DAGGER
While Maelle went to meet her mother, I let myself out through the courtyard and walked into the vines.
The excuse I’d given her was that I needed air. The truth was I wanted to be alone, somewhere I could think without anyone witnessing me sorting through emotions that I’d never experienced before.
When I’d told her I’d take away all her pain if I could, I meant it.
I knew she was strong. Witnessing how she’d handled herself after the bombing proved it to me.
She’d been buried under rubble, yet she’d had the presence of mind to find a way to make enough noise for someone to find her, to know she was alive.
That in itself was remarkable. But now, seeing her family dynamic, I realized Maelle had overcome adversity her whole life.
My parents had supported my sister and me no matter what harebrained idea we came up with. When we were teenagers, there had been plenty. Me wanting to open a motorcycle shop had been the least of them.
The summer Alena decided she was a fortune teller, our mum sewed the costume without asking a single question and I spent a week listening outside the tea shop so she’d have material.
The year we built a raft out of pallets and sold tickets for the maiden voyage, it sank in four feet of canal water while our dad stood on the bank, laughing too hard to help.
Meanwhile, Maelle had had none of that. Her father considered her gender too much of a handicap to her doing work she would’ve been brilliant at. Her mother struck me as strong, but not enough to stand up to Bertrand.
So what had mon feu done? She’d charted her own course, leaving home at eighteen to pursue dreams that were all her own.
She’d risen through the ranks of DGSE without much guidance.
When she landed at Minerva, she was surrounded by both men and women who served as mentors to her. That was where she really thrived.
I’d had nothing to do with her success, yet I was proud of her anyway. So very proud.
Now, if our suspicions were correct, her father would face criminal charges. Worse was his connection to Géraud if what we believed about him proved true. Yet she didn’t hesitate. More than once, she’d said she wouldn’t protect her father by hiding anything she learned.
When I went to work for MI6 and later Unit 23, I’d vowed to protect the Crown from any danger, any enemy. No such vow was required for Minerva Protocol. I gave it anyway.
So here she was, faced with the one thing that might make some waver in their loyalty. Not Maelle. I believed with all my heart that if it were anyone else in her family, she’d do the same thing. Truth and justice drove her. Period.
When I heard footsteps on the gravel at the end of the row, I knew they belonged to Maelle. She walked along the vines with her collar up and her arms wrapped around her waist. I knew the tell. Whatever had happened with her mother showed.
I moved over on the low stone wall where I sat. She sat beside me, close enough that our shoulders touched.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked after several seconds of silence.
“She knows I’m lying,” she said. “Only not what about. She accused me of thinking she’d no longer be alive in May.”
“And is she wrong?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Good. She’ll need you to believe she’ll get better in order to fight the cancer.”
“What she sees is my pain. I lie to strangers for a living and sleep fine. My mother doesn’t feel the lies. She feels me. She knows something is wrong. I’m good enough to fool her and not good enough to spare her, and I don’t know which one makes me worse.”
“Neither,” I said. “If that’s your failure, I hope you never fix it.”
Whether it was only our mood or that of the rest of the family too, I couldn’t say. But dinner was far more subdued tonight. Chantal appeared tired, Bertrand disinterested, and Rémy distracted.
“Forgive my reticence,” Rémy said, halfway through the meal. “This time of year is especially busy.”
“Then, you deserve an extra pour of wine tonight,” Chantal told him. He lifted his glass to her before he drank.
The coq au vin was arguably the best I’d ever tasted, yet I finished what I’d been served without asking for seconds.
The only person who showed any emotion at all was Marthe, who was clearly irritated by our lack of praise for her special dish.
We said good night without waiting for dessert and silently made our way upstairs. When we reached the bedroom, Maelle gathered her things, saying she wanted to take a bath.
While she did, I messaged Blackjack. New development re: financials. Will brief tomorrow.
He answered in under a minute. Copy.
By the time Maelle came to bed, the pillow was in place between us.
She switched off the lamp, and for a minute, neither of us spoke.
“Killian?” she said first.
“Yes?”
“I slept better last night than I have in a year.”
I had the pillow out from between us before she finished the sentence. She backed against my chest like she’d done it a hundred times, and I wrapped my arm around her waist.
She was quiet for long enough that I figured she was nearly asleep. Then she spoke again.
“There’s a Christmas market in Dijon. It’s in the squares around the old market halls.”
“Is there?”
“When I was small, we went every year. Maman, Papa, Marthe, and me.”
“What was it like?”
“Magical. The squares were filled with small wooden chalets, with lights strung between them. There was a carousel, and Maman let me ride until I was dizzy. We ate chestnuts out of paper cones, the adults drank vin chaud—hot spiced wine—and the bakery sold nonnettes, little iced gingerbread cakes, in tins. My mother would choose a santon—a small painted clay figure for Valais’ nativity scene.
She taught me one never buys a crèche whole.
It’s built, one figure a year, for a lifetime. ”
“What else, mon feu?”
I couldn’t see her face, but I still knew she smiled.
“We’d walk around together for a while, then everyone would separate to buy gifts. Marthe would go with me, and I’d get to pick one present each for my mother and father.”
“How old were you when it stopped?”
“I don’t remember. One year, we didn’t go, and then it became something we used to do.”
She turned under my arm so she was facing me in the dark.
“I want to go tomorrow. All of us. What do you think?”
“It sounds wonderful. Rémy can drive your parents and Marthe, and we’ll go on our own.”
“I hope Marthe will say yes and not use Le Réveillon as an excuse.”
“First, tell her she must go so she can help you choose your mother’s gift. Second, what is Le Réveillon?”
“It’s the French Christmas Eve tradition.
The word comes from réveil—waking—because the point is to stay up half the night.
Here, it begins in the afternoon, in the cuverie.
Every family who works for Valais comes, and there are long tables full of food that Marthe and her helpers have been preparing throughout the week. ”
“Tables full of Marthe’s food? I’m excited already.”
“That isn’t all. As soon as it’s dark, my father dresses up as Père Noel—Father Christmas—and distributes gifts to all the children.”
“Only for the children?” I asked.
“Their parents are given bonuses earlier in December.”
I couldn’t picture it, but it would be fun to see Bertrand dressed up and handing out gifts.
“By ten or so, the workers leave for their own family celebrations. After that, we go to the midnight mass in the village. When we return home, our réveillon begins. Marthe serves the first course, then she sits with us. It’s the only night of the year when she’ll accept a place at the table.”
“So, there’s more eating?”
“Of course!” She laughed. “There are oysters, foie gras, escargots, and roast capon. Dessert is la b?che de Noel, the yule log cake. We eat until three and sleep until noon.”
“It sounds brilliant. I can’t wait. Truly.”
“Thank you, Killian,” she whispered. More and more, she used my given name instead of my code name, and I loved it.
“It’s me who should be thanking you, Maelle.”
“You’re welcome.” She turned in my arms, facing away from me, and I wrapped my arm around her like I had earlier.
“Bonne nuit,” she said, as if a wall other than the pillow hadn’t come down.
I lay in the dark, grinning like an idiot. There was no intimacy, and there wouldn’t be, yet it was already the best night I’d spent here.
The next afternoon, we left Valais ahead of the others. We’d told everyone we had presents to buy for each other, which was true. The part we didn’t mention was the briefing we had scheduled with the team at Onteora.
Maelle drove, taking the curves above the village without touching the brakes.
We were almost there when my mobile rang with a call from Blackjack.
“You’re on with me, Beacon, Hornet, and Delfino,” he said. “I got your message. Go ahead.”
Maelle told them what we’d found, that while the domaine’s other distributors paid the typical discount of sixty percent of retail, Fontenay paid eighty.
“We believe my father is laundering money through the estate,” she said.
“We can’t prove it yet. Until we find how the money goes back out, all we have is a customer who overpays. ”
“Hornet, what have you found on Fontenay?” Blackjack asked.
“The ownership’s hidden, which, as you already know, Swiss law allows,” he responded. “There are other ways to get it, but I’ll need more time. Give me until after the holidays.”
“Which brings up my next point,” said Beacon. “We’re on official leave until after the beginning of the year. That includes the two of you. If you want to keep digging, that’s up to you. If you don’t, that’s okay too.”
“Enjoy the holidays,” said Blackjack. “We’ll talk on the second of January.”
The call ended, but Maelle didn’t say anything more until we arrived in Dijon and parked the car. “Are you going to ask if I’m all right?”
“I hadn’t planned on it. However, I was going to ask what I should get for Marthe.”
She laughed even though I could tell she was trying not to. “You’re buying a gift for Marthe?”
“I’m buying a gift for everyone. That’s the custom, isn’t it? Now, answer the question, and bear in mind my life may depend on it.”
“Wool socks. Gray, like her dresses. Nothing bright, nothing expensive. If it costs too much, she’ll return it.”
“Understood. And your father?”
Her smile faded, but only for a second. “Papa is easy. Choose anything, so long as you tell him it reminded you of him.”
We had two hours before the family arrived and one rule between us—nothing either of us bought could be seen by the other. She headed one way, and I went the other.
I found the perfect thing at a shop on the edge of the old town. The storefront was narrow, and inside, a workbench sat behind a counter that looked as old as France.
I’d known what I wanted to get for Maelle since the afternoon when Chantal told me about a thirteen-year-old girl who’d carried a pruning knife into the vines. It was a knife made for a man’s hands, she’d said.
Inside, the maker showed me what he had. I held up my own hand and measured hers against it from memory, and he asked if the piece was for my wife.
“My fiancée,” I responded. The word came out so easily it stunned me. When had it stopped feeling like a lie?
He promised it for tomorrow morning.
Maelle was waiting at the fountain, with a wrapped bottle. She didn’t say what it was, and I didn’t ask. When she looked at my empty hands, I shrugged. If she could have secrets, so could I.
The others arrived later that afternoon.
“We’ll go in pairs,” Chantal announced. “One hour.” She held up a piece of paper. “I have distributed lists with who each team should buy gifts for.”
Before we split up, Bertrand bought chestnuts in paper cones for everyone and made a show of handing them out.
“Maelle never once waited for them to cool. One day, Rourke, you will hand these to my grandchildren, and they will not wait either.”
Bertrand walked off to charm a group of women shoppers, leaving me thunderstruck.
When he’d said the word “grandchildren,” a picture formed in my head. I envisioned Maelle at this market, with our child asleep against her shoulder and her belly round with the next one.
I’d never wanted children. I’d never let myself want anything or anyone I couldn’t walk away from. Now, I wanted all of it, and I wanted it with her.
The engagement was a cover. What I’d imagined wasn’t.
A few minutes later, Maelle went off through the stalls with Marthe, and Chantal wrapped her arm through mine.
While we wandered, I scanned the market for mon feu. More than anything, I wanted to be sure she was having fun. “You’re not looking at the merchandise, Monsieur Rourke. You’re looking for my daughter.”
“Guilty.”
“Bien. Then, I’ve chosen the right partner.”
After we finished purchasing presents for those on our list, we met up for vin chaud that we drank out of souvenir holiday mugs.
Rémy appeared at my shoulder, carrying bags that held his gift purchases.
“Two pieces of advice for tomorrow,” he said. “Praise the escargots before anyone asks, and never refuse a course. Marthe remembers a refusal longer than the church remembers a sin.”
“Noted. Anything else?”
“Oui.” He glanced over at Maelle and her mother, who were head-to-head, laughing.
When he spoke again, the teasing was gone from his voice.
“It’s good to see her like this. Her sense of humor had waned in the last years before she left.
You’re good for her, Rourke. It matters to me that someone finally is. ”
“She’s good for me too,” I said, meaning it.
He tapped his mug against mine. “Joyeux Noel.”
No Christmas had felt like this one since before my parents died. Most years, I was on a mission, pretending to be someone I wasn’t, with no one to buy gifts for. Technically, I was pretending to be someone else now too.
However, watching Maelle with her mother and Marthe, telling stories I couldn’t understand but knew enough about just by the happy looks on their faces, all I could think was how I never wanted this particular mission to end.
It was nearly dark when Chantal took my arm again on the way to the cars.
“Thank you for today,” she said.
“It was Maelle’s doing.”
“It was yours too. You’ve made my daughter smile and laugh again. Not many people can do that.” She stopped and looked up at me. “I know there’s something troubling both of you. I only hope you can set aside whatever it is and enjoy this time with us.”
“We will,” I promised, meaning it.
She patted my arm and let Rémy lead her to their car.
Two days, and then, if our theories proved correct, Maelle and I would rip her family apart. The lies she was having a harder and harder time telling were doing the same to me.