“It is a lot to take in—”
“—fucking boat home to his family.”
The strange names—Marthe, Fanny, Fran?oise—swirled through Marcus’s swimming brain, along with the realization that he had not only a grandfather but a grandmother as well. After years of being alone in the world, Marcus felt he was now part of a family. Warm feelings of obligation filled his hollow veins with gratitude. Even with his head bouncing on his neck like a pumpkin on a stalk as they careened along the Bordeaux–Paris road, Marcus was aware that he owed this third—no, fourth—chance at a new life to the chevalier de Clermont.
This new life would be his last, Marcus promised himself.
* * *
—
“REMEMBER, DON’T BOW TO ANYONE in this house. They won’t like it.” Gallowglass straightened Marcus’s limp, stained neckcloth. “I’m sure your mother was a lovely woman, but you’re in France now.”
Marcus put this bit of intelligence into a crowded compartment of his mind that he was reserving for future study.
“Soon, you will meet a woman called Fran?oise. She is not to be trifled with, no matter how appetizing she smells. Charles will beat you with his rolling pin if you so much as look at her,” Gallowglass continued, twitching Marcus’s coat into place. “And do not, under any circumstances, play cards with your aunt Fanny.”
An arresting combination of aromas, including pastry, lemons, and starch, filled the carriage. Three male wearhs sniffed the air like wolves tracking an alluring new animal. Marcus looked out the window, eager to see the creature attached to this irresistible scent.
“Oh la vache!” shrieked a rawboned woman of impressive height and lung capacity. “Qu’est-ce que c’est?”
“Mademoiselle Fran?oise. Do not be alarmed,” Hancock said, leaping out of the carriage and taking her hand. “He is nothing but a mewling infant, and poses no danger to you.”
“Infant!” Marcus exclaimed. He’d killed British soldiers, saved dozens of Americans and French patriots, assisted at several amputations, and fed off a cutthroat thief before accidentally killing him in Newburyport. He was no infant.
Marcus was, however, still a virgin. He eyed Fran?oise’s quivering lips with interest. They were full and moist, and promised pleasure. And the woman smelled heavenly.
Fran?oise’s eyes narrowed, and she pressed those lush lips together into a taut, forbidding line.
“This is Marcus. He belongs to Matthew. We thought we could leave him with Fanny.” Gallowglass climbed out of the carriage and gave the woman a dazzling smile.
It might have worked on a warmblood, but not on a wearh. Fran?oise crossed her arms, which made her look twice her already ample size, and snorted.
“You cannot leave him here. Madame Fanny is out,” she said.
“That does it. Take him to Philippe. Then we can make a run for it and be as far from Paris as possible when he explodes.” Davy wiped his brow with his cuff.
“Where is she?” Gallowglass sailed forth through the front doors, undeterred. Fran?oise bustled after him. “Denmark? Sept-Tours? Burgundy? London?”
“No, milord. Mademoiselle Fanny is at Dr. Franklin’s house. Helping him with his correspondence.” Fran?oise glared at Marcus, as if he were somehow to blame for her mistress’s absence.
“Correspondence, eh? Why, that old lecher.” Hancock began to gasp and wheeze again.
“We’ll just wait in the salon for her, if you don’t mind, Fran?oise. And perhaps Charles could fix a bit of something for young Master Marcus,” Gallowglass said cheerfully. “He’s feeling peaked from all the excitement, poor lamb.”
* * *
—
FRAN?OISE DEEMED MARCUS TOO COMMON and filthy for Fanny’s salon, and banished him instead to the kitchen.
Charles, the wearh who ruled that subterranean lair, was not female and did not smell as appetizing as Fran?oise did, but within thirty minutes of meeting him, Marcus felt nothing but love for the man. Charles took one look and put Marcus in a wingback chair near the fire. He then began rummaging in cellars, larders, and game pantries for something to tempt his appetite and soothe his stomach.
Marcus was sipping a heady mixture of red wine from Burgundy—he had never tasted anything like it—and blood from a Normandy wood pigeon when a tall blond wearh strode into the room. The creature was a bewildering mix of female and male, allure and aggression, sweetness and swagger. The long flaxen curls and frothy skirts indicated it was female. The crisply tailored army coat with brass buttons and braid, the triangular cocked hat embellished with a red, white, and blue rosette, the gun strapped to the hips, the culottes that peeked out from lace petticoats, and sturdy shoes suggested the opposite.