Chapter Eighteen #2
A strange sense of uncertainty crept up Bernard’s spine.
He had heard someone refer to a Frank as a woman before.
And that meant Hovell either was also related to a woman named Frank, who, in an especially strange detail the spy had accidentally let slip, somehow possessed a great amount of engineering oil, or…
he knew all about Bernard’s time with Lucy, down to the smallest detail of their conversations.
And that was even more disconcerting.
Or… Or… There were a great number of Chance cousins. Bernard had commented on that fact to Lucy. Perhaps the man had intentionally spoken of Frank to test Bernard’s astuteness. How many Lady Franks could there have been in England?
“You look surprised.”
Bernard cleared his throat. “I… Well. You know my true name, and I know the name you’ve provided to me, but other than that…you told me when we first started working together that it was safer to keep details like that private. That they could be used against us.”
Hovell’s eyes glittered. “But you are leaving the service.”
Oh. Oh, yes.
How had he completely forgotten that?
Probably, Bernard realized darkly, because his mind had been otherwise occupied with a beautiful face and a passionate heart that had loved not only him, but justice, just as he was passionate about justice. How could he have failed to fall in love with her?
“Right,” Bernard said quietly. “Yes, of course.”
“Now I have not inquired as to why you have decided to leave the service,” Hovell continued lightly. Even his accent was different, richer. More refined. “But I presumed it was because of a woman, and after receiving your letter about Lucy…”
All the hackles on Bernard’s neck went up. “Lady Lucy.”
Why it mattered that the man show the proper respect to the woman, Bernard did not know. But it mattered.
And the pushback allowed him to test his theory as to Hovell’s real identity.
“Indeed?” Hovell appeared distinctly unconvinced, which was never a good sign.
Bernard was not the best spy in the world, he would readily admit that. He was not sent out to France or to Germany, but into England’s prisons, but he did very well there.
And he knew Hovell.
Or at least, he thought he had.
“Now, you wrote to me about Lady Lucy, as you say, just before you left. On her own paper, by the way, which was not very good form,” Hovell said lazily.
“I didn’t have access to any other—” Bernard stopped himself before he went any further as a chill settled within him.
On her own paper.
Another detail he was letting let slip? Cousins wrote to one another, didn’t they? But did Hovell want him to think something else? Did he want him to surmise that…
“You’ve seen her,” he exhaled.
Hovell flashed a smile. “Yes.”
“Yes?” Bernard could not believe it. How long was Hovell going to keep this charade up?
He thought back to his own actions. He had been most clear in his note to Hovell. He had become entangled with Lucy, it had all gone to hell, and he was going to leave to protect her. They could meet in London.
He hadn’t written the note to send the man directly to her! So…what man would go see her in the midst of more important business? Other than someone who cared for her, a family member?
Did Lucy know? Had she known the whole time?
“You saw her—you have seen her?” Bernard found himself repeating.
Hovell rolled his eyes as though he were tired of the whole thing—another mannerism he had not seen in the man before. “Yes, I saw her yesterday.”
“Yesterday,” whispered Bernard, glancing down at his hands as though astonished to find them on the ends of his arms.
Yesterday. Hovell had been with Lucy yesterday.
He glanced up quickly. “Was she well?”
“She was weeping,” Hovell said quietly.
Bernard’s jaw tightened. Oh, dear God, I will never forgive myself. All he had done to serve his country, all that was wiped out in comparison to the pain he had given an innocent woman.
Well. His loins stirred as he thought back to a few evenings in particular. Not entirely innocent.
“She was…miffed, I think would be the correct word,” Hovell said slowly. “Devastated might be another word. Angry at you, angry at herself—”
“And she told you this?” Bernard struggled to believe that Lucy would pour out all her feelings to a stranger.
But he struggled to believe his handler had been a Chance this whole time.
How many names had she listed? Cousin after cousin after cousin—he still had no idea which one his handler could be.
The thought of Lucy crying over him, though was an unpleasant piece of information, and it had him shifting in his armchair. He couldn’t live without Lucy, but she had been the one to order him to go, hadn’t she?
He was hardly going to force himself where he was not welcome.
Hovell smiled. “Lucy is not a difficult woman to read.”
It was the man’s arched brow that prompted the ire, and before Bernard knew what he was doing, even in spite of his own theory about Chance cousins, he’d snapped, “Lady Lucy!”
“I have never called her by that title,” Hovell said smoothly, “and I’m not about to do that now. She wants you back, Moray.”
Bernard blinked.
“She wants you back,” repeated his guest, his words slower this time, as though it would help him understand better. “Did you not hear me, you cretin? Lucy wants you back.”
“She regrets it, but she’ll soon regret having me back,” Bernard said darkly. “The woman is a saint, but she cannot live with a man she does not know.”
Nor a man who would not allow anyone to know him.
Oh, Bernard was no fool. This was mostly his fault, he knew. Perhaps he should never have told her he was a spy, perhaps that was the moment that the distrust had slipped in. The revelation had been made to grow her trust, but all it had done was reveal how well he could lie.
And if he could lie about that, well…