Chapter Twenty-Nine
He’d worried about what his mother thought of him while she was still living.
He sometimes still wondered what her evaluation would be and if she would approve of the man he’d become.
Céleste was the only other woman he’d ever felt that concern over.
The same general idea, yet it felt entirely different.
Claude and his mother had sent them on their way with a basket of food and a repaired wagon wheel, but with the warning that the repair would likely not last terribly long.
Claude felt it would get them to Le Tréport—the Three Sisters port town they were aiming for—but it was a very good thing they weren’t going beyond.
The sky overhead had grown particularly leaden.
The clouds seemed ready to burst at any moment.
Céleste sat close to him on the bench, near enough that the ruts and juts in the road would bump her into him.
She was wrapped in a blanket, but the brief moments of touching still felt very personal, very . . . cozy.
As long as he lived, Aldric would never forget the look on Céleste’s face when she’d glanced up from her vegetables and seen him carrying a hefty load of firewood across a field.
Hers had been the look of a woman who very much liked what she saw and was inarguably impressed.
It was, no doubt, his pride and a touch of embarrassing arrogance that had made him enjoy that as much as he had.
Gentlemen of Society were encouraged to be active and athletic, applauded for polishing their skills in boxing and sword fighting and horsemanship, among other things that helped them maintain as much physical prowess as possible.
Yet they were so constantly dressed in endless layers of clothing.
No one except those at the private boxing salons and sword-fighting tutorages had the least idea of the athletic build any gentleman might or might not have.
He didn’t particularly wish for that to change—it would be utter chaos if men were encouraged to arrive at balls dressed for a bout of fisticuffs—but a man could very much grow used to a lady unabashedly admiring the glimpse she had.
Not just any lady, though, but the only lady he truly wished to impress in that way, the lady whose opinion of him mattered in a way no one else’s did.
Adèle was in the back of the wagon, sitting atop a blanket spread out over the hay, playing with her carved animals.
There was room enough on the bench for a gap between him and Céleste.
She was choosing this closeness. She’d also chosen to cross the farmer’s field to where he’d been.
And to melt into his embrace. And to let him kiss her.
He still didn’t know if he was more annoyed that they’d had an audience or more relieved. Without Claude’s mother watching the entire thing, he would have simply gone on kissing Céleste. And while he would have thoroughly enjoyed doing so, it would have made keeping his head incredibly difficult.
They’d made a promise not to worry about the complications of the future until they were safely at Norwood, but he couldn’t entirely keep from his mind the realization that, at some point, they wouldn’t be together anymore.
She would sort out what she meant to do with her life and her situation, and she would move on.
This odd chapter in their lives would be closed.
As they rolled along, he glanced at her. She had in her hand the note they’d found in Adèle’s book. She’d spent a lot of this leg of their journey looking at it.
“Disconcerting, isn’t it?” he said. “Whoever wrote this was close enough to put it in the book.”
“And he is someone different from the man we ran from last night.” She didn’t look up from the note. “The man last night said he’d been sent by someone else. The one who wrote this note is the one being extorted. Two different people.”
“And yet we can’t identify either of them. We can’t even say where they are.”
“I don’t understand the game that’s being played,” she said. “But that’s how it feels: like we’re being toyed with.”
He felt that too, and he didn’t like it at all.
“I know this handwriting. I’ve seen it before, but I can’t place it.”
Tension tiptoed over him. “The handwriting is familiar?”
She nodded. “Familiar enough to know I’ve seen it but not enough for me to remember where. The capital letter I has extra swirls. I know I’ve seen that. I know I have.”
He kept his eyes on both the road and the sky overhead. “It has to be someone fairly well-known to you then. Someone who’s written a letter to you or to Jean-Francois that you’ve seen.”
“You saw the letters that were sent to his house,” Céleste said. “This isn’t the same handwriting, yet it contains the same threats.”
That was true. The same threats and likely motivated by the extortion scheme that involved more than one victim.
“You don’t suppose there are three people coming after us, do you?” she asked.
Lud. How were they to thwart three people they couldn’t identify?
“Only a few more days and we’ll be in Le Tréport,” he said. “Another day will see us across the Channel, and then we’ll be in England and on our way to Norwood. We’ll be safe there.”
She folded the paper again and slipped it inside her caraco jacket. “I am—”
In that exact moment, the heavens burst open, and rain began to fall heavily. In the back of the wagon, Adèle squealed, clearly not liking the soaking they were suddenly getting.
Fortunately, there was what appeared to be an abandoned barn just off the side of the road. He’d been watching it for a little while, wondering if they ought to stop there. He didn’t need to wonder any longer.
He guided them in that direction. The stone building was still standing, but where the enormous barn doors would have been was simply an open, gaping hole.
He drove the wagon directly in, horse and all.
The roof overhead was still intact with only the tiniest gaps here and there.
Aldric found a section of it where no water appeared to be leaking and pulled the wagon to a stop.
They hopped out quickly and set to work.
The blanket in the back that had been spread over the wagon bed was quite wet.
They’d be short a blanket that night if it didn’t dry sufficiently.
And Adèle was dripping wet, as was Céleste, she having given up her cloak the very first day of this frantic flight from danger.
Aldric pulled off his coat and wrapped it around her.
“Thank you,” she said.
The remaining blankets had been under the wagon bench, protected from the rain. He opened their traveling bag and pulled out Adèle’s nightdress. The poor thing had started to shiver.
He hunched down so he could talk more directly to her. “Your tante will help you change from your wet clothes. Then we will wrap you in one of the dry blankets. You’ll be warm again in a trice, ma petite douce.”
She smiled at him and captured his heart ever further.
It was the same almost hopeless tug of his heart that he felt with Roderick: wanting to keep these children near, to just love them the way they deserved to be loved, knowing they both had parents who didn’t offer them that.
But they weren’t his children, and that kept him at a distance.
Céleste saw to Adèle while Aldric flicked out the wet blanket and laid it across the wagon bench and over the front of the wagon. If they were fortunate, it would dry quickly.
He unhitched the horse. There was still a decent amount of hay left in the back of the wagon, plenty enough to provide for the horse while still making their makeshift accommodations less uncomfortable.
And the wet blanket meant the hay itself had stayed dry in the rain.
Aldric pulled an armful of hay out of the wagon bed and placed it in a dry corner of the abandoned barn.
The horse moved directly to it and began eating.
Aldric tied the lead, still attached to the horse’s bridle, to an outcropping of the wall.
There was slack enough for the horse to move about, but the mare wouldn’t run off in the night.
He took up one of the dry blankets and wrapped Adèle in it once she was changed.
“Are you feeling warmer?”
She nodded and leaned against him. He wrapped his arms around her.
“I’m a bit wet myself,” Céleste said. “I’ll change into my nightdress so I’ll at least be wearing something dry.”
“A good idea.” He smiled at Adèle. “Shall we step over by the horse and watch Buttercup eat her supper?” That would give Céleste a bit of privacy.
She nodded again.
Céleste set Aldric’s coat around his shoulders. “It’s growing colder.”
He looked up at her from his position still hunched down holding Adèle. “And you are wearing wet clothes.”
“Only for a moment longer.”
“Then I will give you back the coat once you’ve changed,” he said.
“We can have that debate when the time comes.” Céleste gave him a tenacious look that was ruined by a well-timed shiver.
“I’ll suggest a compromise instead.” Aldric pulled on his coat, then stood, picking up Adèle as he did. “You change into your dry nightdress, then wrap yourself in the other dry blanket. I’ll keep my coat on.”
“I’ll agree to that.” She smiled, and as had been the case increasingly often these past days, his pulse pounded in response. Moments like these, when the three of them felt a little like a family, were engraving themselves on his heart, making him imagine foolish things.
Benicks weren’t good at family. They ruined every one they were part of.
He carried Adèle over to where the horse stood and stopped with his back to Céleste. He set the sweet girl on her feet. She leaned back against his legs.
“Buttercup,” Adèle said, her French accent still heavily inflecting the word.
“Listen to you, speaking English.”
She grinned up at him. “Tante Céleste can speak English. And tonton Henri. And tante Nicolette. And tonton Aldric.”