Page 57 of Dagger’s Shield

I was nearly out of the room when she spoke again.

“Maëlle?”

“Oui, Maman?”

“No matter what it is, you can always tell me the truth. I will not judge you for it. Please promise me you understand what I’m saying.”

“I do. I promise.”

Those four words were truer than any other I’d spoken. My mother would not judge me. But when the truth came out, she might not forgive me, either.

13

DAGGER

While Maëlle went to meet her mother, I let myself out through the courtyard and walked into the vines.

The excuse I’d given her was that I needed air. The truth was I wanted to be alone, somewhere I could think without anyone witnessing me sorting through emotions that I’d never experienced before.

When I’d told her I’d take away all her pain if I could, I meant it. I knew she was strong. Witnessing how she’d handled herself after the bombing proved it to me. She’d been buried under rubble, yet she’d had the presence of mind to find a way to make enough noise for someone to find her, to know she was alive. That in itself was remarkable. But now, seeing her family dynamic, I realized Maëlle had overcome adversity her whole life.

My parents had supported my sister and me no matter what harebrained idea we came up with. When we were teenagers, there had been plenty. Me wanting to open a motorcycle shop had been the least of them.

The summer Alena decided she was a fortune teller, our mum sewed the costume without asking a single question and I spent a week listening outside the tea shop so she’d have material. The year we built a raft out of pallets and sold tickets for the maiden voyage, it sank in four feet of canal water while our dad stood on the bank, laughing too hard to help.

Meanwhile, Maëlle had had none of that. Her father considered her gender too much of a handicap to her doing work she would’ve been brilliant at. Her mother struck me as strong, but not enough to stand up to Bertrand.

So what had mon feu done? She’d charted her own course, leaving home at eighteen to pursue dreams that were all her own. She’d risen through the ranks of DGSE without much guidance. When she landed at Minerva, she was surrounded by both men and women who served as mentors to her. That was where she really thrived.

I’d had nothing to do with her success, yet I was proud of her anyway. So very proud.

Now, if our suspicions were correct, her father would face criminal charges. Worse was his connection to Géraud if what we believed about him proved true. Yet she didn’t hesitate. More than once, she’d said she wouldn’t protect her father by hiding anything she learned.

When I went to work for MI6 and later Unit 23, I’d vowed to protect the Crown from any danger, any enemy. No such vow was required for Minerva Protocol. I gave it anyway.

So here she was, faced with the one thing that might make some waver in their loyalty. Not Maëlle. I believed with all my heart that if it were anyone else in her family, she’d do the same thing. Truth and justice drove her. Period.

When I heard footsteps on the gravel at the end of the row, I knew they belonged to Maëlle. She walked along the vines with her collar up and her arms wrapped around her waist. I knew the tell. Whatever had happened with her mother showed.

I moved over on the low stone wall where I sat. She sat beside me, close enough that our shoulders touched.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked after several seconds of silence.

“She knows I’m lying,” she said. “Only not what about. She accused me of thinking she’d no longer be alive in May.”

“And is she wrong?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Good. She’ll need you to believe she’ll get better in order to fight the cancer.”

“What she sees is my pain. I lie to strangers for a living and sleep fine. My mother doesn’t feel the lies. She feels me. She knows something is wrong. I’m good enough to fool her and not good enough to spare her, and I don’t know which one makes me worse.”

“Neither,” I said. “If that’s your failure, I hope you never fix it.”

Whether it was only our mood or that of the rest of the family too, I couldn’t say. But dinner was far more subdued tonight. Chantal appeared tired, Bertrand disinterested, and Rémy distracted.

“Forgive my reticence,” Rémy said, halfway through the meal. “This time of year is especially busy.”