“Do not be afraid,” he murmured. “You are safe now.”
A memory tickled, soft, dark, velvet. She opened her eyes in wonder, recognition unfurling inside her like a flower.
“I know you.”
His arms tensed. His breathing stilled.
“I recognize you.” She lifted her head to study his features. Wide, clear brow. Long, straight nose. Firm, unsmiling mouth. His fair hair, long and untamed, an aureole of gold around his angel face.
“You are overwrought,” he said carefully. “Under the circumstances, it is natural for you to imagine . . .”
Her breath exploded, a puff of impatience with him, with herself. “I am upset. I am not stupid. I do not ignore the evidence of my senses.” Or the prompting of her heart. “It was you. In the prison.”
It was you all along.
He hesitated. “Yes.”
“How?”
“Aimée.” Just her name, like the whisper of leaves. His green eyes were full of shadows and secrets like a forest. She could get lost in those eyes.
“Tell me,” she said fiercely.
He sighed. “During the Terror, Amherst organized a secret ring to smuggle victims fleeing France across the channel. When I went to live with him, I . . . joined them.”
When he was seventeen, he’d told her yesterday. Before that, he remembered nothing.
Her blood drummed in her ears. Her mind boggled, teetered on the edge of comprehension. A great void opened at her feet.
It was not possible. The man who had spirited her to safety seven years ago had been no youth of seventeen. He had appeared out of the darkness like the answer to a prayer, tearing her from her old life, setting her on a new course. The same man. This man, Lucien Hartfell. Her brain could not conceive it.
She could not hear, she could not think, over the pounding in her head. She could not remember every word overheard eight years ago in the barn, in the dark. So she listened to her heart instead.
“When you came to Moulton to court Julia, did you know you would find me here?” she asked.
Lucien held himself as stiffly as a prisoner before the Tribunal, condemned before he opened his mouth. “No. I lost . . . track of things for a while.”
An unexpected tenderness unfolded inside her, an aching pity, a sorrow for something she did not understand.
When you lose your powers, your memory goes, too.
Had she recalled those words? Or imagined them? It did not signify. What mattered was that Lucien was not invulnerable after all. In his own way, he was as lost, as confused, as she.
“Then I must be grateful,” she said, “to God or the Fates, who brought you to me again when I was in need.”
His gaze met hers, stunned.
She smiled and stood on tiptoe to press her lips lightly to his. “I am grateful. For both times.”
His marble face flushed. He made her a bow, oddly formal. “I am always here,” he said. “If you need me.”
Chapter Eight
Everyone—from Sir Walter and Lady Basing in their separate rooms on the second floor to the hall boy on his pallet by the kitchen fire—was settled for the night.
Aimée tossed on her narrow bed, unable to get comfortable. Her feet were too cold. Her sheets were too rough. An unfamiliar restlessness invaded her veins. She thanked God and Lucien that for the first time in weeks she could sleep without a chair jammed under her door, alone without fear.
Except she no longer wanted to sleep alone.
Aimée flopped onto her back and stared at the ceiling. She was a Frenchwoman. She must be practical. Lucien had rejected her once for what she was certain were very good reasons. She was not at all sure she had the courage to gamble her heart and risk her reputation only to be rejected a second time. She needed to think of her future.
A future without love? Without passion? Without Lucien.
She threw back the covers and reached for her dressing gown.
Foolishness.
Or very great wisdom.
She found she did not care.
She crept down the attic stairs. In the past, she had been grateful for each small telltale creak that might warn her of Howard climbing up the stairs. Now every betraying sound made her teeth clench and her hand squeeze the bannister tighter. She breathed easier when she reached the carpeted hallway on the second floor. Bedchamber doors stretched along either side of the corridor. Downstairs, a clock chimed. Bing bong, bing bong.
Christmas Eve. A night for miracles.
Aimée stopped outside Lucien’s door, her bare toes curling into the carpet. Her heart thumped. Stay or go? Knock or open the door? A rap might bring Lucien. Or it could attract the attention of another guest.
She took a deep breath for courage and opened the door.
Shutting it behind her, she stood a moment on the threshold to get her bearings. A faint light filtered through the open draperies. Of course. Martin was in London. Lucien had no manservant to draw the curtains, to turn down the bed.
She peered into the shadowed recesses of the room. She could barely make out the dark bulk of Lucien’s body on the bed, the pale curve of one bare shoulder rising above the covers.
Her mouth went dry with daring and desire. She wet her lips and whispered. “Lucien?”
A flare of silver light, quickly doused.
Lucien spoke out of the dark. “What is it, mignonne?”
The endearment—her mother’s endearment, spoken in that deep, masculine voice—made her tremble. She straightened her spine. “I couldn’t sleep. You said before . . . If I ever needed you . . .”
I need you. Now and again and forever, you.
She gleamed like a candle in the darkness, slim and pale and utterly desirable.
Lucien almost groaned. Her dark hair tumbled around her shoulders. Beneath her thin nightgown, her dainty feet were bare. He wanted her with a ferocity that would make her recoil, in ways that would shock her, if only she knew.
But she could never know. She had come to him for comfort, not lust. Because she could not sleep.
God help them both.
His body throbbed. Under the covers, he was naked. His dressing gown was across the room. He could not rise to get it without her seeing exactly how she affected him.
Imposing a rigid control on his muscles and his voice, he lifted the duvet, silently inviting her into his bed. They would still be separated by a sheet. He prayed it would be enough.
She drifted toward the bed. Her groping hands slid over the mattress before she slipped in beside him. The stuffing gave under their combined weight, tipping her against him. With a little sigh, she pillowed her cheek on his shoulder. Her warm breast pressed against his side. Her cool, naked feet touched his.