The Soldier's Dark Secret Page 22

  He would still love her. He would tell her he loved her, and he would keep telling her until she believed him and until she accepted that she had no reason at all not to love him back. He wouldn’t walk away. Even though that was what he was expecting Celeste to do? To sit back, and accept his decision and to live with it? Was that arrogance or was he back to wallowing in his guilt?

  Guilt stopped Blythe Marmion loving Celeste. Jack did love Celeste. But Jack could never make Celeste happy because Jack didn’t deserve to be happy. Because it should have been Jack who died, and not the girl.

  But the girl had spared him.

  Celeste had all her answers now, and not many of them were pleasant, yet tonight she’d seemed surprised when he suggested it had turned out badly. He remembered what she’d said in Cassis, about laying ghosts. He remembered wishing he could do the same. He remembered concluding, as he always concluded, that it was impossible. But if Celeste could do it, why couldn’t he?

  What if he was wallowing? What would the girl say to that? He had always assumed that she was torturing him with her suicide. He had always believed it was revenge for her child’s death, for all the deaths. Remember this, soldier. Never forget this, soldier. What if she simply couldn’t bear to go on?

  What if she was sparing him?

  What if he allowed himself to love Celeste?

  The idea filled him with such happiness, he felt light-headed. It felt—it felt right.

  What if he lost her? What if he walked away, and she stopped loving him and she found someone else? He couldn’t contemplate it. He couldn’t imagine it. He had, he realised with horror, assumed that she would always be there, waiting for some indeterminate point in the future when he might feel entitled to claim her. He cursed himself under his breath. Arrogant, stupid, fool. What was he waiting for? The future could be now, if he was willing to take a chance. If she was still willing to take a chance.

  Jack looked up at the apartment building. ‘Dammit, there’s only one way to find out.’

  * * *

  ‘Oh, Jack!’ Celeste fell on him, wrapping her arms around his neck. ‘Oh, Jack, I have been so worried. I am so sorry. I should not have said— I only meant to help you.’

  ‘You did.’ He pulled her tightly against her, holding her so close she could hardly breathe. ‘You did.’

  She leaned back to look at his face. ‘What has happened?’

  He laughed. ‘You,’ he said and kissed her. He tasted of the Paris night. He kissed her hungrily. ‘I love you so much,’ he said. ‘I don’t know if I can forgive myself for what happened in the village that day, but I do know I’d never forgive myself for losing you. I can’t believe how close I came to that, Celeste. Oh, God, Celeste, I love you so much.’

  He kissed her again, more wildly, and the heaviness in her heart shifted. He loved her. She framed his face with her hands. ‘Is it true? You really love me?’

  ‘I really do love you, more than anything. That’s the easy bit,’ Jack said, kissing her again. ‘I love you, and I don’t want to waste another moment of my life without you. You were right. About the guilt. About atoning. About all of it. I was spared. I don’t know why, but I was spared, and it’s time I claimed my life back. I don’t know how I’ll do it, Celeste, but I want to try. I love you, and I’d be a bloody fool to pass up the chance of happiness with you.’

  ‘And you are not a bloody fool.’ She beamed at him. She didn’t think she had a smile wide enough for him, so she kissed him. ‘I love you.’

  ‘And I love you. I don’t know what that means for us, Celeste. I have no idea what our future will be, but I can promise to love you always, and to try.’

  ‘Jack, mon coeur, that is all I want.’

  There would be a time for explanations, but it was not now. Celeste led him into her living room, where the fire burned and the uncurtained windows showed them the night-time Paris sky. They kissed, the deepest, thirstiest of kisses, as they shed their clothing, claiming each other with their mouths and their hands. They kissed, and they touched, and they sank on to the rug in front of the fire and they made love. There would be a time to discuss the future, but what mattered now was that they had a future, and it started here.

  Epilogue

  Trestain Manor—two years later

  ‘ “It was with some interest that we attended the exhibition of paintings which is currently being displayed at the town house of a certain celebrated member of the ton.”’ Sir Charles looked over the newspaper at his wife. ‘Well, we all know who that is a reference to. I wonder how Jack managed to persuade him?’

  Lady Eleanor finished pouring the tea. ‘My love, when I think of the amount of money Jack has persuaded the great and the good to part with for this enterprise of his, convincing his lordship to hang Celeste’s pictures in his salon would have been an simple matter.’

  Sir Charles laughed indulgently. ‘Very true. Though I confess, they are not the sort of pictures I’d want hanging in my salon. I much prefer those landscapes she used to paint. Very pretty, they were,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, one could think of many words to describe her recent works, but pretty would not be one which springs to mind,’ Eleanor said with a shudder. ‘Those portraits which she made of the Waterloo veterans, for example. Why must she choose the— Well, frankly, Charles, the shabbiest and the most pathetic of men. As I recall, one had no legs, and another— His face. I could not get the image of that poor man’s face out of my mind for days.’

  ‘Which was rather the point, don’t you think?’ her husband said drily. ‘That particular set of paintings was, I gather from Jack, almost solely responsible for raising the funding needed to establish the hospital in Manchester.’

  ‘Jack would say that. I have never seen a man so besottedly in love. Or so proud of his—his wife.’ Lady Eleanor put down her tea cup. ‘You know, it is such a relief to finally be able to address Celeste as Mrs Trestain. I don’t know why it took them so long to get married.’

  ‘There was the small matter of her origins, though I believe that dear Celeste was rather more concerned about that than Jack.’

  ‘She is the daughter of an English lady and a French count. Such a romantic story. It is a pity they were not married, but look at the FitzClarences. Being base-born never did them any harm.’

  Sir Charles patted his wife’s hand. ‘Would that everyone saw it your way, my dear, but Celeste’s French family will not even acknowledge her.’

  ‘Well, her English family are very happy to own her. Now that she is finally Jack’s wife, of course. Do read me the rest of that piece, my dear.’

  Sir Charles cleared his throat. ‘“The portraits are painted by Mademoiselle Celeste Marmion, who has, we understand, lately taken on the name of Mr Jack Trestain, formerly Lieutenant-Colonel Trestain, known to many of us as the Duke of Wellington’s renowned code-breaker.” Wellington will not like that. He has made it very publicly known what he thinks of Jack’s fund-raising.’

  ‘To his detriment. I never thought I would say this of the man who saved England, but I think his attitude towards those poor men who fought for him, indeed laid down their lives for him, is shameful.’

  ‘Absolutely. It is enough to make one consider turning Whig,’ Sir Charles said. He waited for his wife to laugh at his joke and, slightly unnerved when she didn’t oblige, once more returned to the newspaper. ‘“Contrary to what we have come to expect of Mademoiselle Marmion’s work, this latest selection of paintings is bucolic, a mixture of landscapes and portraits, all of which were made in the north of Spain. The funds which Mr Trestain hopes to raise from the sale of the paintings are to be directed towards one village, in recognition of the support which the Spanish peasants gave the British army in the latter years of our war with France.”’

  ‘It is rather an odd thing to do, is it not?’ Lady Eleanor
asked, frowning. ‘Why this particular village?’

  ‘I am sure it is merely a case of it being representative,’ Sir Charles replied, folding up the newspaper. ‘Symbolic, don’t you know. Shall we take a trip up to town next week? We can take a look at Celeste’s latest exhibition, and we can have dinner with the pair of them. Jack is in fine form and excellent company these days. He is quite restored.’

  ‘I like to think that we played some small part in his recuperation.’

  ‘I rather think Celeste must take the lion’s share of the credit for that. And Jack himself. I must say I’m immensely proud of what he’s achieved, even if it is considered beyond the pale by some of my acquaintances.’

  ‘One can only hope that marriage has moderated their billing and cooing. I was positively embarrassed, the last time we met.’

  ‘My love.’ Sir Charles got up from his seat and kissed the nape of his wife’s neck. ‘Nurse has taken Robert and Donal and the baby out for a picnic. I was rather hoping that we could indulge in some billing and cooing ourselves.’

  ‘Charles!’ Lady Eleanor exclaimed, looking shocked.

  He pulled her to her feet and kissed her.

  ‘Oh, Charles,’ Lady Eleanor said in a very different voice as she allowed him to take her hand and lead her out of the breakfast room.

  * * * * *

  Historical Note

  The first thing to say is there’s a fair bit of history in this book. Thank you so much to the other Harlequin Historical authors who shared research recommendations and helped me out with references to what we now refer to as post-traumatic stress disorder. In particular, thanks to Louise Allen for sharing her amazing research catalogue and for the insights from Dr Martin Howard’s book, Wellington’s Doctors.

  Four books in particular were of immense help in the gestation of this story—and all four are now looking as dog-eared and exhausted as I feel, having written it!

  Christopher Hibbert’s The French Revolution is an excellent all-encompassing account of the Revolution from its early days right through the Terror until Napoleon stepped in. It gives a real sense of what it must have been like in the last days of the Terror, when Celeste’s mother was hiding in Paris and, as Madame Rosser attests, arrests became quite indiscriminate. The case she mentions of a woman guillotined for grieving too openly for her husband is a true one.

  Richard Holmes’s Redcoat tells the story of the British army from an ordinary soldier’s point of view. It’s stuffed full of fantastic anecdotes, including stories about interminable mess dinners and endless toasts, which mirror the dinner Jack and Celeste attend. Finlay, of whom we shall see much more in the next book in this miniseries, came to life as a direct result of my reading in Redcoat that almost no enlisted men made it up through the ranks of Wellington’s army. Who could resist a man who beats the odds—and the ingrained snobbery too?

  If you only read one book about Waterloo I’d highly recommend choosing Nick Foulkes’s Dancing into Battle. This is not a blow-by-blow account of the battle itself, but of the men who fought it, their wives and children, and the gossipmongers who watched from the sidelines. It’s irreverent, funny and, unlike many historical tomes, a very easy read.

  Lady Richmond’s famous ball, which is mentioned in this book, gets the full treatment here, as does the Duke of Wellington’s relationship with the fatally attractive though apparently quite empty-headed Lady Wedderburn Webster, which so enthrals my Lady Eleanor.

  The story of the French spy who passed himself off as one of Lord Uxbridge’s men also originates from here.

  And then there’s my favourite example of the British stiff upper lip: when Lord Uxbridge was wounded, he said to Wellington, ‘By God, sir, I’ve lost my leg.’

  ‘By God, sir, so you have,’ the Duke replied.

  George Scovell, an engraver’s apprentice, was Wellington’s real code-breaker, and if you want to know more about him try Mark Urban’s book The Man Who Broke Napoleon’s Codes. As to Jack’s dark secret—though the setting and timing, near Burgos in 1813, is historically accurate, the event itself is an invention wholly of my own. In fact it owes rather more to the Vietnam War than the Peninsular one, when the Vietcong used innocent villagers as shields, as may or may not have happened, in Jack’s story.

  A lot of reading and research, but luckily I have another book to write on the same subject. Finlay’s story is next. Though how that will turn out at this moment in time I have absolutely no idea!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from A DEBT PAID IN MARRIAGE by Georgie Lee.

  We hope you enjoyed this Harlequin Historical.

  You dream of wicked rakes, gorgeous Highlanders, muscled Viking warriors and rugged Wild West cowboys from another era. Harlequin Historical has them all! Emotionally intense stories set across many time periods.

  Enjoy six new stories from Harlequin Historical every month!

  Connect with us on Harlequin.com for info on our new releases, access to exclusive offers, free online reads and much more!

  Other ways to keep in touch:

  Harlequin.com/newsletters

  Facebook.com/HarlequinBooks

  Twitter.com/HarlequinBooks

  HarlequinBlog.com

  http://www.harlequin.com/harlequinexperience

  Chapter One

  London—spring 1817

  ‘What exactly do you think you are doing?’ Mr Rathbone demanded, his deep-blue eyes fixing on her through the wisps of steam rising from the copper bathtub. Dark-brown hair lay damp over his forehead. One drop escaped the thickness of it, sliding down his face, then tracing the edge of his jaw before dropping into the tub.

  Laura slid her finger away from the trigger, afraid of accidentally sending a ball through the moneylender’s sturdy, wet and very bare torso. She had no intention of killing him, only frightening him into giving back the inventory he’d seized from her uncle Robert. Judging by the hard eyes he fixed on her, he wasn’t a man to scare easily.

  ‘Well?’ he demanded and she jumped, her nerves as taut as the fabric over the back of a chair.

  When she’d slipped into the house determined to face him, she’d expected to find him hunched over his desk counting piles of coins or whatever else it was a moneylender did at night. She hadn’t expected to surprise him in his bath with a film of soapy water the only thing standing between her and his modesty. What had seemed like a good plan in the pathetic rooms she shared with her uncle and her mother, when hunger gnawed at her stomach and cold crept in through the broken window, now seemed horrible.

  Laura settled her shoulders, shoring up the courage faltering under his steady stare. Beyond this humid room was nothing but ruin and poverty. She had no choice but to continue. ‘I demand you return to me the fabric you seized from my uncle.’

  The moneylender raised his arms out of the water, disturbing the calm suds, and she caught sight of his flat stomach before the soapy water settled back over it. His hands rested on the curved sides of the tub. They were long but sturdy, like those of the delivery men who used to haul the bolts of cloth off the cart and into her father’s draper shop. Mr Rathbone’s were smooth and free of calluses, however, and, except for the red of an old cut snaking along one knuckle, the hands of a gentleman.

  She took a step back, expecting him to rise from the water and rush at her. He did nothing except study her, as though appraising her market value. ‘And who exactly is your uncle?’

  Laura swallowed hard. Yes, this was important information to impart if one was to make demands of a naked man. ‘Robert Townsend.’

  ‘The gambling draper.’ Neither shock nor surprise broke his piercing stare. ‘He came to me six months ago in need of a loan to pay a large debt accrued at Mrs Topp’s, among many other establishments. In return for my money, he put up the inventory of the draper business as collate
ral. When he defaulted, I seized the goods, as was my right pursuant to our contract.’

  The floor shifted beneath her. Uncle Robert had lost the business. In the past, he’d stolen merchandise from the storeroom, a bolt of silk or a cord of tassel, and sold it to fund his gambling. They were losses to the business, but not the whole business.

  It couldn’t be gone, not after everything she’d done to hold on to it after her father’s death.

  Anger overcame her shock and she gripped Uncle Robert’s old pistol tighter, her sweating palms making the wood handle stick to her skin. ‘I don’t believe you. I know how men of your ilk operate, taking advantage of desperate people with high interest rates until they have no choice but to turn everything they own over to your grasping hands.’

  Mr Rathbone’s eyes narrowed a touch. What the gun and the element of surprise had failed to do, her smear of his character managed to achieve—a reaction.

  ‘If it’s proof you require, I’m most happy to oblige.’ He pushed up against the edge of the tub and rose.

  ‘Sir!’ Laura gasped and shuffled back until the edge of a table caught her hip. She clutched the pistol tighter, unable to tear her eyes away as fat drops poured down his slender body, catching in the ripples of his stomach before falling into the sloshing water of the tub. The drops were not thick enough to offer any semblance of modesty and she struggled to keep her gaze from wandering from his handsome face to the long length of chest, stomach and everything else beneath. Her heart pounded harder than when she’d crept into the house through the open terrace door, then pressed herself deep into the shadows of an alcove beneath the stairs when a maid had passed by.

  He lifted one long leg, then the other over the copper tub and stepped dripping on to the small towel on the floor next to it. Over a nearby chair lay a brown banyan of fine silk—French, she guessed, by the subtle pattern in the weave. She expected him to take it up and pull it on over the long expanse of him, but he didn’t. Instead he strode past her, through the wide double doors adjoining the dressing-and-bathing room to his bedroom without so much as a second look, as though she were not standing there threatening his life and he was not stark naked and leaving a trail of wet footprints on the wood floor. He headed to the small desk in the opposite corner of the bedroom, near the windows and across from the tall, four-poster bed hung with expensive embroidered curtains. Behind the desk, he opened one of the drawers. Neither the neat stack of papers on top nor the oil lamp on the corner did anything to prevent her from seeing him as Eve must have seen Adam after they’d tasted the apple. Laura could feel her own judgement coming. What she wouldn’t give for a lightning bolt from above, or at the very least a large fig leaf.