Page 83 of The Devil in Oxford
If a girl cannot cry after rescuing the one she loves from a murderer, then when can she weep?
Ruan startled as if he’d been stung by a bee. Eyes wide. “Youloveme?”
I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, after he’d so clearly heard my riotous thoughts. I slid to the foot of the bed and began struggling with the neckcloth holding his left ankle, making use of my hands. The sooner we could leave this house, the sooner I could reassure myself he was safe. “Of course I do, you daft man. Though it is rather inconvenient that you heard that. I was hoping to manage some grand romantic gesture, perhaps some groveling involved after that abysmal letter I wrote you.”
He let out a low throaty laugh, pulling against the remaining cloth bindings.
“Stop moving, you’re making the knot tighter. But yes, if you must know. I’m afraid I do love you.” I pulled at the stubborn fabric at his ankle that he’d only managed to make harder for me to unravel. “It scares me to death, and I still am not convinced that you will not wake up tomorrow and realize this was an utter mistake, but—”
“Youloveme.”
I nodded solemnly as I finished freeing one of his legs, before moving to the next. My fingers trembled as I brushed the exposed skin of his foot, making quick work of the second restraint, fixating on my own hands rather than looking up into his dear face. “I am utterly terrified. I love you and I do not trust it. The very thought that one day you might change your mind—or worse, me watching you die… I could not bear it.”
“Oh, Ruby…” Ruan’s voice broke as he muttered something to himself in Cornish. I slid up the bed, leaning over him as I worked at the ties on his remaining wrist. He leaned up, brushing an awkward kiss against the stained cotton lace covering my collarbone, the only part of me he could reach in our current predicament. “Gods, do I love you, woman.” He let out a dark laugh, his free hand reaching up to cup my cheek. “My life is nothing but chaos and danger and yet I would not trade a second of it for a peaceful life. Youarea tempest, as I told you that afternoon in Cornwall after we solved our first murder together. Violent and angry and beautiful, and I would not have you any other way.”
Only Ruan Kivell would speak ofmurderin the same breath aslove, and I would not change him either. My throat constricted as I leaned down, taking his lips in a kiss that quickly grew out of control, and I was not certain in that moment if the salt I tasted was fromhistears or my own. Nor did it matter. At long last, he broke the kiss with a groan. “Ruby?”
Dazed, I sat up, half concerned I’d hurt him. “What is it?”
He wet his lips, eyes dark. “Would you mind untying me the rest of the way so we can go home, take a bath, and finish this thing in a proper bed like civilized folk?”
I wiped at my cheeks with both hands, swallowing down a laugh. “I think I’d like that very much.”
CHAPTERTHIRTY-NINEThe Final Play
RUANinsisted on walking home from Laurent’s, despite the fact he was unsteady on his feet. I think part of him needed to reassure himself he was well after being sedated for most of a day. Hand in hand, we made our way through the night. Mrs. Penrose and Mr. Owen fussed over me the moment we entered the house, but in time they allowed us to go upstairs. Ruan refused to leave my side, insisting on bathing me himself, removing the blood and soot and filth from me with his own hands. Checking my ear and my scrapes and cuts to make certain that no true harm had befallen me.
Then at long last, once satisfied I wasn’t about to die from my assortment of injuries—and heedless of his own more interior wounds—he took me to bed. Twice. The first time was fast, desperate, and needy. The second unhurried, patient. And each broken kiss and foolish word uttered between us in the predawn hours underscored those absurd words we said to one another at Laurent’s home. This was not lust, not in the least.
It was love.
And I’d be damned if I knew what to do with it, but I would try.
I did not deserve this man. I knew that much, but there wassomething between us that would always bring us back together. Be it fate or love or his old gods’ schemes. I knew in my very bones that I would always come home to Ruan Kivell and he to me. Like the tide to the shore… returning each day without fail.
WHENILETmyself into the darkened halls of the Ashmolean the next morning, I remained uncertain what to expect from Frederick Reaver. I’d read the morning paper while still in bed with Ruan, the headline staring back at me:
CELEBRATED ANTHROPOLOGIST DEAD OF HEART ATTACK AGED72
A much younger photograph of Emmanuel Laurent sat below the newsprint, showing the man alongside his son before the latter went off to war. Ruan had a peculiar expression on his face when he saw Ernst’s face smiling back from the newsprint. He’d been so impossibly young when he died. I hastily folded the paper and put it away. I did not like the pain that flickered to life whenever Laurent was mentioned in Ruan’s presence. And I was quite certain the two of us would have a great deal to talk about when it came to Ernst and his devious father. But for now, I was grateful that Ruan was safe in body—even if his spirit had taken a beating. He did not offer to join me at the Ashmolean, nor did I ask him to. It was painfully clear that the less he learned about Laurent’s perfidy, the better. With a kiss on his forehead, I’d left him there in the warmth of our upstairs room with Fiachna devotedly purring at his side.
I knocked twice on Reaver’s office door, slipping my lockpicks back into my satchel.
“Come in. Come in.” His voice was muffled through the wooden paneling.
I nudged the door open with my toe, half expecting to find the bristly, growling man I had thought my enemy these last severaldays but instead found an altogether different one sitting behind the desk.
Leona sat in a practical armchair across from him. She cast me a rueful look as she drank her tea. Her legs drawn up beneath her.
“Am I interrupting?”
Reaver shook his head, his singular dimple flashing as Leona studied the depths of her cup. “No. I wanted Leona here as well for this. She arrived a few moments ago.”
My fingers curved around the door suspiciously.
“Close it, if you would?”
I did as he asked, stepping into the bright office, and took the seat beside Leona. Every muscle in my body rebelled from the night before. A great deal had happened over the last week, and I wasn’t certain how I felt about having been lied to, suspected of treachery, and nearly killedagain. This was becoming a bad habit. “How is Jack?”
