“I know.” He avoided her gaze, smoothing his hand across the soft fur. His small fingers disappeared as they passed through a fold and reappeared on the other side. “I miss her.”
“You will see her again, chéri,” Simone encouraged. “We must simply bide our time until we can learn why she passed on and you did not.”
“Do you think I’ll go to Hell, Sister?” he asked in a small voice. “Is that why I am still here? Because God does not want me in Heaven?”
“I most certainly do not!” Simone whispered fiercely. “God and Maman will welcome you into Heaven, into their arms, one day very soon. You must believe that.”
Didier nodded half-heartedly and then looked into Simone’s eyes. “I think Lady Haith can help us. Truly. She is…different.”
His gaze was so earnest, so hopeful, Simone was tentatively won over. “Very well, Didier,” she acquiesced. “If I happen to encounter her again while we are in London, I will confide in her, if ’twill make you happy.”
Didier’s answering smile was radiant.
“But I hope you realize the danger telling another of your presence holds for me,” she warned, thinking of Charles and his disgusted horror at her confidence.
“Lady Haith will not betray you, Sister,” he promised solemnly. He looked as if he was going to say more, but then thought better of it as a rap sounded at the chamber door.
“’Tis Papa,” he whispered. He placed an invisible kiss on Simone’s cheek and then, in a blink, was gone.
Simone’s stomach clenched when she heard the key scraping in the lock. She sank down into the soft mattress and pulled the furs to her chin as the door swung open and her father stepped inside the room, carrying a single candle.
“Simone? Do you sleep?” Armand asked in a low voice.
“Non, Papa.” Her heart raced as he shut the door quietly behind him. His full, ruddy face was etched with fatigue, the ever-present tic around his eye jumping wildly as he limped across the chamber and placed the candle on a small table.
He is too calm, Simone thought as Armand came to stand at the foot of her bed. His arm was drawn against his side and he stared at her intently. Something is terribly wrong.
Her imagination ran unchecked: Lord Halbrook had called off the betrothal and they would be forced to leave London because of her scandalous behavior. Where would they go now? The meager funds Armand had managed to gather for the journey were nearly depleted and they could not return to France.
“Simone, have you an explanation for your behavior?”
She swallowed, and the hairs rose on the back of her neck. “Non, Papa.”
Armand rubbed his withered arm and rocked on his heels. His lips moved soundlessly as he stared at her, forming inaudible words.
And Simone stared back, too frightened to look away for even an instant. Armand was eccentric, and not a little intimidating. His one quest since Simone could remember had been to find some mysterious treasure, its worth reported by Armand to be quite priceless. Her father was largely a stranger to her, always away searching for his elusive prize while Simone was growing up. When he was in residence at Saint du Lac, he was brusque and moody, and not unlikely to punish a misdeed with his fists. Even now, in his advanced age, he was large and strong. Simone knew her rash behavior this evening was beyond forgiveness, and she wondered if he would whip her.
Finally he spoke. “You cannot reason to me why you deliberately disobeyed me? Why, the instant I left your side, you sneaked away with a known seducer to let him fondle you for any who may pass by to see?” He moved around the end of the bed toward Simone.
Her voice was barely a whisper. “Non, Papa.”
“Come to me,” he commanded, standing at the bedside now and beckoning to her with a finger.
Simone’s entire body shook as she crawled from beneath the covers and sat on her heels before her father. She was eye level with him now, and she couldn’t help but flinch when he raised his good hand to grasp her chin.
“I have an idea as to why you behaved as you did,” he said.
Simone’s throat barely allowed her to reply. “You do?”
“Oui.” The corner of his mouth not frozen into place crept upward. “’Tis because you are very, very clever.”
Simone’s eyes widened. “I am?”
Armand abruptly kissed both of Simone’s cheeks and then crushed her to him with one arm. “So very clever!” he repeated with a laugh. He held her away again, beaming at her in a way Simone could not recall him doing the whole of her life. “When Halbrook saw you in the arms of the young baron, he tripled the amount he’d offered for you!”
Simone closed her eyes, her relief dizzying. “Oh, thank God.”
Armand chuckled again, and when Simone opened her eyes, she saw him hovering over her dressing table. He searched among the items scattered there, mumbling to himself, before selecting one and returning to the bedside. He perched on the edge of the mattress and held up the item he’d chosen from her toilette.
A small, silver reflecting disc.
“Look, and tell me who you see.”
Simone frowned and then glanced at her miniature reflection—her hair hung down in black sheets around her near-colorless face.
“Me?” she offered weakly.
Armand shook his head with a sly smile. “Who is ‘me’?”
Simone gave a frustrated sigh. He father was eccentric to the point of exasperation. “Simone du Roche of Saint du Lac. Papa, I do not understand—”
“Say au revoir to this girl,” Armand interrupted, “for she will soon be no more.”
“Papa?”
Armand rose from the bed awkwardly, leaving Simone with the mirror. He limped to the window and looked out over the soft dawn, washing the rather seedy street where their inn was located in flattering light, and then he smiled.
“I have done it, Simone—England is mine!” He turned to her, shaking a fist in the air and laughing as if he could not help himself. “In two days’ time, you will become the Baroness of Crane!”
Simone’s world tilted. “What?”
“You are to marry Nicholas FitzTodd, here in London, with William’s own blessing!” Armand clarified, obviously pleased.
“Non,” Simone whispered, horrified. She instantly recalled with startling detail the warning Nicholas had whispered in her ear: If this is some intricate plot to ensnare me as your husband, ’twill not work. I do not yield to feminine trickery.
Armand beamed. “This is better than I ever could have hoped for!”
“But…but Nicholas FitzTodd is penniless!”
