Page 77 of A Night of Secret Surrender
‘I tried to kill him. He will never give such retaliation up and I don’t want to be looking over my shoulder for ever.’
She looked spent and exhausted. Her eyes were red and her nose was running, but the fear in her face was lessened.
‘You won’t need to. I will see to that.’
‘So what happens now?’ Her voice was small and hollow.
‘I’ll be the one waiting for him to come.’
‘No. I want to be here, too.’
‘Very well.’
To send Celeste off alone after what she had admitted seemed wrong. ‘But you have to promise not to get in the way, not to shoot. Guy Bernard is mine, the final piece in the puzzle of the past. I want you blameless in his death. Do you understand?’
* * *
He was giving her the gift of the life she once thought she had taken. He was allowing her clemency. After all she had told him, he would still give her that? She could barely believe it.
‘He will come this evening, using the trellis beneath your window. He will wait until it is dark and the house is silent because that is what he taught me to do. If you greet him in the same way you did me, you will have him at a disadvantage.’
The clock in the corner chimed out the hour of eleven in the morning. Had it been that long since breakfast? It felt like hours on the one hand and like no time at all on the other.
‘I’ll ring for tea. I think we both need it and afterwards the housekeeper will find you a room so that you might have a sleep. It will probably be a long night.’
She nodded, pleased at the way he had taken charge of everything since her mind was still ringing from her confession. Once, she had imagined she might never have survived such an admission. Now all she knew was the relief of it.
He had listened to her words as a man and an honourable one at that. She could have asked for no more and the discharge of culpability was empowering.
Her body was free again and only hers, no longer soiled and tarnished. The grace Summer had given astounded her. She wanted to cross the room and crawl back into his arms, the protection found there so very precious.
But she did not, of course. Tea was coming and so was Guy Bernard, and if Summer had any chance of defeating him, he’d need his mind on the job. Already she could see him thinking in that particular way of his, the spy who had outwitted all his enemies because of cleverness and sharp wits.
‘Unload the gun you brought and put it on the table there. Live bullets in a room this size are liable to hit things they are not meant to. Besides, people generally want to tell their story and he will be no exception. But for now, we will have a drink and rest for there are plenty of hours to wait.’
* * *
His housekeeper had taken Celeste to the yellow bedchamber, a room that overlooked the back garden and which caught the afternoon sun. Situated on the next floor up, Shay was glad of the distance between them. His body shook with outrage from all she had told him, the fury building until he could stand it no more.
Shutting his door, he drove his fist into the wall beside it, the scrim jagging against his skin and drawing blood and pain, and the sort of ache that finally broke through the blinding anger of what had happened to Celeste.
He drew back his arm and slammed it in again, this time a sob of anguish escaping with the crash and then he hit out a third time, the madness diminishing exponentially with such temper and passion as his more usual resourcefulness crept back in.
He didn’t want to break his fingers, he needed the damn things to confront Guy Bernard when he came. Leaning back against the wall, he slid down it, legs folded up, his mouth against his hand, sucking at the bruising and the split skin.
He felt worn out and drained. He felt het up and energised, too, if that was indeed possible. It was how Celeste had always made him feel as she rode upon the edge of danger in everything she did. She was unlike anyone else he’d ever met and that was saying something in his walk of life.
He would deal with Guy Bernard and take Celeste Fournier home to Luxford. He did not care what happened in the future or how difficult it all was. She was his. She always had been his and always would be.
He would protect her and cherish her and keep her safe. Nobody would ever hurt her again. He was willing to sacrifice everything to make certain that this happened.
And so I pretended that it was you until all I could see was your face and all I could feel was your body. Even when I screamed I imagined it was you.’
Celeste challenged him and made him furious. She’d offered him her body even after everything she had been through and filled him up completely with her own brand of passion. Her secrets were dark and heinous, but then so were many of his own, the shady deals of espionage wrought in blood and deceit. He’d killed people, too, under the banner of war and sometimes it had not been pretty.
She was exactly right for him. She made his blood beat faster when she came near and his heart swell with bursting pride.
In her he could only see the grace and the hope of survival. She was the rose that bloomed among the debris, determined, brave and true. The White Dove. James McPherson had the truth of it there.
