by Allegra Gray
“Oh,” she breathed, and slid down to take him inside her fully. “Oh,” she said again.
Philippe’s head fell back at the sheer bliss of being inside her again. Using his hands, he guided her into a gentle rocking motion. Need hammered at him. He wasn’t going to be able to last.
But then, it seemed, neither was Bea. She rocked harder, faster, grinding against his thrusts. Mon Dieu. Any moment now…He flicked her nipple with his tongue, pinched the other between his thumb and forefinger.
She shrieked and came in a shower of convulsions, squeezing him as he too gave in to the raging need for release, spilling himself inside her as they collapsed against one another, spent.
Philippe closed his eyes. Suddenly, England felt like home.
June 22, 1815
London’s church bells pealed joyfully, celebrating the coalition’s victory, but across the English Channel, Richard Durand allowed his head to sink into his hands. It was over.
Napoleon Bonaparte had lost. The defeat at Waterloo four days ago had decimated the French army and crushed the spirit of those who’d celebrated the Emperor’s return. A brief visit to the battlefield had sickened Richard in body and heart. The once-rolling farmland of Belgium was strewn with the bodies of dead and dying men.
Napoleon had failed. Richard had failed. The British war plans he’d personally delivered had come too late. Though from the battle reports, he wasn’t sure any amount of military intelligence could have salvaged the campaign.
Word was, Bonaparte had abdicated for the second time. Richard knew there would not be a third.
Already there were rumors of another White Terror. During the first, the Jacobins who’d supported the Revolution had been systematically routed, attacked and murdered in the night, or forced to stand trial. The trials had all been shams, the end result the same. Death. He shuddered. This time, it would be supporters of Napoleon who faced such a fate. How many people knew Richard was one of them?
He glanced around at the familiar furnishings of his Parisian home, to which he’d retreated. He’d hidden his actions well. The best recourse now was to disavow any association with the fallen Emperor. No one would know how much he’d staked on Napoleon—that Richard’s coffers were now empty, his son estranged. Richard could survive. He always survived. He’d simply keep his head down until the storm blew over.
Right now, though, he needed a drink. A visit to his club would garner him the latest news, and would further the impression he had nothing to hide, Richard reasoned as he donned his hat.
The Paris streets were busy enough that the plain black carriage that followed him went unnoticed. Only when Richard emerged several hours later onto a darkened street, having consumed enough liquor to dull the bitterness of defeat, and heard the words, “Monsieur Durand, vous êtes en état d’arrestation,” spoken with a clipped British accent, did he realize he was in trouble.
“You have no authority over me,” he hissed at the officer who hustled him toward an unfamiliar carriage.
“Au contraire. You are charged with committing a crime on British soil.”
“Absurd. I have not set foot in England in years.”
The evening shadows masked any expression on the Brit’s face as he replied, “I believe otherwise.”
“Check the ships’ rosters,” Richard snarled.
“Oh, I’ve no doubt we’d find them all in proper order. You are intelligent enough to have seen to that. Now get in.”
A glance at the driver revealed a pistol aimed directly at him. Richard climbed inside. The Brit settled across from him, tapped twice on the window, and the vehicle moved off.
“What crime?” Richard asked.
“Theft. In particular, theft of a set of military plans, stolen with intent to provide information to British adversaries. In short, you are accused of spying.”
“I have no idea what you refer to.”
“Hmm.” That didn’t seem to bother the man.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Back to England, to stand trial. Rather inefficient, in my opinion, but my superiors insisted.” His tone darkened. “My usual method of dealing with spies is far more expeditious.”
Richard swallowed. Fear, combined with the copious amounts of liquor he’d consumed, set his stomach to churning. “I am a well connected man,” he blustered. “You’ll hang for this.”
The Brit’s lips twisted in a semblance of a smile. “How would anyone know I was here? I never set foot in France.”
Richard Durand remained confident—right up until he saw the court document listing the lineup of those prepared to testify against him. Kettridge. Peters. He’d expected as much. Miss Charity Medford. He’d never heard of her. Monsieur Jean Philippe Durand, and his newly wedded wife, Beatrice. Well. His son had married the lady spy.
He had two options left: play innocent and act hurt by Philippe’s betrayal, or offer up secrets of his own in exchange for his life.
He paced the small room where he waited for the proceedings to begin.
The kings counsellors, prosecuting him on the charge of high treason, had wasted no time securing a court date. Most certainly his home and offices had been searched, but even then Richard had not despaired. He rarely committed to writing anything that could link him to unsavory matters. It was why he insisted on face-to-face meetings—he’d seen too many men brought down by mere slips of paper. Indeed, had that idiot Peters not misplaced his note in Beatrice Pullington’s coat so many weeks ago, Richard might be free and far from here.
Someone knocked on the door. A guard poked his head in and informed him that the younger Monsieur Durand had requested an audience with him prior to the proceedings.
Ah. Option one, then: act hurt. Richard followed the guard into the courtroom, as yet sparsely populated, though court officials were beginning to file in. Philippe stood toward the front.
“My dear son, it has been so long.” Richard moved to embrace Philippe, but a warning shake of the younger man’s head stopped him. Richard looked down at his hands. “I saw—but it cannot be—a mistake, of course. This foolish British court has listed you as a witness for the prosecution.”
Philippe shook his head again, his jaw clenched. “It is not a mistake.”
“Not a mistake?” Suddenly Richard felt very old, and it occurred to him for the first time, how very few men in his profession lived to enjoy old age. Would he?
Richard gestured to their courtroom surroundings. “How can you do this to your father?”
Philippe’s blue eyes pierced him. “You are not my father.”
Richard felt the sting of truth in that verbal blow. Wearily, he took a seat on a nearby wooden bench. Indeed, he’d long known the implications of his son’s early arrival into the world. When he’d married Solange, he’d been the one to suggest a quick wedding, citing the need to return to military duty, but Solange had immediately agreed. Later, he’d suspected. But since he and Solange never had other children, and she accommodated his every request in other matters, he’d pushed it from his mind.
“For that matter,” Philippe continued, his features hard, “what sort of father would frame his son for espionage?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He was losing ground.
“Richard, I am not the fool you seem to think me.”
Time to switch tactics, regain the offensive. He folded his arms. “Fine. You were in bed with a British spy. I had every reason to believe you’d turned against your own country.”
“Against Bonaparte, perhaps. All of Europe has turned against him. But I would never turn against France.”
Richard looked hard at Philippe and felt, for the first time, a grudging respect for the son he’d never understood. The man who stood before him was confident, articulate in matters well outside the studio. He’d never seen that before—and now it was too late.
“They’re going to convict me, aren’t they?” He’d been a fool to believe Napoleon could win
. Faced with his own trial, he had no desire to remain a fool.
“Yes.” Philippe stated the truth without malice.
“I could provide information. The names of all the others.”
“They already have those names. Though I doubt the men they belong to still use them.”
A buzzing filled Richard’s ears. Somewhere far away, André Denis and his one remaining henchman were beginning new lives. Perhaps they would be caught. Perhaps not. Richard would never know. Everyone in the courtroom seemed to be moving as though underwater.
So this was what it felt like when your world collapsed. He’d caused this for so many others, and spent his whole career trying to avoid experiencing it himself.
“Philippe,” Richard said finally, slowly, “I see now I was wrong about you, and I am sorry it has come to this. I do not deserve your mercy, but I will beg it of you anyway. If I am found guilty, they will sentence me to hang.” He lowered his voice. “Spare me only the humiliation of that public death. Give me money to bribe my guards tonight. Not for escape—only that they will allow me the means to make my end privately.” He swallowed. “I have always been a private man.”
Philippe stared at him for a long, long moment, then reached into his satchel.
Epilogue
There was just one secret Bea had left. And though she and Philippe had both promised to be open with each other, she’d waited to find just the right way of telling him this one.
Tonight seemed perfect.
They’d held a salon, the first since Philippe’s arrest, to celebrate his return to the artistic community, and the completion of the first painting he’d ever done on English soil.
When the portrait of Beatrice had been unveiled, the room had filled with cheers. Bea’s eyes had filled with tears.
It wasn’t quite what they’d originally planned. By the time she and Philippe had reunited, the blush of spring, the seasonal essence he’d hoped to capture, had given way into the full flush of summer. No matter, he’d told her, for he’d chosen to paint her not as a muse, but as a goddess, and a goddess deserved nature in all its glory for her backdrop.
Though she’d posed for many an afternoon, he’d kept the finished product from her view until tonight’s unveiling.
In the portrait, the abandoned rose garden bloomed in wild profusion, and Philippe had spoken true. No amount of blooms could detract from the painting’s centerpiece: a woman whose allure, whose sensuality, drew more from her confidence than from the filmy fabric that draped and clung to her curves in ways the Greek sculptors of old would have yearned to imitate.
Bea was simultaneously proud of the woman she’d become, and grateful for the love of a man who recognized and valued her so. She truly had it all.
As the last of the guests bid their farewells, Bea came to stand at her husband’s side. “You are a success, my love. A resounding one.”
“Non. It is you they admire.”
“Only because of your talent. Had anyone else painted me, the work would soon be relegated to the attic. For your work, admirers turn out in droves.”
He winked. “Perhaps. What better way to get a close-up look at the artiste who was almost a spy?”
“Who knew your notoriety on that account would turn into such a boon?” Bea acknowledged the truth behind Philippe’s teasing tone. Her new husband had more followers than ever before, if tonight’s event was any indication. Basic human curiosity, coupled with an open invitation, was too much to resist for London’s gossip-hungry upper class.
Thank heaven the extent of her own activities had stayed out of the papers, Bea reflected. She guessed the public would not be as forgiving of her—nor had she been as innocent.
But that was all past. Next week she and Philippe sailed for France, where her portrait would be displayed to patrons of art in Paris. Bea smiled at the giddy rush that always overtook her when she thought of this unbelievable fact. Come spring, they would return to England. They planned to live in London most of the year, for Philippe acknowledged Bea’s close ties to family and friends there, and hoped to strengthen his own bond with Lord Owen.
But first he needed to put his own past to rest. His stepfather’s betrayal and death had hurt, she knew, but it was Solange who haunted him. He’d confided a desire to sort through his mother’s estate, in hopes of coming to peace with the questions about her life first as an artist, then as wife to a ruthlessly ambitious man. And in hopes of finding the portrait she’d allegedly painted of him as a young child.
Which brought Bea back to the secret she ached to tell. She slipped an arm about Philippe’s waist and tilted up her face to his. “I have a request to make.”
“Anything, mon coeur.”
He brushed his lips to hers, and she savored the touch before leaning back to finish her plea. Her heart beat faster, spurred by both desire for Philippe and anticipation of his reaction.
“I know you always chose your own subjects,” she said, a smile playing at her lips, “and you do not accept requests or commissions. But I hope you’ll make an exception.”
“You wish I should do another of you? Is one not enough?” he teased.
She batted him playfully. “Not me.”
He frowned. “Who is it you desire I should paint?”
Her smile burst forth in full. “Our child.”
His eyes widened, lit by a fiercely proud gleam as he lifted her in the air and spun her in circles. “When?”
“April, I think.” She laughed.
He set her down with a sound kiss.
Moments later, Philippe lifted his head long enough to say, “That, ma chérie, is an exception I shall be overjoyed to make.” He lowered his head once more, and Bea promptly forgot the rest of her surroundings as they fell away—as they always did—before the man who’d introduced her first to passion, then offered her his love.
ZEBRA BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2010 by Allegra Gray
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
Zebra and the Z logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.
ISBN: 978-1-4201-1927-5
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
