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"Turn over. On your side." Away from me. He could not bear to become another thing she had to brace herself against.

She shifted, her injured arm cradled against her chest, her hip finding the mattress. The movement pulled her hair loose from whatever had been holding it. It fell across the pillow in a dark spill, the ends curling against the linen.

He sat on the bed behind her. The mattress dipped under his weight, and his hip settled against the curve of her lower back. Her body was still warm from working hard all afternoon, but her breathing was shallower than it should be.

He drew her injured arm out along the coverlet. The skin around the cut was warm and slightly swollen, the edges still seeping.

He could fix this. Skill returned like a servant answering a bell. Clean wound. Stop bleeding. Stitch. Bandage. Watch for fever.

Then leave.

Never lose his temper with her again.

Never discuss loyalty.

Never discuss souls.

When he touched the needle to her skin, she shivered and shut her eyes tight. The first stitch went in.

He exhaled. "I had a twin sister."

He kept his eyes on the wound. The thread, the angle, the tension.

"Her name was Charlotte. One day she went missing. I found out she had been raped. By two of my friends."

She gulped. "How did you know there were two?"

"A footman saw them leave the room. Charlotte was crying."

The needle went through again. Out. The thread pulled taut.

"She killed herself."

He said the words flat, quick, like crossing bad ground at speed.

He didn't speak about it for a reason. Now he would not be able to close his eyes without seeing the gray waters swirling and the bonnet turning in the current.

"Did you see her?"

His hand stopped for half a beat. "No."

"Then how—?"

"They found her bonnet at the river. Her cloak too, farther down. My father had men searching for days. I vowed to avenge her. I killed the first—Andrew Fawkes, Marquess of Gaunt. The second, Antoine de Montmorency, fled south and vanished somewhere along the Barbary Coast. My father sent me to the Theresian Military Academy near Vienna to escape the prosecution." The needle again. He felt her arm tense. "That is where I met Gaetan."

He reached for the brandy. Poured it. She hissed.

"In 1797 I returned to England. Earned my own battalion. Three years later, the first letter arrived. Clues on the second man's whereabouts. But they came with a cost." He blotted the wound. "I had to infiltrate the Foreign Office. Report on certain—movements. Pass certain information. The clues kept coming. The cost kept rising. Fifteen years later, here I am."

"Did the letters ever lead you to him?" she asked.

"Near him. Talleyrand has an exquisite understanding of distance. Near enough to keep a man walking. Never near enough to arrive."

His fingers had gone cold. Interesting. The body possessed an astonishing memory for catastrophes the mind had spent years forgetting.

"Talleyrand?"

"Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord. Former Bishop of Autun." Something in her expression made his hands slow. "Do you recognize the name?"