Page 29 of The Avenging Angel and the Spy
“There now, Master John-Jack. France is not so far away as all that.” He turned and directed the child’s attention across the rippling green channel waters to the dark mass of land that appeared no more than a shadow on the horizon. “See? You can almost reach out and touch it. Your papa can come sailing home from there before you’ve even had a chance to miss him.”
“Twuly?” Although John-Jack looked skeptical, he wrapped one arm about Sinclair’s neck, and he leaned forward to squint. Sinclair soon had the little boy convinced that he very nearly had touched the coastline of France,
Belle could only stare. She knew few men who would have been perceptive enough to recognize the child’s fear of losing his father, fewer still who would have troubled to do anything about it. Sinclair looked so natural, so at ease with the boy in his arms, he might well have been parent to a numerous brood of his own. Which he could be, for all she yet knew of Carrington.
Although his background remained a mystery to her, she was discovering more about Sinclair that she liked and desired. She supposed she should be angry with him for stealing the kiss, but how could she, knowing she had been a willing partner in the crime? She was no missish virgin to fool herself into thinking that women were not prey to the same passions as men. It had taken Sinclair Carrington to remind her of that. If circumstances were different, if they were not facing such a dangerous mission …
But they were, and in future she had best try harder to keep a clear head and him at arm’s length. Both their livesmight depend upon it. Even now it was high time one of them remembered the business at hand, that they should be boarding the packet before it sailed without them. Although loath to interrupt Sinclair as he charmed away the last of John-Jack’s forlorn expression, she said, “We really must return that child to his family and?—”
“Jean-Jacques.” A man’s voice called in the distance behind her.
“And then-.” Belle stumbled over what she had been about to say. The voice called again, its French inflection plucking at her heart like the haunting refrain of an old melody.
Hearing footsteps behind her, she turned slowly, the man’s shadow falling across her. He halted at the sight of her, catching his breath, his familiar features becoming white and pinched.
Belle felt as though a hand of iron seized her heart and crushed it. A drumming sounded in her ears. Sinclair, the child, the bustling dockyard blurred, vanishing in a thick haze that left her alone with this man who stood so close she could have reached out and touched his hand.
The grains of Time appeared to have been magically pulled back into the top of the hourglass. She might once more have been standing upon the stone steps of Saint¬Saveur, the noble Comte de Egremont coming to claim his bride.
Except that Time was cruel, a malicious prankster. His waving hair, once so golden brown, was now shot through with silver. Deep furrows bit deep into his brow and alongside his mouth were lines far too harsh for such a gentle face.
“Jean-Claude,” Belle whispered. Somehow she’d always known she was fated to see him again one day and had imagined what she would do and say. The time had come and her voice failed her. All she could do was scan his gaunt face for some sign that he had at last forgiven her.
He hadn’t. His gray eyes no longer filled with dreams, only hurt and disillusionment. Neither Time nor the Revolution had done that to him. The guilt was all hers.
Belle lowered her gaze, no longer able to bear to look at him. When she and Jean-Claude stood silent as though struck from stone, Sinclair shifted restlessly behind her, the boy still in his arms.
Sinclair had watched Belle’s eyes widen with recognition, the shock hard followed by the color draining from her cheeks as though she had taken to bleeding inwardly. Never had he thought to see the proud Isabelle look so stricken, so humbled, and the obvious cause of it was this pale stranger with his flinty, accusing eyes.
“Now, who the devil might this Jean-Claude be?” Sinclair did not realize he had muttered the words aloud until John-Jack answered him.
“That’s no devil. That’s my papa.”
When the child squirmed to be free, Sinclair set him down. John-Jack ran over and flung his arms about the man’s knees.
“Papa! Papa! This gent’mum’s been teaching me how to touch Fwance.”
The child’s piping voice seemed to break the spell, at least for the stranger if not for Belle. The man she had called Jean-Claude slowly inclined his head toward the boy.
“Jean-Jacques. Where have you been? I have shouted myself hoarse calling you.”
“Why, I was wight here all the time, Papa.”
“The fault is mine,” Sinclair said. “I was amusing the lad, and although I heard your call, I did not make the connection. The child told us his name was John-Jack.”
Cold gray eyes shifted toward Sinclair as though recognizing his existence for the first time. “My son has difficulty withhis native tongue. Your country seems to have made a proper Englishman of him.”
What a world of bitterness lie concealed in those flat tones, Sinclair thought.
“I thank you for looking after Jean-Jacques,” Jean-Claude continued. “I am sorry that he should have given you any trouble.”
“It was no trouble.”
The Frenchman took his son by the hand to lead him away without another word. The movement stirred some life back into Belle.
“Then the boy is yours, monsieur,” she said in a small voice, as though she could not comprehend the fact. “You married again?”
“Oui, I did,” was the curt reply. “But I am now a widower.” As though dragged against his will, Jean-Claude turned back to Belle. Like thin ice cracking, some of his brittle shell seemed to melt.
