smile was knowing, and her eyes were shy. Men would kill to possess this woman.
He came to her, unwinding his cravat, sliding it out of his collar, tossing it onto the chair in passing. He felt infinitely powerful. She made him feel that way. “I’m glad you’re so willing. I suppose you’re preparing for one last beautiful night of lovemaking…”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Perhaps.”
“…before you start dying of thirst.”
Her brows contracted in annoyance. “I had not intended to bring that up. Such matters are not conducive to romantic behavior.”
“Casts a damper over everything, doesn’t it, all that dire nobility of yours.”
“I have changed nothing with my decision. I merely strip away the veneer of civility. I do not need to justify my behavior to a—”
“Then don’t. The best minds in the British spy service are going to talk you out of it tomorrow. We spent the last hour plotting. We have plans.”
“Oh.” She looked stubborn and apprehensive. Also relieved. Nine-tenths of her was hoping to be persuaded out of that idiocy.
He said, “I have plans, too.” She had only to look at him to see what he had in mind.
He jerked the last button loose and pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor, then stripped his trousers off. She started to sit up, but he set his hand on her shoulder to keep her as she was. He liked her this way…naked, laid out on her belly. She was exquisitely lovely, and she couldn’t attack. “Have I mentioned you’re the most beautiful woman in the world?”
“From one cause and another we have missed saying such things to each other.”
Those sleek cat muscles of hers told him how nervous she was. Willing, but nervous. He could use that nervousness. He could make it explode inside her like foam in a keg. He’d send her wild tonight. Beyond thought. Beyond restraint. “I like the curve here…” He ran his hand down the long, taut muscles that paralleled her spine. “It’s like the countryside back home. Long and rolling.”
“I am like countryside?”
“Somerset countryside.” He stroked her buttocks. “With little hills.”
“But truly, men have strange minds.”
He stroked her again. “Did your mother tell you that?”
“I find that my mother did not say anything to the point. She did not wish me to be a courtesan, you understand, and therefore did not instruct me in those arts.” She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. “Except for a few trifles. I believe they are not known to respectable English girls, who are very uneducated. I will show you, if you like.”
A pang of pure lust shot through him. His lady was not at all innocent in some ways. He foresaw many long, interesting nights while they worked out exactly who would be in charge in this bed. “Later, maybe.”
“There is one in particular that sounds interesting. I am curious to see how it works.”
She would drive him insane. She’d do it on purpose.
“We’ll save it for those long winter nights ahead. Have I told you I love you, Annique? It started about the fourth time you tried to maim me. I never did find time to say the words.”
“It is the right time now. We are at leisure, and I am not armed.” She was sad under the teasing. He’d put a stop to that fairly soon. “I find it gratifying in the extreme to be loved, especially by a man like you. I shall become quite puffed-up and conceited with it, I think.”
“You go right ahead and do that.” The sweet flesh of her back had decided to stop being nervous and go soft. The tremors in her were just beginning. “This is where you say you love me back.”
“Ah…love.” She pinched a crease into the linen pillowcase beneath her. “You must be disappointed, mon ennemi. I desire you. This is not love.”
“Just desire.”
“You are the first man for me. There must be a first man for every woman, when she is innocent and fools herself into believing in love. This is true even if she is destined to lie with seventy thousand in her lifetime.”
She lay there, wanting him. Scared of it. Wondering if that made her a whore or just a fool. Halfway wondering if she was trading herself to an enemy spy, for safety. Not trusting herself to know the difference between wanting and being in love. If her mother weren’t already dead, he’d strangle her himself.
And that was enough worrying from the Fox Cub tonight. In ten minutes he’d make her forget that nonsense. Give him fifteen, and she’d forget her own name. He slid the book out from underneath her and tossed it away. Her breasts cuddled softly into his palm.
When he touched her, he felt the shudder, felt the throb in her flesh.
You’re mine, Annique…every exquisite, dangerous inch of you. “I haven’t worked it out yet, but seventy thousand would keep you fairly busy.”