A babe. Gregory’s stomach churned. She was right. He hadn’t considered what she was risking. Hadn’t asked. Hadn’t assumed she risked much at all. She seemed so sure and confident, so invincible. Able to conquer anyone or anything that stood in her way.
“I’m sorry.” He’d spoken the words more times in this single conversation than he likely had in his past twenty-eight years. But they no longer seemed enough. “I should have been more honest from the start. I should have considered the threat to your family.”
“I deserved to be told the truth. Just because I’m French and can’t claim a marquess or earl as my father doesn’t mean you can belittle me.”
“I never thought it did.”
Her throat worked back and forth. “You’re lying again.”
“I’m not lying. I’m only...I was so concerned about Westerfield that I...” He sighed, because truly, what more was there to say? He hadn’t thought about the sacrifices this quest would require of her or her brother.
She stood beside the mule, her cheeks overly pink, her dark tresses slipping from their pins to fall in little waves about her shoulders and hurt rolling off her like waves from the sea. Both of them concerned for their families, both trying protect their kin. How could he fault her for wanting to shield those she loved?
Curse this senseless war that pitted them against each other. That took a good man like his brother and threw him in a dungeon to rot. That threatened a kind person like Danielle for helping others in need.
“Dani?” a voice called from the woods.
Danielle swallowed and swung her gaze toward the stand of firs behind him. “Over here.”
“Oh, there you are.” Serge appeared from behind a thick tree. “I must have gotten turned around a bit in the woods.”
She raised an eyebrow at her brother. “Am I supposed to be surprised?”
Serge’s eyes moved between them, honest and perceptive as always. “Is everything all right?”
She sighed wearily. “It’s fine. I just...we were...discussing some things.”
Serge glared his way. “Did he hurt you?”
“Not in the way you mean, non.”
“Well, there’s rabbit back at camp. I set it to roasting a bit ago. Thought we could eat before we head out.”
She rubbed her temple, another tired gesture.
“Don’t act as though eating rabbit is such a hardship. If we don’t sup now, we’ll be stuck having more salt pork for dinner.” Serge grimaced. “That is, assuming you still want to head out tonight.”
The breath clogged in Gregory’s throat. Perchance she’d changed her mind. Maybe something in their conversation had made her understand—
“Oui.” She lifted her sack. “I still want to leave.”
“But can we eat first?” Serge offered her a big, sloppy grin.
“If we hasten.”
She started through the trees with Serge following closely behind, neither bothering to wait for Gregory nor even looking back.
Just like they wouldn’t look back when they left for good in another half hour.
Chapter Ten
Danielle didn’t wait for Halston as she threaded her way back to camp, nor did she look at Kessler once she and Serge entered the little clearing. Instead, she headed straight for Westerfield. She’d do a quick check of him, eat some food and then they would be on their way. The sooner she was gone, the better.
But leaving didn’t feel better. It felt...
Uncomfortable. Awkward. Wrong.
Which was ridiculous. Of course it wasn’t wrong for her to leave. Halston and Kessler didn’t trust her; nor did they treat her as an equal.
Except for back in the woods. Halston apologized, nearly kissed you and understood why you wanted to leave. She shoved down the little voice whispering at the back of her mind and knelt beside Westerfield.
She laid a hand across his brow, still hot with fever and damp with sweat. “Westerfield? Can you hear me?”
His eyelids didn’t even flicker.
All the more reason for her to go. She was starting to care too much for the ailing Englishman and his determined brother. For the servant with a soft heart and...well, she couldn’t think of anything to commend Kessler. But the rest of them were almost tolerable.
“Danielle?”
She turned abruptly. That she recognized the voice and the soft way her name rolled over Halston’s lips was yet another thing that didn’t bear thinking of. “Did you want something?”
“The food is ready.” Halston held out a hand to help her up, his eyes flickering to his brother. “Is he any better?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Will he...?”
“I can’t say for certain one way or the other.” She headed toward the fire where everyone else had gathered and plopped onto the ground. The conversation was quiet—a word from Serge, a question from Farnsworth, but mostly silence without even Westerfield’s cough to interrupt them. Perhaps the mustard plaster had been a mistake. At least the man had been making sounds that indicated he still lived before. Now he lay motionless as a corpse.
“Not hungry?” Halston asked from beside her.
She shook her head and stared down at her food, but that didn’t stop the warmth of Halston’s gaze from touching her face and washing through the rest of her body. Why was he sitting beside her, anyway? And why did he keep staring?
Because of the kiss? Her face heated. Non. It wasn’t a kiss. It was an...an...an almost kiss.
Almost kiss? Did such a thing even exist?
It must. Otherwise the memory of his eyes gazing into hers, of his body shifting subtly forward, wouldn’t keep running through her mind.
Why had she pulled away?
Why had she let him get so near in the first place?
And why did she now have the irresistible urge to jump up and seat herself on the other side of the fire? His presence had never bothered her before.
Well, mayhap once or twice, like the night he’d caught her trying to escape with Serge, or the argument she and Halston had gotten into while standing atop the—
“Dani!” Serge shouted from across the fire.
She jerked her gaze up to meet her brother’s. “Is something wrong?”
He scrunched his forehead. “Are you all right?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Um, mayhap because I had to call your name three times to get your attention.”
Three times? Heat started somewhere in her chest and worked its way up over her throat and onto her face. Then Halston cleared his throat beside her, and her cheeks burned even hotter.
She scowled at her brother. “What did you want?”
“Are you ready to go?”
She glanced down at her still-full plate. “Oui.”
After setting her dish on the ground, she pushed it nearer the fire and stood.
“Wait.” Halston scrambled to his feet, his hand reaching out to grip her wrist. “I’m sorry for not telling you the truth about Verdun. I’m sorry for not considering all you risked by helping us. Please forgive me, and please stay.”
She tried to tug her wrist away, but he only held tighter, the heat from his palm searing through the sleeve of her dress to her skin. “If anyone finds out how I’ve already aided you, my family will be imprisoned, possibly even killed.”
“Then we’ll pray for God’s protection.” The flickering firelight danced across his imploring eyes. “We’ve already seen God’s hand on Westerfield, haven’t we? Shouldn’t my brother be dead by now?”
She slanted her gaze toward Westerfield’s ominously silent figure. “Yes, he should have died. But either way—”
“I want to stay.” Serge appeared at her side.
“And I know the verses Papa reads at the dinner table. ‘For there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.’ If there’s no difference between Jew or Greek to God, then why’s there a difference between French and English? If we don’t help them, they’ll likely be imprisoned or killed. Isn’t saving a life more important than taking sides?”
Suddenly cold, she rubbed her free hand over the arm Halston still held. Serge had turned those verses around. That wasn’t how Papa meant them, surely it wasn’t. It wasn’t a question of taking sides. The Englishmen were her enemies, their countries had been at war for over a decade, and Laurent was dead as a result. Maybe there wasn’t any difference between Jew and Greek, but there was certainly a difference between English and French.
Wasn’t there?
“The verse also says there’s no difference between servant and master,” she croaked, eyeing Farnsworth from where he watched her across the fire.
“Then maybe Kessler and Halston will learn that themselves on our journey,” Serge answered easily, as though the decision to stay was simple. As though they didn’t risk both their own lives as well as the rest of the Belanger family’s.
“But if we’re caught—”
“Do you remember when Papa helped Maman? He could have been killed, but he helped her anyway.”
The memories flooded her mind in a giant rush. She’d been a mere girl of three and ten when Papa had entered their lives. Grandpère, with all his power and devious intentions, had given Maman a cruel task, and Maman had fought rather than comply. “Grandpère would have killed her.”
Serge rubbed his throat, the memory probably more terrifying for him than for her. After all, it hadn’t been her neck beneath Grandpère’s blade. “He would have killed us all.”
She drew in a breath and looked down, only to find that Halston no longer gripped her wrist. Instead he held her hand, slowly massaging the weary, calloused flesh while she spoke with Serge.
“Papa made the difference between Maman’s life and death.” Serge flopped a patch of auburn hair out of his eyes. “The difference in our lives, too. Now we have a chance to do the same for someone else. I think we should stay.”
Papa wasn’t their Papa back then, of course, and he hadn’t had to help them. After what Maman had been forced to do to him, he’d had every reason to leave the lot of them to Grandpère’s machinations. But he’d helped anyway. Because it was right. Because he could. Because God had given him the ability to correct a terrible wrong—and bring down the most prominent smuggling ring in northern France in the process.
“Will you stay?” Halston’s words were soft, his touch gentle and tender. Though probably not able to understand most of their French words, he seemed to grasp the meaning of their conversation.
It’s treason, a voice rang inside her head. You can’t help these men without being a threat to your own country. The very kind of threat your father watches for and reports to the police.
But God hadn’t created countries; He’d created Adam and Eve. That was it. And so her family had oft sneaked across the channel to visit Uncle Michel and Aunt Isabelle in England, and Uncle Michel and Aunt Isabelle had visited them on more than one occasion, even while the wars between their countries raged on. Because English or French, it should make no difference.
What if Halston was right? What if God had caused the two of them to meet in the woods and helping them was indeed God’s plan?
She inhaled deeply, drawing the cold winter air into her lungs. “All right. We can stay.”
* * *
Danielle opened her eyes and stared up at the rough wooden planks linking the underside of the cart she’d purchased in Saint-Quentin. The mule snorted from where it lay tethered to a nearby tree, and two squirrels nattered close at hand. She stretched her arms, rolling out from beneath the small shelter where she’d slept last night. It seemed only right she stay with the beast. The Englishmen would have no idea how to care for the animal, and she wasn’t about to send Serge to the cart and camp with four men by herself.
She yawned and looked up at the ever-gray sky above. Mayhap one day the sun would deign to shine on this forsaken road in northern France, but until then, nothing but bleak skies, bare trees and brown earth surrounded her.
She buttoned the top of her coat and shook out her tangled mass of hair. She should take time to put it to rights, but only after she checked on Westerfield.
He’d been so weak last night, his skin burning to the touch and body drenched with sweat, fluid rattling in his lungs with each shallow breath he took.
She bent to gather her blankets, bundling them in the back of the wagon before fishing out some oats for the mule. What would Halston do if Westerfield died? If ever love and determination had the power to save a person from death, then Westerfield deserved to live a thousand times over because of Halston’s dedication.
The man wouldn’t even entertain the possibility that his brother might die. He would make a perfect husband one day, considering how earnestly he cared for his family and how determined he was to do right by them.
Why couldn’t there be some Frenchman like Halston in Abbeville? Marrying him wouldn’t seem so terrible.
Or rather, someone like Halston. Certainly not the man himself. She’d never marry an Englishman who thought his country right for declaring war on hers, much less an aristocrat who believed himself above people like her and Serge and Farnsworth because of his parentage. Mayhap he cared about his family. Mayhap he would make some prim English girl a good husband. But his future had nothing to do with hers.
Which left her just as alone as before she’d journeyed to Reims three months ago. No decent man in Abbeville wanted her, nor did any in Reims. Probably because she couldn’t manage to do a womanly thing to save her life. She could kill, skin and roast a rabbit, sure. But most men wanted bread to go with that rabbit and a wife who could mend their shirts rather than accidently put bigger holes in them.
She huffed, feeding the mule another handful of oats before tromping off toward camp. She was too wrapped up in this entire tortuous journey, trying to save an Englishman she shouldn’t care about, nearly kissing another Englishman she shouldn’t allow herself to look at.
But last night by the fire, with Halston massaging her hand—yet another thing she shouldn’t have allowed—and Serge looking at her with those pleading eyes, the decision to stay had seemed so simple. So right.
This morning, that decision had turned into a giant mess.
One that put her family at risk.
One she’d not be able to easily get herself and her brother out of.
What had she agreed to? And why? Just because a rich, dashing man with imploring eyes had told her he needed her?
She was a fool to believe him, and not just once over but twice or thrice.
She growled and kicked at a tree root protruding from the forest floor. Not that the root bothered to move for her. Instead she jarred her toes against the front of her boot, causing them to protest in pain.
Then a cough echoed through the trees, and she stilled as more coughing filled the air. Westerfield had lived another night.
Mayhap all was not as hopeless as it seemed.
Chapter Eleven
The foul scents of animal and sweat mingled with the odor of ladies’ perfumes. Gregory stepped away from a group of women behind him and closer to the wagon where Westerfield lay, only to find an elderly man standing on his right.
Where had all these people come from? Mere minutes ago, they’d been traveling along unhindered. The foot traffic had been heavy
as they passed more and more houses interspersed with fields and the occasional woods, but Danielle had told them to expect people that morning when she mentioned they’d be journeying around the bustling city of Amiens.
As though traveling with such a crowd wasn’t bad enough, now everyone had suddenly stopped, the press of bodies suffocating beneath the wan winter sun. Gregory shifted uncomfortably. They needed to move around this crowd before someone discovered that the only French thing about him was his clothing.
Westerfield blinked open his bleary eyes. “Why are we stopping?”
Gregory stepped closer to his brother. Fortunately no one stood near the cart’s right side to overhear Westerfield’s use of English.
“There’s some kind of holdup,” he whispered in bumbled French.
Westerfield propped himself up on his elbows and looked around the throng of peasant travelers. A cough rumbled from deep in his chest, and the group of women standing behind the cart took several steps back. Good. Less chance of them overhearing his and Westerfield’s accents.
“Anything to be concerned about?” Westerfield’s soft voice was barely audible over the muted threads of conversation and animal noises.
“Besides all the people?” Gregory craned his neck, looking past Kessler, Serge, Farnsworth and Danielle in front of him to the throng traveling the worn dirt road. An endless sea of wide-brimmed peasant hats and assorted mobcaps stretched ahead. He stood on his toes, attempting to view what, if anything, clogged the road. Up at the very front of the mass, a series of black bicorne hats floated above the crowd.
Gregory’s fingers clenched around the smooth little button at the top of his coat’s pocket. They’d all likely be locked in a dungeon before sunset. “I believe there’re gendarmes ahead.”
Westerfield’s face, which had regained color in the week Danielle had been treating him with herbs, grew suddenly pale. “No.”
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