Page 83 of Dagger’s Shield

“What the fuck, Aristide?” Rémy shouted at him.

If I turned on him, he would fire before I covered half the distance, so I kept my hands where he could see them and waited for something to take his eyes off me.

Just as Géraud shouted at Rémy to get the door open. Dagger stepped out from behind a tank.

“Drop your fucking gun, Géraud. Now!”

In the split second Géraud looked up at him, Rémy lunged.

“No!” I screamed.

The first and second shots went off simultaneously. Rémy slunk to the floor, and Géraud folded where he stood.

Dagger’s weapon was still raised as he came toward us. Preacher and Cassidy were right behind him. I dropped to my knees beside my cousin while they made sure Géraud’s weapon was secure.

Preacher looked over at me. “He’s gone.”

“Rémy,” I said, cupping his cheek. “Please look at me.”

His eyes found mine. “Maëlle?”

“I’m here.”

He drew me closer. “Rhône.” He gasped.

“I don’t understand.”

“Rhône.” He said the word, then his eyes turned unfocused. Like Géraud, my cousin was gone.

Killian was already next to me and wrapped me into his arms.

“Go,” said Preacher. “Get her out of here. We’ve got this.”

He helped me to my feet, like I was a child, and held me close to him. Neither of us spoke as we crossed the yard together.

I stood next to him as he opened the side door into the chateau. I took a step inside, and the noise from the party washed over me, bringing me out of the trance I’d fallen under. Between the band and two hundred voices shouting over each other, no one in that room had heard a damn thing that had happened across the yard.

Maman found us before we entered the throng. “There you are! Where is Rémy? He promised me the first dance of the year.”

“There was an alarm in the vat house. He’s seeing to it,” I told her. The smile I wore was as false as the lie I told without giving it a single thought.

She clicked her tongue. “The boy does nothing but work.” Her warm hand wrapped around my cold one as she pulled me into the crowd that had begun the countdown.

“Dix! Neuf! Huit!”

We reached the middle of the floor as the numbers ran out, and when two hundred voices shouted, “Bonne année!” I kissed my fiancé and smiled through the tears I couldn’t stop from falling.

Over Killian’s shoulder, I found my father. His eyes went from us to the doors he’d watched all night, then to us again. The man he’d waited for hadn’t come, and now, Rémy was gone from the room as well, and somehow, he already knew why.

19

DAGGER

Maëlle’s hand was so cold that I held it between both of mine and brought it to my mouth. Worse was the glazed-over look in her eyes.

I’d participated in enough cleanups to know what was happening across the yard. The bodies would go out first, then the phones—Géraud’s and Rémy’s both—then every trace of what had taken place in the last hour would be washed away. Before dawn, whatever vehicle Géraud had arrived in would be gone, and there’d be no evidence remaining that he’d ever been at Valais.

As the clock struck, fireworks cracked over the vineyard and I kissed Maëlle. Her father watched us over the heads of his guests. I could feel his gaze without needing to look.