The Paris Agent(42)

“We did some good work here,” Noah said solemnly, glancing between us.

“I will never understand how that village was bombed,” Adrien said. “It still keeps me up at night.”

We all stood in silence at that, until Noah said hesitantly, “They’ll debrief you thoroughly, Adrien. You’ll have days of questioning.”

“I know. And I’m ready.”

I could see there was more Noah wanted to say, and yet he stood frozen, as if the words were stuck at the end of his tongue. Just then, we heard the plane approaching, and the next moments passed in a blur as we guided it to land.

Adrien clambered into the body of the plane and our new w/t operator, François, scrambled out to the field to replace him. And soon we were helping François to Clément’s farmhouse where he would stay for several days, until Noah could secure a bicycle for him, at which point he would cycle the six miles to the nearby village of Donzenac and secure himself a room there.

As the circuit courier, I would soon spend much of my time cycling back and forth to ferry messages, but this was the safest option given the likelihood that Germans were wandering the streets with D/F units, scanning for signals.

It was only much later, when Noah and I finally fell into bed beside one another, that I had the chance to ask, “When Adrien was leaving, I could see you wanted to say something more to him.”

“Yes,” he said seriously, but then he gave a chuckle. “Josie. You read me so well.”

I knew how his shoulders would slump when he was tired. I knew how his footsteps grew heavy when he was frustrated. I knew Noah Ainsworth’s every expression—his every mood. He knew me just as well. It was part of the wonder of our relationship—how perfectly in sync we had fallen.

“What did you want to say to him?”

Noah tensed even as he pulled me into the circle of his arms.

“He knows about us. I’m certain of it.”

“What? But how?” We were so rarely all together. I was the go-between as the circuit courier, and we had stuck to that arrangement faithfully, even when we were planning the factory sabotage.

“You probably didn’t even notice, but I brushed my hand against yours as I passed you at the field,” Noah said, frustration in his voice. He was right—I hadn’t noticed. Noah was so affectionate that he was constantly touching me when we were alone, and we were well out of the habit of remembering we were not actually married when in the company of other people. “I forgot myself for a moment. I looked up and realized he was staring at us and I just… I don’t know how to explain it. His expression was so dismayed. So serious. I know that he knows.”

“Okay,” I said, but adrenaline was surging in my body, my heart pounding against the wall of my chest. “That doesn’t mean he’ll tell Baker Street.”

“My love,” Noah said helplessly. “Adrien is a faithful agent. He has risked his life for this work, and he will no doubt do so again in the future. I couldn’t even bring myself to ask him to lie for us because I knew that he would never agree.”

“So he tells them he suspects a romantic entanglement,” I said, throat going dry. “That doesn’t mean they’ll separate us. We’ve done incredible work here, you said so yourself. Surely they’ll see—”

“Josie,” he interrupted me, his arms contracting around me. But he didn’t need to contradict me because I knew why our relationship was an issue, and it had nothing to do with our effectiveness.

The intimacy Noah and I shared was a strength when it came to our bond. It was a weakness when it came to our work. An agent needed to keep a cool head if he or she was interrogated. Romantic love, or even close friendship, was a vulnerability the Germans could easily exploit, and this was exactly why Miss Elwood had warned me about my friendship with Noah in the first place.

“What do we do if they recall one of us? Or if they send us elsewhere?” I asked miserably.

“We need a plan,” Noah agreed, brushing his lips against my hair.

“How can we plan for this? We don’t know when the war will end. We don’t know where we’ll be when that happens. How will we find one another?”

“Twice now, life has brought us together. I have to believe we will find one another again. We have to do our jobs now, and even if that means we work apart for some months or even years, it will all be worth it when we can be together in a better world later.”

“I don’t have a key to my old apartment in Paris but the upstairs window frames are all a little worn. If you climb up onto the balcony, you could jiggle one open…climb inside and stay there until I arrive,” I said suddenly. “If the war ends and I’m in France, I’ll find a way to get myself there.”

“Good. And if we have made our way back to England by then, Baker Street will connect us.”

“If the war ends,” I whispered sadly.

“We have to believe the war will end, my love,” he told me softly. “If we entertain any other possibility, we’ll find ourselves too depressed to be of any use.”

It came as no surprise a few days later when François received a message that our circuit was being disbanded. Noah would be sent to initiate a new circuit in the Corrèze commune and was to sit tight and await instructions as to when, but I was being immediately deployed to join the Success circuit in Paris.