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She found herself yielding to the plea in his eyes. “Very well, Mr. Phillips. Where shall I meet you?”

“At the Palais Royale. I have been told there are several restaurants there. But please, let me fetch you in the carriage. It is not safe for a lady at night.”

She acquiesced, though with a warning that it was somewhat different from her London residence.

They arrived at her destination, and the groom opened the carriage door for her. She gave Rees her hand.
“Au revoir, monsieur.”

He held her hand a moment, his eyes never leaving hers. “Until this evening.”

Rees chose the Café de Chartres, a restaurant made famous during the Revolution. A fellow Englishman from the embassy had shown it to him a few days ago. From what he had seen in the week he’d been in Paris, the British were spending most of their time on the town, discovering the delights of the Continent.

At least it appeared a warm, cozy place for him to spend a few hours
with Lady Wexham. The small restaurant was located along the stone galleries of the famous—or infamous—Palais Royale.

The quarter teemed with civilians, both highborn and low, and soldiers—British, Prussians, and Cossacks in their colorful uniforms. But Rees had little interest in the hordes milling about in the street outside. He only had eyes for the woman sitting across from him at the small table.

After losing hope that he would ever be able to find her, it was as if the Lord had led him to be on that street corner at that precise time of day. He’d hardly believed it to be Lady Wexham at first, her appearance was so altered.

Instead of a lady dressed in the height of fashion, she had appeared almost drab in a gray gown and simple straw bonnet adorned with only a ribbon. At first glance, she looked like someone’s governess or a lady’s companion. But once he’d stood in front of her, in close proximity, he’d been captivated as quickly as in Mayfair. She could dress in sackcloth and she would still take his breath away.

This evening, she looked more the lady, although her gown was simple by her London standards. It was a pale green and she wore a gossamer shawl draped loosely over her shoulders. Her glossy hair was looped in a thick coil with no ringlets loose around her face. The style highlighted her fine cheekbones and dramatic dark eyebrows.

She sat gazing at the other patrons in the crowded restaurant. French people tended to eat out much more than their British counterparts. Restaurants and cafés abounded in the city, Rees had quickly found.

A waiter approached their table. After conversing with him a few moments, they made their selections, Rees content to follow his companion’s recommendations.

When the waiter departed, Lady Wexham turned to him. “It is plain fare, but I think you will like it. Their fish and game are very fresh. And their wines are good.”

He wondered whether she came here often and with whom.

“Your French is very good,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“You hid that fact well all the time you were in my household.”

He didn’t know whether she was angry or teasing him. She had kept her feelings concealed up to now. “It wasn’t always easy, believe me, especially when we were at Hartwell House.” He eased back in his chair, curious himself. “How long before you knew I was not a real butler?”

“Not long.” She shrugged. “Valentine alerted me that you were not all you appeared.”

“Of course.”

She paused, taking a sip of her wine. “You made an enemy of her.”

“Yes, I realized that. How is she?”

“She is well—as well as can be expected in a city that has known nothing but shortages for too many years.” She shrugged. “She will survive. That is what she does best.”

“Does she still . . . work for you?”

“Not precisely. She still lives with me and insists on looking after me. But I have told her she must find herself a new occupation. I think she will open a shop.”

He digested this information, wondering if it was a matter of Lady Wexham’s not being able to afford a lady’s maid. “And Gaspard?”

Her smile grew wider. “He has opened a restaurant of his own. I should take you there.”

He returned her smile, feeling for the first time that something of the walls that separated the two had fallen a fraction. “Yes. You should have told me and we could have gone there tonight.”

Then his smile disappeared. The fact that she kept neither chef nor lady’s maid pointed to reduced circumstances.

Her expression also sobered. “First I needed to find out for myself whether you were . . . sent by the British.”

“I see.” He rubbed a hand across his jaw, wishing he could prove to her that they were no longer on opposing sides. “I was not. They are no longer after you.”

She looked at him a long moment as if weighing whether to believe
him. “Perhaps not, yet they run this city for all intents and purposes. While Louis sits on his throne and does whatever the British tell him.”

“You cannot blame England if it wants to see some stability in France before it leaves.”

“I suppose not.” She gazed at a point over his shoulder. “I sometimes wonder if the regime they have installed here will not be worse than anything previous.” Her golden eyes were somber. “The royalists are out for blood—the blood of anyone they judge to have been either a Bonapartist or a Jacobin.”

“That is precisely one of the things Wellington is here to prevent.”

She sat back and folded her hands upon the tablecloth. “So, tell me what you have been about since I left London.”

“I think perhaps I should first tell you how I came to be in your household.” If he hoped for her trust, and any future with her, he had to be truthful about his past dealings with her.

“Very well.” Her tone gave nothing away.

He recounted how he had been offered the opportunity to spy on her in exchange for a chance at advancement in the foreign office.“I soon discovered that hard work and merit play very little part in how promotions are given out.”

She toyed with her spoon. “So, you had to agree to something that was not palatable to you?”

Feeling himself diminish in her estimation with this part of his narration, he forced himself to answer truthfully. “Yes. I know now it was not honest, but I also wanted to protect my country. Too many men have died.”

“I understand,” she said softly, and in that moment, hope stirred in his chest. He clenched his hand to keep from reaching across the table and taking her hand in his.

“I did not want to believe that a lady as beautiful . . . and intelligent and amiable as you could be involved in spying on the British.” He cleared his throat, having trouble keeping his thoughts clear as he watched the expressions flit across her eyes—surprise, amusement,
sympathy. “Not when you had lived the major part of your life in England and called it home,” he added.

She looked at her hands as if acknowledging what she’d done. “Yes, it was my home, and I would not have done anything to—to harm it.” She bit her lip. “But a Frenchman convinced me that Napoleon’s armies would not survive long, and I had . . . a duty to help with the future.” Her troubled eyes met his once more. “The Comte de Provence was the worst possible choice for France, but he was the only one the British would consider. They are so afraid of revolution on their own shores that they are content to suppress all democracy across the Channel.”

She looked away again. He had the sense she had more to stay, so he remained silent.

His patience was rewarded. “But that is not the only reason,” she said in so low a tone he had to lean forward to catch her words. She swallowed, as if unable to continue.

“It happened when you were seventeen and returned here, didn’t it?”

Her eyes widened. Then collecting herself, she took a deep breath, as if delving into the past took all her effort. “Yes. I told you I fell in love with a young soldier. It was not my choice—or his—for me to leave him, or France. My mother discovered the attachment and forced me back to England.” Her voice grew flat. “You see, her ambition was that I must marry a wealthy gentleman. She had lost everything during the Revolution and her only hope lay in me, her daughter.”

Her lips twisted. “So, I know what it is to be obliged to do something that goes against one’s inclinations.”

She had been forced into marriage. The realization shifted all he knew of her. Mere events listed by dates in a file had done no justice to the tale of a young woman whose mother had pinned her whole future on her daughter’s marriage, an eighteen-year-old who bore the responsibility of providing not only for her mother’s future but for that of her French servants as well.

As she filled in the details of the things he’d read in her dossier, his heart went out to the young woman who had had to give up her
first—her true—love for the sake of an ambitious mother. “I was a prize on the Marriage Mart that year.” She emitted a humorless sound. “
Maman
even managed to procure a coveted invitation for me to Almack’s through Princess Esterhazy. I’m sure she has some tenuous claim to relationship if we trace our lineage back far enough.”

“That is when you met the Earl of Wexham.”

She nodded.

The waiter interrupted them, laying out a tantalizing array of hot dishes.

“Roast quail,” Céline explained with a graceful motion of her hand. “A roebuck pâté with a gooseberry compote, trout with a truffle ragout, an artichoke pie, side dishes as you see.”

He inhaled. “Smells delicious.” Rees hesitated then asked, “Would you permit me to say grace?”

She inclined her head in assent.

“Dear Lord, thank You for leading me to Lady—Mlle. de Beaumont. Please bless our evening together, as well as this food we are to partake of. In Your precious name we pray, Lord Jesus.”

He looked up before taking up his cutlery to gauge her reaction.

She was unfolding her thick napkin. “I think if you are having such trouble remembering my name, you should call me by my given name.”

He swallowed, feeling another wall between them come down. “Céline,” he ventured.

She smiled.

“If you will call me by mine.”

He waited, breathless, for her to utter the word.

“Rees.”

He released his breath, realizing he’d waited a long time to hear his real name on her lips.

“I like your name.”

“It’s Welsh. My grandmother on my father’s side was Welsh. It was a family name from one of her relations. But I use the English spelling.” He fell silent, realizing he was talking too much.

But she didn’t seem to mind from the way she was listening.

She took up her fork. “So, you are thankful for having found me. You said you were searching for me?”

She had listened to his prayer. “Yes, I was. But please, I’m more interested in your story before I get back to mine.”

“Very well.” She gestured toward his plate. “Please, don’t let your food get cold.”

They ate for a few moments before she resumed. “I had many admirers that first season. But as one quickly discovers, very few make a serious pursuit once the parents inquire into a young lady’s dowry and expectations. I was but a poor émigré.

“That did not weigh with the earl. He was wealthy enough to choose whichever bride struck his fancy. He had already been married once, in his youth.” She paused, looking down at her place. “He had only one overriding concern.”

He remembered her dossier and could hazard a guess. “He needed an heir.”

24

C
éline stared across the candlelit table at Rees. “Yes.” Was her barrenness so evident, even to him? She thought she’d grown used to this failure, but seeing the knowledge in his eyes reminded her afresh.

He coughed behind his napkin. “Forgive me, but when I . . . I chose to accept the task of going into your household, they gave me a file to read.”

“You know all about me then?” Somehow hearing it from his lips made it harder to bear.

He shook his head, his smile rueful. “Hardly that. I know facts, facts that anyone can discover with a little digging. I know you married the earl at the age of eighteen after your first season, and I know he died childless.”

She moistened her lips, somewhat appeased. “You can imagine then how important it was for him to marry a healthy young woman of impeccable pedigree who would produce a healthy male child.”

“As far as anyone in my station can imagine such a thing, yes.”

She smiled faintly at the irony in his tone. “You have never given an heir any thought, Mr.—Rees?”

He set his fork and knife down on the edge of his stoneware plate before answering. “Not in terms of an ‘heir.’ Like any man, I would like to have children someday with my wife.”

Of course, he would. Another reason she must never think of a future with him. She shook away the instant of self-pity and forced another smile. “Would you? Yet you’ve delayed your marriage.”

“I was never betrothed,” he reminded her.

She remembered his words to her that afternoon in his bedroom. “I thought only financial considerations were keeping you from proposing.”

He fingered his napkin, his words hesitant. “I had desired to be married and have a . . . a family. But I had never met the woman with whom I wished to share my life.”

When she raised her brows in disbelief, he hastened, “It is true, there was a young lady. She was a close friend of my younger sister,” he continued, “and I had watched her grow up. I respected and admired her greatly, and as my situation in life improved where I could finally think about marriage, she seemed an ideal candidate.”

“But?” she ventured softly when he paused.

“I wasn’t in love with her.”

He held her gaze, and she found herself spellbound by what she saw in his smoke-gray eyes. “No?” she whispered.

“When you left . . . I didn’t think I’d ever see you again. I had no hopes of ever being able to come over here after the war—not after having compromised my spying assignment so thoroughly.”

His words reminded her of the reality of his role in her life. “Compromised? I wouldn’t say so. I would say you have done very well for yourself.” She eyed his evening clothes, which sat very well on him.