Camille wept anew.
When her tears had finally subsided, he asked quietly, “What happened to him?”
“He was buried in Westminster, behind St Martin-in-the-Fields.”
“He doesn’t belong there.” His arms tightened around her. “Would you let me bring him home to Lux estate?”
Camille drew back, tears turning her vision blurry. She wiped at her eyes, needing to see his expression. “You would bury him in your family’s cemetery?”
“Heismy family,” Renard said with conviction. Then his mouth curled into a small smile. “Besides, I don’t think my mother or father would have it any other way.”
Somehow the idea of family, of her son resting in the same place as the people who would’ve been his grandparents, people Camille knew had been good and kind in life, made the separation in death easier to bear.
Camille closed her eyes, envisioning a little boy with her red hair and Renard’s bright eyes. “I’d like that.”
He nodded. “I’ll have him moved tomorrow.”
“Thank you.”
His hands rubbed soft circles on her back, the touch gentle, familiar. “Milly, will you come back with me?”
That name, the one he’d used in private while they lay in each other’s arms, filled Camille with joy and pain. They’d known each other but a few weeks and had fallen so hard. Even now, she couldn’t understand the changes over that brief time. She wished to go back to that time—before the pregnancy, before the obsession which had led Renard to harm those whom he perceived had hurt her—and assess those feelings to pinpoint exactly when they’d both lost all sense of right and wrong. But she couldn’t go back, not when her memory was long and objective.
She pulled away. “No, Renard. I cannot go with you.”
He buried his face in her hair, as if her rejection hurt him physically. “Why must you keep running from me?”
The emotion in his voice pulled at her own. They were both creatures of dark things, selfish wishes. But they were not the same. No, even as unforgiveable as Renard’s actions against Flank and Grey were, he’d committed sins for the sake of someone else. While she had destroyed three lives, more, for her own pride.
“You know what I am,” she said, hating how her position and circumstances had damned her since the cradle. “I am bastard born, a blemish on society and the good name of bad men. Our first encounter was coincidence, the ones that followed were destined to ruin.”
“That’s nonsense, Camille.” Renard’s voice was firm, even as his touch gentled. “We are all more than our parents’ names and expectations. We are what we make of ourselves.”
“Then I am still a monster.”
Renard released her then, but not to retreat from her admission. He tipped up her chin and asked, “How could you think such rubbish? A second with you in a dark alley and I knew you’d fallen from the heavens.”
She pushed him away. “That’s unfair.” Her chest burned, her throat ached. “I’m not some angel to place in the clouds. If you knew what I’d done”—she bit her lip—“you’d never look at me the same.”
“You are a devil, you wretch. Not even hell would forgive what you’ve done!”
He cradled her face in his hands. “Then tell me. Make me understand.”
“It was me,” she whispered. “Itold the gossip sheets about the duke’s affair.”
Renard’s brows pinched. When his face cleared with understanding, his voice was incredulous. “Youthrew your own life into scandal? But why? Weren’t you taken care of?”
“There was a roof over our heads, and food for our bellies, if that’s what you mean. But myfather”—she couldn’t say the word without snarling—“kept my mother and me like pets. She, for his own satisfaction, and me... I was no more than a commodity to gain power.”
“What do you mean, Milly?”
Fresh tears blurred her gaze, but these were not from grief like the previous ones; these were droplets of pure rage. Rage and hurt she must share now, no matter how much it stung. Because the man before her had committed such atrocities believing she was an angel, when she’d been a vengeful spirit all along.
“I’ve had a good memory since I was a child,” she said. “Thedukeused me to impress benefactors for his foundations, put me on display for dinner parties under the guise of me being a distant relative. I was the perfect child, you see. I had to be. My mother raised me with the knowledge that a girl who obeys is safe. A ‘good girl’ is allowed to eat and wash and wear pretty dresses.
“But as I grew, and my beauty as a child did not fade, the duke’s interests in what I may gain for him changed.” Revulsion replaced the anger. She shuddered, remembering the hands that had run over her body, assessing her ‘true worth.’ “The duke sent for me one night to meet a friend of his, I thought to encourage the man to invest in one of his schemes, but I was not summoned for business, but for pleasure.”
Renard froze at her side, but he did not ask. Did not push. He waited for her to regain her composure.
