‘After your father’s death?’
She stood at that suddenly, pushing the chair back so hard it fell over, the noise of it bringing the servants in quickly from the kitchens. ‘England is the soft land of ease and excess, Major. There is nothing here that could make you understand exactly what it was like for me there in the middle of a war in France. You could not know how it was.’
* * *
He got up, too, his blood running as hot as her own as he grabbed her arm and pulled her from the room. When she went to scratch him with her other hand he fastened on that one, too, lacing her fingers together with his fury. Once in his library he pushed her inside and locked the door.
‘Then tell me what it was like for you, Celeste. Tell me what happened after the soldiers took you away from the house of Caroline Debussy; the same five soldiers who were found a day later with their throats cut in a room off the Champs Elysées.’
‘You know that?’
‘It was Guy Bernard who killed them for you, wasn’t it? He killed them because they had hurt you.’
‘No.’ The croak of the word was barely audible. ‘You can’t know this. You were not there. Anyone who was is dead.’
Tears were running down her cheeks now, tears that she did not even dash away as they fell unstopped, a dam of emotion that had suddenly burst.
‘What happened to you, then?’ This time he was gentler. This time he felt his own throat thicken. ‘Tell me, Celeste, and then live, damn it!’
She brought one hand up, running it through her hair, and he could see the conflict of whether or not she should allow him the truth in her eyes. Finally, resolution settled.
‘What do you think might happen when five soldiers take a young girl to a private room?’
He’d asked himself the very same question, but was now silent as she continued.
‘They raped me for a whole day and all I thought of was you.’
‘Me?’ He could not quite understand what she was telling him over the loud beat of his heart, over the sound of rushing in his ears.
‘You were the only man who had ever touched me like that before...and so I pretended that...it was you until all...I could see was your face and all...I could feel was your body. I could even smell you there, that particular scent that I have never forgotten. Even when I screamed I imagined it was you.’
‘Hell, Celeste.’ This time he leaned forward and took her in his arms. This time she did not fight and she felt soft and right and warm. She felt like home as they stood together with the horror of the past streaming down her face.
‘It’s over now. I will see you safe. I promise it.’
He whispered the words into her hair as he held her close, the clock in the corner ticking away the moments and then the half hour.
He would keep the fury of all she had admitted inside him until he was alone, keep it in a place where it was controlled and manageable until he could deal with it in his own way. He kept swallowing away the thickness in his throat.
When she finally pulled back he let her go, but he was not quite finished with his questions, for he needed to know what had happened as desperately as she needed to tell him.
‘Then Bernard came and killed them all?’
She nodded. ‘He’d heard the commotion for his contacts had alerted him of the soldiers’ presence. I did nothing to stop him. I stood there and watched until every one of them was dead and I was glad of it.’
‘Good for you. I would have done the same thing. They deserved exactly what they got. Sometimes justice like that is the only punishment for men who have stepped so far outside humanity. Sometimes death is the only option for a depravity that is staggering.’
‘Thank you.’
‘For what?’
‘For listening. For not judging. Even for asking me to tell you because I am certain things like this are easier out than in and I have always thought that it was my fault, or my father’s.’
‘It’s not. I hope like hell that you know it wasn’t.’
‘I know. Now I know. Before I didn’t.’
He swallowed as he gave her his next words. ‘I want to talk to Guy Bernard when he comes. I want to have the chance to comprehend this revenge of his, to understand why he has come here now.’
