“You are well, I hope?” His thick, dark brows knit and his gaze swept over her.
“I am very well.” Except she could not breathe at the moment and her legs seemed too weak to hold her upright, but that was his effect on her, not malaise.
His features relaxed. “And your son?”
She lowered her eyes. “Claude was well last I saw him.”
He fell silent, as if he realised her answer hid some- thing she did not wish to disclose. Finally he spoke again. “I thought you would be in France.”
She shrugged. “My aunt lives here. This is her shop. She needed help and we needed a home. Vraiment, Belgium is a better place to—how do you say?—to rear Claude.”
She’d believed living in Belgium would insulate Claude from the patriotic fervour Napoleon had generated, especially in her own family.
She’d been wrong.
Gabriel gazed into her eyes. “I see.” A concerned look came over his face. “I hope your journey from Spain was not too difficult.”
It was all so long ago and fraught with fear at every step, but there had been no more attacks on her person, no need for Claude to risk his life for her.
She shivered. “We were taken to Lisbon. From there we gained passage on a ship to San Sebastian and then another to France.”
She’d had money stitched into her clothing, but without the capitaine’s purse she would not have had enough for both the passage and the bribes required to secure the passage. What would have been their fate without his money?
The money.
Emmaline suddenly understood why the captain had come to her shop. “I will pay you back the money. If you return tomorrow, I will give it to you.” It would take all her savings, but she owed him more than that.
“The money means nothing to me.” His eyes flashed with pain. She’d offended him. Her cheeks burned. “I beg your pardon, Gabriel.”
He almost smiled. “You remembered my name.”
She could not help but smile back at him. “You remembered mine.”
“I could not forget you, Emmaline Mableau.” His voice turned low and seemed to reach inside her and wrap itself around her heart.
Everything blurred except him. His visage was so clear to her she fancied she could see every whisker on his face, although he must have shaved that morning. Her mind flashed back to those three days in Badajoz, his unshaven skin giving him the appearance of a rogue, a pirate, a libertine. Even in her despair she’d wondered how his beard would feel against her fingertips. Against her cheek.
But in those few days she’d welcomed any thought that strayed from the horror of seeing her husband killed and hearing her son’s anguished cry as his father fell on to the hard stones of the cobbled street.
He blinked and averted his gaze. “Perhaps I should not have come here.”
Impulsively she touched his arm. “Non, non, Gabriel. I am happy to see you. It is a surprise, no?”
The shop door opened and two ladies entered. One loudly declared in English, “Oh, what a lovely shop. I’ve never seen so much lace!”
These were precisely the sort of customers for whom Emmaline had improved her English. The numbers of English ladies coming to Brussels to spend their money kept increasing since the war had ended.
If it had ended.
The English soldiers were in Brussels because it was said there would be a big battle with Napoleon. No doubt Gabriel had come to fight in it.
The English ladies cast curious glances towards the tall, handsome officer who must have been an incongruous sight amidst all the delicate lace.
“I should leave,” he murmured to Emmaline.
His voice made her knees weaken again. She did not wish to lose him again so soon.
He nodded curtly. “I am pleased to know you are well.” He stepped back.
He was going to leave!
“Un moment, Gabriel,” she said hurriedly. “I—I would ask you to eat dinner with me, but I have nothing to serve you. Only bread and cheese.”
His eyes captured hers and her chest ached as if all the breath was squeezed out of her. “I am fond of bread and cheese.”
She felt almost giddy. “I will close the shop at seven. Will you come back and eat bread and cheese with me?”
Her aunt would have the apoplexie if she knew Emmaline intended to entertain a British officer. But with any luck Tante Voletta would never know.
“Will you come, Gabriel?” she breathed.
His expression remained solemn. “I will return at seven.” He bowed and quickly strode out of the shop, the English ladies following him with their eyes.
When the door closed behind him, both ladies turned to stare at Emmaline.
She forced herself to smile at them and behave as though nothing of great importance had happened.
“Good morning, mesdames.” She curtsied. “Please tell me if I may offer assistance.”
They nodded, still gaping, before they turned their backs and whispered to each other while they pretended to examine the lace caps on a nearby table.
Emmaline returned to folding the square of lace she’d held since Gabriel first spoke to her.
It was absurd to experience a frisson of excitement at merely speaking to a man. It certainly had not happened with any other. In fact, since her husband’s death she’d made it a point to avoid such attention.
She buried her face in the piece of lace and remembered that terrible night. The shouts and screams and roar of buildings afire sounded in her ears again. Her body trembled as once again she smelled the blood and smoke and the sweat of men.
She lifted her head from that dark place to the bright, clean white of the shop. She ought to have forgiven her husband for taking her and their son to Spain, but such generosity of spirit eluded her. Remy’s selfishness had led them into the trauma and horror that was Badajoz.
Emmaline shook her head. No, it was not Remy she could not forgive, but herself. She should have defied him. She should have refused when he insisted, I will not be separated from my son.
She should have taken his yelling, raging and threatening. She should have risked the back of his hand and defied him. If she had refused to accompany him, Remy might still be alive and Claude would have no reason to be consumed with hatred.
How would Claude feel about his mother inviting a British officer to sup with her? To even speak to Gabriel Deane would be a betrayal in Claude’s eyes. Claude’s hatred encompassed everything Anglais, and would even include the man who’d protected them and brought them to safety.
But neither her aunt nor Claude would know of her sharing dinner with Gabriel Deane, so she was determined not to worry over it.
She was merely paying him back for his kindness to them, Emmaline told herself. That was the reason she’d invited him to dinner.
The only reason.
The evening was fine, warm and clear as befitted late May. Gabe breathed in the fresh air and walked at a pace as rapid as when he’d followed Emmaline that morning. He was too excited, too full of an anticipation he had no right to feel.
He’d had his share of women, as a soldier might, short-lived trysts, pleasant, but meaning very little to him. For any of those women, he could not remember feeling