“Yes, all of it,” Drew said. “I even found that envelope you put in my office, Evangeline. Jesus, it made me a perfectly placed traitor. As for the journal you kept, a lot of the damage can now be undone. My men are tracking down all the spies. We’ll be clean of them before the end of the day.”
She was afraid to ask, but she had to. “My father? Is there any chance at all that he’ll survive this?”
“We will send a message shortly to Paris. We believe that Napoleon will trade your father for Edgerton. As the duke told you, Napoleon is loyal to those who are loyal to him. Ah, as for yourself, my dear ma’am, the duke assures me that once you’re married to him, you won’t have time for any more visits to the beach at midnight.”
“I’m pleased you can now speak to her without swallowing your tongue, Drew,” the duke said, and buffeted his friend in his arm. “She doesn’t bite, usually.”
“She’s bitten you, Papa?” Edmund wanted to know, staring at Evangeline with undisguised awe.
“Only in situations where she’s so mad at me she’s lost all her words, Edmund.”
Drew Halsey, Lord Pettigrew, stared at Evangeline, who was leaning into the duke, a vivid smile on her face, and just shook his head. “Life,” he said after looking deeply into a snifter of brandy, “is sometimes stranger than a man’s wildest nightmares.”
“I’m not quite certain how to receive that proclamation,” Evangeline said, and laughed, even as the duke leaned down to kiss her. “Forget Drew,” he said into her mouth, “I never have wild nightmares.”
“Is she going to bite you for nuzzling her, Papa?” “I pray she’ll do no biting at all until much later,” the duke said. Drew coughed behind his hand. Edgerton had closed his eyes, Mr. Bullock hovering over him, his gun at the ready.
Two hours later, the duke, Drew Halsey, and their soldiers escorted Edgerton back to London. “When will Papa come back, Eve?” “Very soon, Edmund. Probably by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. Trust me that he didn’t want to leave, but it seems there are more matters
he had to attend to in London before he can come back to us.” “I saw him kissing you again, not just talking into your mouth,” Edmund said, and he was frowning. “He wasn’t patting your back like he sometimes does to me. No, he was rubbing your back, up and down and up again. He looked really interested in what he was doing.”
“Well, yes,” she said. “I suppose he was rather absorbed in what he was doing. Actually, I’m rather fond of both you and your papa as well.”
“I didn’t know you bit my papa, too. I never thought about anybody biting anybody else. Fancy that both you and Papa do it. Once I saw him bite your ear and you stretched your neck up so he could bite you better. Why he’d want to bite your ear?”
She came down on her knees in front of him. She looked into his beloved face, and lightly laid her hand on his shoulder. “Do you like to have me here, Edmund?”
“Yes,” he said clearly. “I like to chase you.” So did his father, she wanted to tell him, but caught herself just in time. “I like you to chase me, too. Getting shot is sometimes disconcerting, but I’ll manage it well enough.”
“You’re going to stay here with me? You’ll teach me how to swim better than Papa?”
“Yes,” she said, “I’m staying. When your papa gets back from London, we’ll all talk about it.”
“I’m going to go shoot a peacock and when he’s lying there dead, I’ll bite him.”
“You’d get feathers in your mouth. That wouldn’t be fun at all. Ellen would have to wash your mouth out. No, you wouldn’t like that, Edmund.”
“All right,” Edmund said, nodding. He turned to run back up the stairs. “I’ll go bite Ellen.”
Lucky Ellen, Evangeline thought, watching Edmund run upstairs. Even after he was gone she continued to stand in the magnificent entrance hall, shaking her head, grinning like a loon, so relieved, so happy, she thought her heart would surely burst.
Chapter 39
It was the following morning. The sun was bright, the breeze off the sea tangy and light. It would be a mild day. Evangeline was whistling as she walked from the breakfast room to the drawing room.
“Madame,” Bassick said. “There’s a gentleman here. He says the duke sent him to you.”
She nearly ran to the drawing room, a smile on her face. “Thank you, Bassick,” she called over her shoulder. “Close the door.”
She stood frozen in the doorway, staring at Conan DeWitt. He was pointing a gun directly at her. “Close the door, or else I’ll kill that old man standing out there. Do it now.”
She closed the door. Slowly she turned to face him. “What are you doing here?”
“I’d like to tell you that I’m Edgerton’s emissary here to inform you that the bloody duke is dead. Unfortunately, it isn’t true. They’ve got Edgerton. I believe, thanks to you, Eagle, they’ve got all the men who have come into England through you as well. I got away. The same men who warned Edgerton that Lord Pettigrew and his men were here at Chesleigh also told me. If he’d waited even an hour longer, I would have been caught with all the rest.”
“Why did you come here? Surely you know that they’re looking for you?”
“Let them look to Scotland, they’ll not find me. I told John not to trust you. I warned him repeatedly, but he wanted you, you see. What’s more, he wanted you in his power, so that what you were, what you would become, would all be in his hands. He was a fool as well because he’d convinced himself that his hold on you was strong enough to keep you in line. But still, regardless of whatever it was he was holding over you, I still knew you would betray us.”