Shadows In Paris (Seagrove & Raven #2)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

L ondon, January 1941

Lizzie Beaumont burrowed her hands deep into the pockets of her winter coat as the icy winds swirled around her and she made her way towards the Special Operations Executive HQ on Baker Street.

‘Cold enough for you, miss?’ asked the rosy-cheeked door attendant as she passed him and entered the building.

‘It certainly is.’ Lizzie flashed him a smile as she unbuttoned her coat and slipped it off her shoulders to reveal her new khaki uniform.

Val, Lizzie’s mentor, had surprised her the previous evening with the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry uniform. ‘Now you’re an official FANY, you’d better start dressing like one.’

The sight of the pressed uniform draped over her chair had startled Lizzie. ‘I thought the FANY rank was only for cover. I didn’t realise I’d need a uniform like a real soldier. ’

Val looked amused. ‘It is for cover. Go and change. Let’s see you in all your glory.’

Lizzie ran her fingers down the starched material of her jacket and straightened her tie. The expression on her mother’s face the previous evening when she arrived back at the house in Regent’s Park wearing her new uniform was priceless.

‘What the dickens?’ Rose said, her mouth falling open in surprise.

The uniform had a similar effect on her father and sisters, and they teased her again relentlessly at breakfast.

Val looked up from her desk when Lizzie knocked and entered her office.

‘Good morning. It really suits you,’ she said, her warm smile reaching her eyes.

Lizzie knew she was lucky to have Val as her mentor and had grown very fond of her since she’d been assigned as her assistant.

‘Thank you. Where do you want me today?’

‘Jack will run through your coding and radio operation training with you.’

Lizzie tried to suppress it, but her face flushed slightly at the mention of her commanding officer, Jack King. Val turned her attention back to the papers on her desk and Lizzie hoped she hadn’t noticed her young assistant’s hot cheeks. Even after months of working closely with Jack, she still found it difficult to act as though there was nothing intimate between them. Fortunately, Val and the others in the secret organisation set up the previous year to wreak chaos in Nazi-occupied territories, seemed to have no inkling they were involved. Jack said they were all far too busy juggling their workload and dodging Blitz bombs to notice what was going on right under their noses.

‘Right, that’s good. No matter how much they drilled the coding into my head at Bletchley Park, I’m still not sure I fully grasped it. Do you know where I’m to meet him?’ Lizzie asked.

Val nodded as she sharpened her pencil. ‘Yes, he said he’d be waiting for you in the new cipher room.’

With that, Lizzie was dismissed and hurried out of Val’s office, the chill of winter already forgotten.

Jack stood behind his desk when she entered the room, and she saw the appreciation on his face as he cast his dark eyes over her.

He let out a long, low whistle. ‘Well, well, just look at you. You’re a sight for sore eyes, Seagrove!’

Lizzie closed the door swiftly behind her, twirled around, and gave a quick bow.

Jack beckoned her to come closer as he moved from behind the desk, his arms reaching towards her. He was tall and well-built, and he towered over her as he enveloped her in his warm embrace. She tilted her chin upwards. His lips brushed hers, and she tingled from head to toe. He could still do that to her with a mere touch.

‘Now we’re both in uniform,’ she said from within the safety of his arms, peering into his amused face. ‘You look so dashing in yours, I bet the girls are swooning all the way down Baker Street when you go out.’

Jack laughed. ‘I wear my overcoat in this weather, and I can assure you there’s been no swooning.’

Lizzie touched his face and ran her fingers over his angular cheekbone. ‘You look so handsome, I find that hard to believe, Captain King.’

Upon the successful completion of their mission in Reims the previous year, he had been officially promoted to captain and now wore his uniform to deflect questions about the nature of his covert work.

Jack pulled out a chair for Lizzie and she sat down. Then he poured her some coffee just how she liked it, and he joined her at the desk. Their knees touched as he pulled a sheaf of papers out of a nearby file.

‘How was Bletchley?’ he asked, his eyes searching hers. ‘We haven’t had a chance to talk about it.’

‘I got through it alright. I think. It was hard, though. I’m no maths boffin and the coding is complex.’

Jack nodded. ‘You’ll get the hang of it. It’s only normal, you’ll find it difficult at first. Remember, the finest minds in Britain devise these codes and work at Bletchley Park.’

Lizzie poked him lightly in the ribs.

‘Ouch, what was that for?’ he said, his deep voice playful.

‘Is that supposed to make me feel less out of my depth?’ Lizzie asked, a half-smile on her face.

‘Oh, I see. Well, no, I suppose not, but being out of your depth is what this job is all about. If it’s not complex, we will lose the war.’

‘True, I’ve been over my head from the very beginning when you said I wasn’t equipped for this kind of work.’

‘Let’s not get into all that again,’ Jack smiled, and raised one dark eyebrow. ‘I’ve apologised a thousand times about being such a clod back then, haven’t I?’

Lizzie placed her hand on his. ‘You have, darling. I just find it such fun to tease you about it.’

There was a sharp rap at the door, and Lizzie withdrew her hand. They pulled apart, ever alert at the prospect of being caught out.

Lizzie lived on a knife’s edge with her espionage work and secret relationship. But the thought of a life without Jack was unbearable.

Occasionally she tried to remember what it was like to be a normal young woman in her old Jersey life. She had no secrets then, and life had been simple and sweet. Until the War Office summoned her father to London on the outbreak of war. Lizzie, her mother and siblings had only just been evacuated from Jersey in time before the Germans bombed and invaded the defenceless Channel Islands. Her grandparents were still there, living under Nazi occupation. The thought made her shudder, and she pushed it fiercely from her mind as Val approached, her expression sombre.

‘I’ve just had a message from Hannah.’

Lizzie and Jack both stared at Val, waiting to hear the latest news of the daring Jewish Resistance leader of the Liberty Network in Paris.

‘Tell us,’ Jack said.

Lizzie’s pulse raced as she waited, the tension thick in the air.

‘Hannah reports success with blowing up the latest railway targets.’

Lizzie sensed as much as she heard the ragged sigh Jack released. Hannah was his agent, and he felt responsible for her. He was always unsettled until they had an update, and updates were few and far between.

Sending messages to England via radio from Paris was a dangerous business. Hannah risked being intercepted by the Germans, and that would spell disaster for the budding network.

Val said, ‘I spoke to the boss, and we’ve agreed it’s time for Hannah to have more support from us. At the very least, she needs a backup operator. The network has been causing significant destruction to the German transport system and it would be a shame to have to lessen operations now.’

Jack lit a cigarette and pushed his floppy black hair off his forehead with an impatient movement. ‘I don’t follow. Why would they need to lessen operations?’

‘Good question. What we didn’t know until just now is that Hannah has managed to infiltrate the German High Command. She says she can’t run the Liberty Network at the same level she’s been doing, as well as be present in her new role.’

‘What’s her new role, exactly?’ Jack asked, his voice dangerously low after a long pause.

‘She’s been assigned the position of personal secretary to a high-ranking Nazi officer at their headquarters in the heart of Paris.’

Jack crushed his cigarette in the ashtray and cursed, shaking his head. ‘That woman must have a bloody death wish.’

Val studied Jack in silence as they ran the implications of the daring scenario through their minds. Eventually, she said, ‘Hannah may well have a death wish, but you can’t deny it’s a tremendous opportunity.’

‘What does it mean for us?’ Lizzie asked, swallowing hard.

Jack cleared his throat. ‘It means she has somehow insinuated herself into a role so she can presumably gain access to intelligence about their latest German operations.’

‘She’s fearless,’ Lizzie whispered in awe.

‘Fearless or stupid,’ Jack snapped. ‘I can never quite decide which.’

‘Fearless,’ Lizzie echoed, increasingly bewitched by the tales of the Resistance leader who ran circles round the Nazis in plain sight.

‘Fearless is all very well, but who is going in as the backup operator?’ Jack asked, his voice cold, as if he dreaded the inevitable answer.

Val’s gaze switched immediately to Lizzie.

‘Oh no,’ Jack hissed. ‘If anyone’s going into that snake pit, it should be me or someone more experienced than Lizzie. Reims was one thing; Paris is quite another.’

‘You know that’s not going to happen, Jack,’ Val said. ‘We need you here at the centre of things. Besides, we have too many operational irons in the fire for you to be caught by the Gestapo. We can’t risk it—you know far too much to be strolling around occupied Paris now.’

Jack released a measured sigh. ‘Lizzie isn’t ready to run the Liberty Network. You said yourself she needs time to practice after the Bletchley training.’

Lizzie sat in silence, watching them talk over her head, her heart hammering as she waited to hear her fate.

‘Then you’d better get her ready,’ Val said, turning briskly and leaving the room before Jack could say another word.

The door closed with a thud and Lizzie and Jack stared at each other, both realising the dreadful day was fast approaching when they would be parted again.

If Val said Lizzie was going to Paris, it was only a matter of time until she went.