Epilogue
I’m on my way.
Four simple lines, written in an elegant script on a slip of paper.
It was embossed with the Radcliffe coat of arms and set on a silver tray beside a fine porcelain teacup, pot of steaming tea, and silver tongs.
Upon reading the contents of the note, warmth flooded Marguerite’s body.
A warmth that more than matched the sunlight streaming in through the long windows of Marcus’s studio.
Slipping it into the pocket of her smock, she made a slow turn around the room, still marveling at finding herself in this utterly foreign and fabulous place.
The room was exactly as Marcus described it during their escape from France: wide and airy with an arched and timbered ceiling, a perfect southern exposure from rows of lancet windows, uneven floorboards.
She had no doubt, glancing at the massive carved fireplace, that it was impossible to keep warm in winter.
But for now, with her easels lined up in front of the window, a growing portfolio of sketches leaning against one wall, and her art supplies spread on the canvas-covered dining table, it was near perfection.
She patted the note in her pocket, resisting the urge to look at it again. Re-reading it would not hasten Marcus’s return.
With a sigh, she considered her work. The portrait of the elderly man Marcus had rescued from her sitting room occupied one easel.
Her self-portrait, to her slightly embarrassed delight and amusement, he’d paid for and insisted on keeping in his study.
The large painting of Diana the Huntress was with the London Academy of Art.
She hugged herself as if she might contain the sheer joy bubbling up inside her chest.
Her current work, set on the easel closest to her, was a work in progress, though in her mind’s eye it was nearly complete.
It was a charcoal sketch of a sleeping Eros.
He was lying on his side; white feathered wings folded along the lines of his muscled back.
A sheet was draped over his hips and one long leg was bent, the other stretched out to display the thighs and calves of a warrior.
His long hair was swept back from his face—an oval face, with a high forehead, a slash of brow, and beneath the aristocratic nose, the serious, yet sensuous lips.
Her own lips curved as she examined it. Marcus Aurelius David George Tyndale, Viscount Radcliffe, wasn’t the only member of the household with perfect recall.
She picked up her charcoal and began to work on the piece, absurdly grateful to find her hands steady.
While the odd sound or smell might thrust her back into the cell in the Conciergerie, her ability to draw was returning.
Drawing kept the flashbacks at bay. And at night, the security of Marcus’s arms around her, his voice calm in her ear, soothed away the nightmares.
She cocked her head, studying Eros’s shoulder, then reached out a finger to smudge a line. She stepped back to study the effect, her gaze drifting distractedly past the sketch to the door, as if by looking at it she might will him to walk through it.
Setting down her charcoal, she went over to the table to pour herself a fresh cup of tea. She picked up the tongs and was reaching for a lump of sugar, when she heard voices, doors opening, then a blessedly firm and familiar booted stride.
Dropping the tongs, she turned, eyes fixed on the door.
It flew open and Marcus entered. Without breaking his stride, he tossed his hat onto a chair, dropped his coat on the floor, and held his arms out wide to catch her.
Marguerite, too, had been moving, and in another moment those arms were around her.
He was lifting her, kissing her, spinning her about the room, so that the pale-yellow skirts of her gown flared like Eros’s wings, then wrapped around them both when he stopped.
He was home. And now, so was she.
“Did you miss me?” he asked, coming up for air.
“Such a foolish question.” She ran a finger down the elegant line of his nose, leaving a smear of charcoal in its wake.
There was an indentation on the bridge, one she must remember to capture on her Eros.
She was constantly learning new things about this man; she didn’t think she’d ever tire of it.
Her eyes shifted from the smear to her sooty fingers and said apologetically, “I’m a mess. ”
“You’re perfect.”
The certainty in his voice made her insides feel like sun-warmed honey. She looked back up at his sooty nose, considering where else she might like to leave a charcoal-dusted trail. Desire briefly, but fiercely, battled curiosity, before curiosity won out.
Drawing back from him with a sigh, she asked, “What did he say?”
“Who?”
“Don’t play games with me, Marcus Aurelius David George Tyndale, you know perfectly well who I mean. Grenville.”
“Well, I did also meet with your father…”
“Ah, bah, I expect I could repeat word for word what he said. He made himself quite clear when you brought me to his apartments in London.”
“I swore to return you to him. And I kept my word.” There was a wicked gleam in Marcus’s eyes and she knew they were both recalling the memory of that encounter. “I never said anything about leaving you there.”
“As if I’d have stayed.”
“He demanded that I return you to him. Again.”
“Of course he did.” She rolled her eyes. “As if I am his property.”
A corner of Marcus’s mouth quirked up. “I told him you were mine now.”
“That must have put him in a rare temper.”
“He was already in one. It merely raised the temperature. I feared he might become apoplectic when I showed him the special license.”
“Did he believe it was real?”
Marcus clasped a hand to his heart, an expression of mock horror on his face. “You wound me, my love. How can you doubt my artistry, when I have such faith in yours?”
“I have complete faith that you are, indeed, the finest forger in the business.” She kissed him lightly. Not a single guard or official had questioned the papers he’d created on that perilous journey to the coast.
Marcus smiled and kissed her back, a firmer kiss. “He accused me of marrying you for your money.”
“Money.” She sighed. “I was right, then. It was my money he worried about leaving behind.”
“Still curious that he offered such a large sum for your return.”
“I’ve explained. Even if he intended to pay it, it’s but a fraction of what I have in Switzerland.”
“Come to think on it, perhaps I should marry you for your money.”
“As if I’d let you.”
He kissed her more deeply, his tongue tracing the shape of her lips, then said, “I confessed I knew nothing about your finances. I’d simply fallen madly, hopelessly in love with you.”
“What if he starts telling people we’re actually married?
“You make that sound like such a terrible fate.” He gave an aggrieved sigh.
“I’ve been an elusive and intentionally ill-mannered bachelor for over a decade.
You’re a foreigner. I doubt the ton will care.
But if they do,” Marcus sighed again. “Then I suppose you’ll just have to make an honest man out of me. ”
She looked up at him, one eyebrow raised. “Impossible.”
He took both her hands in his, both his expression and his tone when he spoke utterly serious. “And yet, I honestly love you, Marguerite de Rouvroy.”
It was her turn to sigh. She loved him best when he dropped his various masks and let his romantic passions shine through.
Wrapping her hands around the lapels of his embroidered waistcoat, she pulled him close.
“And I you, Marcus Tyndale. So much so, that I might someday pledge my troth to you. But for now, I’m content to love you and belong to myself.
” She kissed him then, long, and deep, their tongues intertwining, their bodies melding.
Their hands began to drift to buttons and laces. Marguerite gasped. “Grenville.”
Marcus’s eyes were heavy-lidded and unfocused, “Haven’t the slightest desire to strip off all his clothes and make love to him on that table…” His gaze drifted suggestively over her shoulder.
She pulled her hand out from under his untucked shirt, placed both firmly on his half-buttoned waistcoat. “What did he say?”
“You know, if there’s one thing you have in common with your father, it’s dogged determination.”
“Grenville.”
Marcus sighed with real regret. “He damned my eyes. Told me I was making a hash of his plans. That I was no gentleman. And—mind you, this is his lordship’s language, not mine—that I was placing lust over the security of country.”
“Marcus, I’m so sorry…”
He waved a dismissive hand. “Ah yes, and that I needed to return to you to your father forthwith if I wanted to keep my honor and my job.”
“Forthwith,” she repeated, the harsh English consonants awkward on her tongue. “Did you tell him we were married?”
“I did. Not surprisingly, he was a tad more skeptical than ton cher papa. No doubt he’s using his networks to determine the truth of the matter even as we kiss.” He lightly brushed her lips with his.
“And if he does?”
Marcus shrugged. “He’s unlikely to cause a scandal. He dislikes anything that draws public attention to any member of the team, even former ones. Most likely he’ll lock the information away in a drawer in case it might come in handy later…”
“Wait a minute,” she held up a hand. “Go back a moment, if you please. You said former members of the team. What precisely do you mean by that?”
“Ah, the perils of a lover who is as clever as she is beautiful…”
“Do not attempt to distract me with flattery. Also, didn’t you say you wanted me to make an honest man of you?”
“You are beautiful,” he protested.
Marguerite narrowed her eyes at him. “The truth, if you will.”
“Grenville told me that if I didn’t annul the marriage and return you to your father, I should consider my work for the crown terminated.”
“Would he really do that? Make you give up your work? Over me?” Also, despite her mounting alarm, Marguerite couldn’t help asking, “Can you annul a forgery?”
Marcus waved away her questions. “I told him to mind his own damned business.”
She sucked in a breath.
“Told him you didn’t want to go back. And I’d no intention of forcing you to do so. He said a woman has no business deciding her own future, let alone mine. I told him a bloody bureaucrat, however high and mighty, had no business deciding the future for either of us.”
“You didn’t.” Marcus, though quick to act, was generally cautious with his words. And Grenville, in addition to his covert activities, was the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs.
“He told me to choose. My work or you.”
“How dare he? After everything you’ve done for him? For England. The risks you’ve taken?”
It crossed her mind—not for the first time, that it might be a good thing, to have him safe in England rather than on missions to an increasingly dangerous France. But she also knew whatever he decided, it should be his own choice. Not one forced upon him by Grenville, or by her.
“I won’t go back to my father’s. But if it will change Grenville’s mind, enable you to keep doing what you do, then I’ll leave.
Not you,” she added hastily seeing his expression, “but…this place. I’ve always wanted to have a secret love affair.
” She attempted to keep her tone light, but her hands, so blessedly steady since they’d arrived in England, began to shake again.
Marcus caught them in his, “No. I’ve had my fill of secrets—you will not be another one. Indeed, I want to shout to the world that you are mine.”
“But your work…”
“Was an escape from the empty hell my life had become. I no longer need it. I have you. If you’ll stay.” His grip on her hands tightened.
“It’s more than an escape. I’ve seen the way your eyes light up when you come up with a perfect plan, or a perfect forgery; when it all comes together and you accomplish what you set out to do. And what about Scott and Aylesworth?”
“What about them?”
She nodded at an envelope he’d propped on the mantlepiece shortly after it arrived the previous week. It was an invitation to a ball in London; Andre had underlined the date and scribbled beside it, Be my backup?
“They’ll be fine.”
Marguerite frowned uncertainly at the invitation.
“Whatever Scott’s been tasked with—and now that I’m out of it, he can’t tell me—it’s nothing a wily intelligencer like him can’t handle. Besides, it’s England, not France, the ton, not the Public Security Bureau. No one will be chasing after him with muskets or sabers.”
When Marguerite continued to frown, Marcus sighed and said, “If my lady wishes, we’ll go to the ball.
I’ve received my own invitation. Grenville can’t stop me, particularly since I don’t work for him anymore.
It will be an opportunity for you to meet potential clients and students, and for me to show you off. ”
“My father will be apoplectic.”
“Yet another reason to go!”
“Impossible man, it would seem you have an answer for everything.” Her voice becoming serious, she said, “But tell me. Will I really be enough for you?”
“More than enough, mon coeur.” His eyes lit with a fire she was beginning to recognize all too well. “And should you have any doubts, I plan to spend the rest of my life convincing you.”
The look he gave her made Marguerite’s toes curl.
“Make no mistake about it, Marguerite de Rouvroy,” he said, “I may have no interest in your fortune, but the rest of you—your body, your heart,” he gave her a wicked smile, “your hand.” He lifted it to his lips, pressing a kiss to her palm. “I swear, someday they all will be mine.”
“Pfft. Marriage,” she withdrew her hand from his, slid her arms around his neck, and dropped a kiss on his aristocratic nose. “Must you keep coming back to that?”
“Our marriage certificate may be a forgery. Perhaps my finest work,” he said, sliding his hands around her waist. “But speaking as a forger to an artist, I think we both know, there’s nothing quite as wonderful as the real thing.”