Iniquity (The Premonition, #5)(22)

When I don’t stop, but continue to hurry toward the gabled doors of the stables where I’ve stowed my bicycle, his voice turns stern. “Simone!”

I stop immediately, my feet as lead, and turn toward him to wait. He leans on the silver, wolf-shaped handle of his black cane; his left foot drags as he moves toward me on the drive. His limp is the second thing I noticed when I had met him. The first was that he has the face of an angel.

Emil had been a pilot early on in the war, but was wounded when British forces shot up his plane. He managed to make it back to his base and salvage his aircraft, a feat for which he earned a commendation. His award means nothing to him. It only serves as a reminder to him that he’ll never be allowed to fly another combat mission; a fact that causes him as much agony as the bullet still lodged in his leg. He has been working in intelligence ever since—stationed in Lille.

That’s how I met Emil. He needed a nursemaid—someone who could see to his wound and help him with his daily activities. I had been hand picked by him. He had found me when German infantry soldiers forced me, and many French citizens, into the streets of Lille on an April morning. The young and able-bodied women of Lille were to be transported to German labor camps by the order of General von Graevenitz. Emil had been there and had addressed the assembled crowd as carts pulled up to take us to waiting trains.

Emil announced that he needed someone who could speak and read English, someone who could also dress wounds and help him with his rehabilitation. Being the niece of a physician, my aunt pushed me forward from the crowd, thinking she was saving me from the slavery of a work camp. She frantically announced that I had trained under her husband to assist him in his medical practice, which was almost a complete fabrication. I’d been helping her treat minor ailments in the absence of my uncle, but I was not properly trained. Had she known what would happen next, I know she wouldn’t have spoken up. She didn’t know then that she was delivering me to the devil.

“What kind of girl is she?” Emil had asked my aunt, giving me a cool, assessing stare, like he was discussing a calf in the marketplace.

My aunt was only too eager to tell him, “She’s bright. She knows English—her father is French and her mother is British. Her mother taught her several languages—and the piano. She plays the piano like an angel.”

“An angel you say?” Emil had smiled. “How is her disposition? Is she skittish?”

“Skittish?” My aunt had asked. “Why no. She’s a very sensible young lady.”

Emil had slowly taken his pistol from his side holster and held the barrel to my forehead. The gunmetal was cold against my skin. I didn’t move as I gazed into his hooded blue eyes. My aunt beside me was aflutter, sputtering and gasping in her consternation. I barely heard her shrieks, my only thought in that moment was that I’d never see Nicolas’ beautiful brown eyes again or his boyish grin.

With Emil’s eyes still on me, his arm pivoted, removing the gun from my head to point it at my aunt beside me. The sound of the shot had made me flinch. My eyes strayed from his to my aunt’s body in the gutter. Blood had exploded onto the faces of the women who had been behind my aunt. They were all wailing now, screaming in terror, but I could hardly hear them as the shot had deafened me. I didn’t make a sound. I just stood there in shock, wondering numbly how that could happen. Emil took off his officer jacket and wrapped it gently around my shoulders as I trembled. He then pulled my wedding ring from my finger and tossed it upon the body of my aunt. “You are mine now,” he had said before he led me away to his waiting car.

“Is a ghost whispering in your ear?” Emil asks me now. He touches my cheek gently. “You’ve gone quite pale.”

“I was just on my way to Olympia to see if they have any more of the jam you like. We’ve run completely out, and I thought you might want it for the journey,” I lie.

He has a faraway look. “You’re just as you were on the morning I found you—so pale—so beautiful. Has it really been more than two years ago?”

“Almost two and a half,” I murmur.

“The needle in the hay, that’s what you were, Simone, and I found you.”

“I hardly remember that day,” I lie. It’s etched in my brain. I have nightmares of it often.

Emil smiles at me now in admiration as he had then. “Nothing breaks your heart. You’re bulletproof. You’re like me—we both keep so many secrets.”

“If I don’t go now, it will be closed.”

My excuse to meet Xavier slips away from me the moment I see his scowl. “I don’t want your French jam. It will taste like the bitterest defeat now. I’ll never eat it again.” He watches me for a moment. His thumb comes up to trace my lips. I drop my chin. He lifts the silver wolf head of his cane beneath my chin, raising it so that he can see my eyes. “Do you know what I want?” he asks.

“No.”

“I’d like a kiss.”

I show no emotion as I lift my lips to his cheek and press them lightly against his skin. As I pull away, my eyes meet his.”

“You belong to me, Simone. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

He touches the lace of my collar, admiring the fine detail of the day dress he chose for me. “Good. Come, I want to hear you play while the staff packs.” He takes my hand and leads me back toward the grandeur of the main house. I don’t resist. Entering through the kitchen, I nearly stumble to a halt as I see the blood-spattered wall and lifeless body of Tomas, the head chef, near the cast iron stove. Emil’s hand gestures toward the blood pooling on the floor. “Tomas cannot come with us to our next location. I will miss him; I enjoyed his soufflé.”