took a single step toward him. If he was on the road before she could follow, she might never be able to find him, or her father. She needed him gone, yes, but not alone. “That’s it, Jack, leave. It’s the one thing you’re good at!”
He’d already turned for the door, but her words stopped him, even as they backed her up against the bed, because she instantly knew she’d gone too far.
“I left, Tess, because you made it clear there was nothing for me here any longer. I left because you pushed me away. I left because you expected me to go.”
“I expected—? What do you mean by that?”
He was standing in front of her once again, effectively holding her in place without touching her. “You never thought there was a future for us, did you, Tess? That’s why you insisted we not tell Sinjon or René about us. I would leave you at some point, find a fault somewhere, become disappointed with you in some way. When René died you finally had your excuse to send me away, before I left on my own. You, and maybe your father as well, although God knows he had his own reasons. I couldn’t be allowed to stay because I’d failed, hadn’t I? Failed in our best chance to capture the Gypsy, failed to protect René. It fell on me, all of it, and I had to go. Admit it, Tess, if only to yourself.”
“That… that’s not true. I loved you.”
“And I loved you,” Jack said, his voice calmer now, almost gentle. “But it wasn’t my love you needed then, was it? You were still trying to win Sinjon’s approval, still needing him to be proud of you. Until you could gain his love, you weren’t really ready to accept mine, believe in mine. And that hasn’t changed, has it, Tess? Still hoping for that pat on the head, a word of praise, some acknowledgment of your achievements. But he didn’t trust you with his secrets, even after René died. He didn’t trust you with this damn mission he’s taken on. You were good, but never quite good enough. That’s how you see it, isn’t it?”
Tess didn’t answer him. She didn’t need to say a word in order to agree with him.
He tipped up her chin. “Look at me, Tess. Look at me. Sinjon’s a hard man, there’s no denying that. Demanding, difficult to please, impossible to fully understand. I know you and René suffered for that. But you’re a grown woman now. How long are you going to punish yourself for his failings? Because that’s what they are, his failings. Not yours.”
“He left me nothing, Jack,” Tess said quietly. “Knowing what he knows, he left us with nothing. How could he do that?”
“I told you, Tess. He knew I’d come.”
“You don’t understand…” she said, and then let her voice trail off. She’d left it too late, years too late. And she’d done what she’d done because her father had said it was for the best, and she’d been too devastated to think clearly. “Take me with you, Jack. Don’t leave me behind again. I have to see him, I have to talk to him, I have to know why.”
He looked at her for a long time, and then nodded. “Maybe it’s time you learned who Sinjon Fonteneau really is. Let’s go downstairs. There’s something I need to show you.”
Tess nearly threw her arms around him, but held back in time. “Thank you, Jack.”
“Don’t thank me, Tess. You’re not going to like it. I’m about to turn your shining knight into a rogue.”
JACK LED THE way back downstairs to Sinjon’s study. He’d shown Tess the hidden room, but had not disclosed all of its secrets to her.
He handed Tess the brace of candles and opened the glass doors of the cabinet holding the few pitiful ancient relics the marquis kept on display; the collection of a man who couldn’t afford to indulge his love the way he had years ago, in France. Or so it would seem to the world. The Marquis de Fontaine had never shown his real face to the world.
Jack had heard the story only a few weeks before René died. He’d found Sinjon in his study after midnight one night, sloppily drunk and embarrassingly maudlin on what he said was the twentieth anniversary of the death of his wife. He’d been both intrigued and flattered when the man motioned him to a chair and began to speak—and, in the end, he was appalled.
He doubted Tess and René had ever been privy to what had really happened, who their father was and had been, why their mother had died, what had brought them to England, what drove Sinjon to offer his services to the Crown against France.
The Marquis de Fontaine was a man of varied background and myriad talents. He’d prided himself on his knowledge of Greek, Roman and Egyptian antiquities; indeed, he’d devoted the first nearly fifty years of his life to amassing his collection, traveling the continent in order to add to it. Until he’d met his Marie Louise. He’d been amazed at the birth of the twins, slightly bemused as to what the fuss was all about, but they seemed to please Marie Louise, and he was free to go back to what he called his studies.
And his other pursuits.
Then came 1797, and suddenly Sinjon, whose facile use of a loyalty that seemed to bend with the prevailing wind had miraculously kept him safe in Lyon, was faced with the possible loss of his way of life. The worst of the Terror might be behind them, but the Revolutionary Army was becoming too powerful, thanks to the success of General Louis Hoche and some upstart Corsican named Bonaparte. Of the three, the Directorie, Hoche and Bonaparte, he feared the Corsican most, recognizing a lean and hungry ambition when he encountered it. Sinjon began working in secret with other Royalists to bring back the Ancien Régime and all the privileges of rank that went with it before it was too late for any of them.
But it had already been too late. He should have seen the signs, made a decision as to what was most important to him, and taken his wife and children to safety. Instead, he and his band of compatriots goaded and pushed the Directorie at every turn. Employing a plan devised by Sinjon, they nearly succeeded in an attempt to assassinate several of its leaders.
And that, to Sinjon, had been his single biggest mistake. The Directorie retaliated with all the might still at its disposal, hunting down and disseminating their opposition. While Sinjon and his men hid in cellars, not knowing what was happening, his adored Marie Louise had become one of the casualties of his folly.
He’d cried then, great blubbering drunken sobs. Jack sat silent, as there were no words that could comfort the man, heal his guilt and his loss. At that moment, no matter what Sinjon asked of him, Jack would do it. Because he was looking at a beaten old man who had lost everything; his wife, his country, his fortune. Here in England he lived in genteel poverty in a run-down manor house, employed by the Crown but never quite trusted.
Genteel poverty. Forced to plot and often kill, not only to exact justice for all he’d lost and rid the world of that upstart Bonaparte, but also to save a prime minister from scandal, find a way to disgrace those whose voices in Parliament didn’t agree with the Crown, employ his skills to clean up the many messes those in power made with regularity. He’d no choice.
Except that he did. He’d always had a choice. The man had been grieving? How much? Drowning his guilt and sorrows? Really? Jack knew he’d never know exactly where Sinjon’s clever mix of truth and fiction had merged that night, but only the reality of what he had seen. He had been the man’s audience, drawn in, made sympathetic to a supposedly sad and disillusioned wreck of a man. What had come next, his introduction to the second secret room, to the marquis’s secret life, would forever color his opinion of his mentor.
Now he would show Tess her real father,
