by Zoë Archer
Morality had a different price across the Channel.
The shop itself brimmed with beautiful gowns made of luxurious fabrics, though most of them showed signs of slight wear. Their original owners must have had to part with them, needing to raise money for one reason or another. Perhaps their protectors had cast them off. Or maybe the women had had to see one of those secret, special doctors. The kind that ushered away unwanted pregnancy. Bronwyn herself hadn’t needed such a doctor, using her own preventive measures, but the whispers she’d heard from some of society’s faster set told her that those men existed, and, for the right amount, could rid a woman of a unwelcome baby.
She’d also heard that some women didn’t survive the procedure. What a brutal world this was, if only one looked past the pretty surfaces and elegant gowns.
Her own dresses were probably for sale somewhere in the London equivalent of this shop. The thought was even more sobering.
Marco turned at her approach. She waited for a breathless moment as he boldly looked at her, up and down, a slight frown creasing his brow.
“Did you care for him very much?” he asked.
She blinked at the unexpected question. He seemed just as surprised that he’d asked.
Her immediate reaction was to snap that it was no blasted business of his how she felt about Hugh. Yet she’d been holding herself in for an eternity. All her thoughts, her feelings about marriage, and marriage to Hugh in particular; she’d been unable to speak to anyone about them. Her role had been that of attentive wife, then nursemaid. And then, ultimately, widow.
Words and emotions built within her, like one of those pressurized valves used in steam engines. Marco was the perfect person to speak to—a spy, a man who dealt in secrets. Who lived on the outside of society. What did it matter if he knew her thoughts?
She walked to the counter, where an array of paste jewelry shimmered in the gaslight. Picking up one brooch in the shape of a beetle, she said, “I was happy to have the offer. I wasn’t one of the poorest girls on the market, but I wasn’t wealthy, either. My father was a second son’s son, and we got by on the income of a small estate with a decently performing tin mine on the property. Hugh was the best offer I received. It didn’t hurt that he was good-looking and sometimes made me laugh.”
Marco kept silent as she continued to sort through the jewelry. She pictured the butterfly and leaf pins adorning the bosoms of the same women who’d sold their gowns. Did they know that the jewels their protectors had given them weren’t real, or did it come as a bitter surprise when they’d sold the jewelry, only to learn they were cheap baubles?
If those women didn’t know how little they meant to the men who kept them, they’d learned soon.
“We were … happy enough,” she murmured, more to herself than Marco. “He called me ‘sparrow’ and liked the dinner parties I’d host. That was sufficient, I suppose. It wasn’t … a passionate marriage.” She couldn’t look at him when she spoke, and her face heated like a furnace, but it felt right and freeing to speak this way. Was it because he was an outsider, a spy? Perhaps because she truly didn’t know Marco, she could tell him things she’d never said to anyone.
“And when he got sick?” Marco asked quietly.
She held a ruby-colored earring between her fingers, watching the light play across its glassy surface. “Our doctor in England suggested we go abroad to a spa. I learned what I could tolerate.” The basins full of phlegm and blood. Seeing her husband’s once hale body wither into a white, bony husk. “I just wanted him to get better, but he wasn’t improving.”
“Got angry, too,” Marco noted.
She whirled to face him, but didn’t quite pay attention to the fact that she held a bee-shaped pin, because she stuck her finger. A drop of crimson welled. He stepped forward at once with a handkerchief, dabbing at her tiny wound.
“I…” she stammered. No one knew about those feelings of hers. She wouldn’t even admit them to herself.
“It’s natural,” he said. “Here you marry a young, healthy man, and then suddenly you’ve got an invalid to tend to. Like a child with no hope of ever getting older, or becoming independent.” He carefully bandaged her finger with a strip of fine cotton torn from the handkerchief. “It’s worse,” he went on, “because your husband will only get sicker. Now you aren’t a wife anymore, but a nurse. Doing some rather ugly jobs, I’d wager. What woman in her prime would want that for herself? Who wouldn’t be angry?”
It took her a moment to catch her breath. “No wonder you are … what you are. You’ve got an elegant brutality.”
“Not trying to be brutal,” he answered.
“Then why say such things?”
He held her gaze. “Because you want me to.”
Was it retreat or self-protection that had her hurrying back to the dressing room? She tugged off the dress, while the modiste clucked and warned her not to pull too hard or the pins would pop out.
She didn’t want to meet her own eyes in the mirror, afraid of what she might see. A cold-blooded widow glad for her husband’s passing, or a bereft wife who longed for her deceased spouse?
It took all her strength to lift her chin and stare at her reflection.
Both, she realized. She was both. Guilt assailed her like thrown grenades that she should be glad that Hugh had died. At the end, he hadn’t been himself at all. Even his brief periods of high spirits had been more mania than happiness, leaving him exhausted and weakened. It had been a beautiful summer day, hot and clear, when he breathed his last. As if the world hadn’t immersed itself in permanent winter when he got sick. As if other people continued to lead their lives.
“Madame, please,” the seamstress murmured. “You will tear the gown.”
Bronwyn’s fingers stilled. She’d been moving in a daze, trying to rip the dress off herself. But then, she’d been in a daze for months. Years. Perhaps not until Marco crossed the threshold of her erstwhile home had she awakened. Even then, she barely understood what was happening around her, as if slowly peeling away the layers of dreams to face the cold light of morning.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, but she didn’t know who those words were for: the modiste, or Hugh. Or even herself.
She did miss him. That was no delusion. He’d been part of her life for many years, and his absence left a void within her, slick and icy. But only here, in this little dressing room, staring into her own eyes, could she face the truth: she’d cared for him. But love? Love had been missing. Yet she’d never expected it. Marriages arranged on the basis of fortune didn’t have the luxury of love, only the hope of cordiality and respect.
Carefully, she peeled herself from the gown, letting the seamstress assist her in removing it. When she was stripped down to her underthings, she put on her weeds, and they felt heavy as iron.
“I shall have these gowns ready for you by tomorrow evening,” the modiste said.
“Tomorrow morning,” Marco called from the front of the shop. “There’s an extra fifty francs in it for you.”
“Of course, sir!” The seamstress snapped for her assistant, and a skinny girl of around fourteen scurried out from behind some curtains and gathered up the heaps of clothing before retreating.
“Matching hats, parasols, and gloves, too,” Marco added.
Bronwyn stepped from the dressing room. “I can’t afford any of that.”
Disappointment flickered in his gaze as he took in her weeds, but the expression was gone almost as soon as it appeared. “Consider it operating expenses,” he answered. “Everything will be settled when your fortune is restored to you.”
“What if it isn’t? I’ll have to work in a mill for years to pay Nemesis back.”
“Then we’d better be successful.” His smile was an elusive thing. “I’d hate to think of you breathing in cotton fluff in Manchester.”
“You are all solicitous concern,” she muttered.
Her breath caught when he reached for her, his fingers light against her
cheek as he lowered her veil. “Can’t have you causing a scandal in the streets of Calais.”
She gave a small, wry laugh. “It’s too late for that. Scandal has become my constant companion.”
* * *
The remainder of the day was spent in a sham of tourism as she and Marco took in the attractions and sights of Calais. A sham because she had no interest in the bustling market at Place d’Armes, or the heavy towers of Église Notre Dame. Her thoughts were scattered like startled doves, flying in as many directions as the sky could hold. Marco did her the favor of speaking little, though it was obvious he knew his way around Calais and could, if she asked, tell her in depth about the history of the Tour de Guet, or the wonders of the electrified lighthouse.
He had an instinct for knowing what she needed, and that, too, disturbed her.
But she wasn’t easy in his company. She felt too aware of him as a stranger, a man embroiled in the dark work of espionage, and, worse still, a man.
Eight months since Hugh had died, and before that, it had been nearly a year of celibacy as he battled the disease. At this point, spending extended periods of time in the company of an obese fishmonger might intrigue her.
No—it was him. Marco. A shadowed mystery of a man who tempted her with his black eyes and worldliness. Who seemed to know her in a way that was both frightening and alluring.
She was grateful when the day came to a close. Grateful, too, that they’d walked enough around the crowded port city that she fell into a deep, dreamless sleep the moment she lay down in bed. If she dreamed of him, she was blessed with a poor memory of it, and woke to the illusion of a blameless conscience. She also woke to the sound of steady knocking at her door.
Pulling on her wrapper, she answered the door, and found several of the hotel maids waiting with boxes. The boxes bore the name of the modiste, and Bronwyn directed them to place her new wardrobe onto the bed. Two more maids appeared, carrying valises—she assumed they were there to hold her new clothing.
Bronwyn opened a box and studied the fawn-colored dress. At least it wasn’t black. She craved color, just the same. Still, even in disguise, she couldn’t bring herself to wear the vivid blues and greens she once adored. Not yet. No one would pay particular attention to a woman in dull hues. They’d simply think her dowdy, not in mourning.
And that was something her ethics could tolerate.
One of the maids helped her dress and pack. She examined herself in the pier glass over the mantel. The dark brown hat the modiste had selected was actually a rather jaunty number, with a handsome curl of pheasant feathers curving down to bob cheerfully with each turn of Bronwyn’s head.
“Monsieur wants you to meet him in the lobby as soon as you are ready,” the maid said in French.
Wants, not requests.
She didn’t know much about spies. In fact, she knew nothing at all, but she could deduce. And they likely didn’t work often with others. Or, if they did, they wouldn’t be the epitome of social graciousness. Unless it suited their needs.
Bronwyn carried her violin case while two porters took her valises. She wouldn’t get a chance to play for God knew how long, but she’d refused to leave it at Nemesis headquarters. It gave her some comfort, knowing that her old friend might be mute, but at least it came with her on this wild journey, her secret dream came with her like an invisible shadow.
She descended the stairs into the lobby, and Marco rose from his chair at her approach. If she’d been hoping for a look of frank masculine approval in his face now that she’d doffed her weeds, she was sorely disappointed. He only nodded, brief and clipped, and waved her toward the front door.
As she stepped out onto the curb, the sun felt especially harsh and cutting. The traffic on the street seemed sharp, too present.
“This is the first time I’ve seen the world without my veil in months,” she murmured to Marco.
“How does it look?”
“Brighter. Dirtier.” Mud and debris collected in gutters, and soot streaked the buildings’ façades. The veil had hidden all this from her, yet now she could see.
She could also see how good-looking Marco was in the sunlight. The planes of his face were harder, more angled, the shadows beneath his brow deeper. It didn’t give her any solace to realize that her companion on this escapade was handsome. Dangerous and handsome—one adding an edge to the other.
Her own appearance in the daylight must have caught him off guard, too, for he stared at her for several moments, frowning. Something was happening behind his opaque eyes, and whether he liked what he saw or not, she couldn’t tell. But she had his attention, and secret gratification welled.
Even with his attention, her heart pounded with a strange fear. People in the street might stop and glare at her. A widow too soon out of mourning. A disgrace, even here in France. Such scandal wouldn’t be tolerated.
Yet nobody noticed. No one stopped and pointed, or shouted. She was only one woman out of dozens on this street, hardly worth attention.
Did her widow’s weeds weigh more than this gown? She felt … lighter. As if her next step would liberate her from the earth’s gravity, and she’d go soaring up into the sky, and disappear forever. But she wasn’t afraid.
Guilt once again threatened to drag her back down. She oughtn’t to feel glad to be out of mourning.
“Take on whatever role you have to,” Marco said in a low voice. “However you survive, you do it. Each morning, each breath. Survive, and move forward.”
“Is that how you get through every day?”
He spread his palms, indicating that he did, indeed, stand before her.
“I don’t know if I can ever learn the ways of Nemesis,” she said.
“You already have,” he answered. “And you’re managing.”
It astonished her to realize that he was right.
* * *
Marco watched her the entire train ride from Calais to Paris. She had a book spread on her lap—Stevenson’s Treasure Island, which Harriet must have loaned her, since it was one of her favorites—but her gaze was fixed on the window and the passing landscape. Small villages, large towns, and the countryside of farmhouses and the brown fields of early spring.
She didn’t seem unfamiliar with France, and spoke the language well enough, but still she kept looking out the window, as if the rather ordinary and dull scenery held more interest than the swashbuckling deeds of cutthroat pirates. It was as though, despite her trepidation, she ate up everything she could see, every experience she could have. Eight months of seclusion—and the long tending of a husband’s illness before that—surely would make anyone long for a life beyond the pages of a book.
But it was more than her widowhood or previous duties as a nurse that made her stare at the French scenery. That want, that hunger he’d felt many times … that was the origin of her limitless curiosity, regardless of her fear. And he watched her with the same avid curiosity. What was going on behind those sage-leaf-green eyes of hers? Damn it—why should he care?
Without her veil in the daylight, she was both prettier and more unusual looking than he’d realized. The sun showed the minuscule hollow in her chin, the angularity of her nose. Yet together, these flaws made her striking, unforgettable, even when he closed his eyes. She burned there like the afterimage from staring directly at the tungsten filament of an electric light.
He’d known many lovely women in his life. Taken more than his share to his bed. She was not the most beautiful, but she kept drawing his gaze, his thoughts.
She’s your latest mission. Of course she interests you, even if you don’t want to be here.
Though when he searched for it, that reluctance at taking the job to recover her fortune had started to dissolve in infinitesimal fragments. Nemesis was dedicated to the poor, the helpless. She was and wasn’t these things. Yet at the thought of her burying herself as a paid companion, forever a nonentity, something cold and slippery congealed in his stomach.
He start
ed at the unexpected sensation. Just a small twitch, yet she had to have been as aware of him as he was of her, because she finally turned from the window and asked, “Is everything all right?”
“Thinking of what our next step is,” he said. They sat alone in a first-class carriage, so he could speak freely. “As I said on the ship, we’re meeting two Nemesis agents in Paris to help us find Devere.”
She smiled, making his insides clench. “Here I thought there was nothing you couldn’t do on your own.”
“There’s not much point of having a team if you don’t make use of it,” he answered. “It’s not always about being a lone wolf.”
Her smile widened. “I see you as more of a tiger or panther. Hunting alone in the jungle.”
“A solitary business, hunting.”
“But necessary,” she noted. “One has to eat.”
“Or eliminate a threat,” he added.
“Not everyone in the jungle is a meal or a threat,” she countered. “Maybe there are innocent creatures you leave alone.”
“No such thing as innocent. Especially in a jungle.”
“What about when it’s time to mate?” she asked. “Do you hide yourself away then, too?”
Heat shot through him like an injection of morphine. Except instead of lethargy in his veins, he felt sharply, potently aware.
“Some things are worth leaving the safety of isolation,” he rumbled. The hell are you doing, Black? Don’t flirt with her, for God’s sake. But he couldn’t seem to stop himself.
“Not enough to get married,” she pointed out.
“Spies make for bad husbands,” he said.
“A decidedly poor matrimonial candidate.”
He bowed. “You have described me to the atom, Mrs. Parrish.”
“Oh,” she said with an enigmatic smile, “I’m certain there’s more to you than that.”
The widow grew bolder by the moment. Though he couldn’t quite think of her as a widow anymore, now that she’d cast off her weeds. Even though she hadn’t selected brighter gowns, there was a new confidence in her since she’d left mourning behind—even if it was only temporary. When they finally returned to England, doubtless she’d take up her crape and bombazine again. A shame, that. Black didn’t complement redheads’ complexions, and it seemed a crime to cover her striking face with a veil, or hide those intelligent eyes of hers.
