Page 118 of A Fearless Heart
“I need to rest now,” Cady murmured. Romulus and Remus stood up the moment she shifted in her chair, providing her protection as she stood up.
“Cady, don’t leave me!” Addison protested, only to earn growls from the dogs.
Jem muttered something rude under his breath, then moved forward. “Let’s get you somewhere all safe and sound, Mr Addison. Wouldn’t want anything permanent to happen to you before we hand you off to the law.”
“Is that his destination?” Cady asked.
“Should be, my lady,” Jem said. “I’ll see that he doesn’t have a chance to take anything before the Zodiac chats with him and then hands him off to the usual authorities. All right, Mr Courtenay?”
But there was no answer. When Cady looked back, the doorway was empty. Gabe had gone.
Chapter 38
Gabe loved sunshine. He lovedair. He loved water. He loved not starving. He loved not being fed poison.
A week had passed since Cady and the Disreputables had found him. After rallying for the brief interrogation, he spent two days in a bedroom at Calderwood, weak and delirious from all the drugs Addison had made him take with the water. He dreamed of Cady, but the dreams always turned into nightmares, and the few times Cady actually did visit him, he kept warning her away.
On the third day, Jem drove the carriage slowly back to London. He half lay on one seat, and Cady sat on the other side, looking nervous and worried—just as she had the first few times he saw her. It seemed all the progress she made toward facing her fears was now lost. He blamed himself for getting her too involved.
In London, he was brought to his impersonal, depressing home. Cady left with the carriage, telling him that she planned to remain in town for two weeks because they expected to hear back from the Crown Office soon, and it might require several visits to solicitors if matters changed.
He felt physically better a few days later, only to receive a note from Aries, requesting a debriefing and then hinting at another assignment. He crumpled the note up. The zeal that used to propel him from one mission to the next and the next was absent, and Gabe didn’t know when it would return.
Worse, he wasn’t sure he wanted it to. The long, deep silence of his entrapment gave him plenty of time to think, and he thought that the agent known as Capricorn wasn’t a particularly good person to be. Yes, he’d been effective. Yes, he’d done exactly what was asked of him, and he did it uncomplainingly and often enthusiastically.
But to do it, he’d hurt a lot of people. Some had deserved it. But others had not.
People like Cady. He absolutely took advantage of her and manipulated her in ways that anyone would call reprehensible. And the fact that he’d come to love her didn’t excuse his actions.
God. He loved her. Gabe was not good at loving people, and perhaps he ought to vanish into the murky underworld of espionage just to avoid the consequences of knowing that he’d—after years of avoiding it for personal and professional reasons—fallen in love. And not just a little. It physically hurt to think of a life without her.
But that’s what he faced, because not only did he love Cady, he’d also lied to her and betrayed her. And now he was here to apologize for it, so that he could take on his next assignment with a clear head.
Ha.
He raised his hand to the door knocker of the town house, and let it fall again.
He was afraid.
Afraid of what Cady would say, how she’d look at him. No matter how he felt about her, Gabe had treated her terribly, and she had every right to never want to see him again.
He summoned his courage, or tried. Before he could knock, the door opened. Rook stood there, dressed in his livery as footman. “What are you doing…sir?” he asked with less than the usual deference.
“I’m here to see Lady Arcadia. If she’s at home. I mean, I know she’s at home. I mean, at home to me.”
“You’d better step inside,” Rook said, rolling his eyes. “Her ladyship and Mr Osbourne are at breakfast, but I’ll go see if she’s at home. Wait in the parlor.”
Gabe paced in the parlor, half thinking he should just leave before he made things even worse. Mr Osbourne! Rook’s use of the name meant that the Crown Office had indeed granted the old lord’s request, and the letters patent had been amended to allow the title and estate to pass to Cady, making her into Lady Calder and Trevor into plain Mr Osbourne. Which was probably for the best—Trevor didn’t want the title, and Cady was much better suited to act as caretaker of Calderwood anyway. And her elevation to heiress would of course make her all the more desirable on the marriage mart. No third sons for her, not now that she could have her pick of first sons.
And then Cady came through the doorway. She wasn’t wearing mourning any longer. Now she was resplendent in a pastel gown that made her look light on her feet, and illuminated her face in a way that the dark outfits never did.
He straightened up as she approached. “My lady.”
“Stop with the false formality,” Cady said irritably, taking a seat on one of the tufted chairs by the window. “Sit down if you want to talk. It hurts my neck to look up that much.”
Well, that more or less told him how delighted she was to see him. Nevertheless, Gabe sat on the chair across from her and leaned forward. “You decided to stay at the town house?”
“For a while,” she said. “I’ve spent more than enough time at Calderwood after all. This is a change of scenery for me. And I’ve found a doctor who actually exhibits an interest in treating my condition, rather than dismissing it. Naturally, she is a woman. She’s German and calls herself a…what’s the word…psychiatrist.”
