a drink.”
It was a horrible pub on the docks, the kind of place where gravel-voiced women slopped gin into grimy glasses for men who were already drunk at ten in the morning, but it was just what Eve needed: anonymous, cheap, windowless so she didn’t worry about people sneaking up behind her. Two shots of gin followed by a pint of bitter steadied her jumping pulse. She used to be proud of that slow pulse that got her through danger, but it had been a long time since she’d held up that coolly under pressure. Maybe the last time was in René Bordelon’s green-walled study.
René. She took another draught of beer, tasting hatred along with it. In Siegburg her hate had tasted bitter; now it was a sweet thing. Because now, she could do something about it. The satchel at her feet held a Luger. Not her old Luger with the scratch on the barrel, the one René had taken from her—but it would do.
Cameron, for all his gentlemanly air, knocked the gin back as fast as Eve, giving a murmured toast of “Gabrielle.” When Eve raised her eyebrows, he explained, “Another of my recruits. Shot in April of ’16. I rotate them, the ones I lost.” He raised his beer and said “Léon” before downing a swallow.
“Was I in your rotation?”
“No, only those confirmed dead.” Cameron’s eyes had that terrible drowning softness again. “Every week following your trial, I expected to get the news you’d died in Siegburg.”
“After Lili, I almost did.”
They looked at each other a long time, and then they ordered another round of gin. “Lili.”
They were both silent, until Cameron abruptly started saying something about a pension for Eve. “You’ll find it more useful than the medals. I knew you didn’t have any family, so I pushed a pension for you through the War Office. It’s not much, but it’ll keep you afloat. Maybe help you buy a house somewhere in London.”
“Thank you.” Eve didn’t want the medals, but she’d take the pension. It wasn’t like she’d be going back to typewriting with hands like hers; she needed something to live on.
Cameron studied her. “Your stammer’s better.”
“Go to prison, and you find there are worse things than a halting tongue.” She took another draught of beer. “And this helps.”
He set down his glass. “Eve, if I can—”
“So, what are you going to do now?” She cut him off fast, before he could say anything he’d regret.
“I was sent to Russia for a while, during their bit of upheaval. Siberia. The things I saw . . .” He sat blank-faced for a moment, and Eve wondered what he was seeing through the curtain of remembered Russian snows. She didn’t ask. “It’s Ireland next for me,” he resumed. “To run a training school.”
“School for what?”
“People like you.”
“Who n-needs people like me anymore? The war’s over.”
He laughed bitterly. “There’s always another war, Eve.”
Eve didn’t even want to think about the next war, or a generation of new, fresh-faced spies who would be fed into its gaping mouth. At least they’d have a good teacher. “When do you leave?”
“Soon.”
“Is your wife going?”
“Yes. And our child.”
“I’m glad you had—that is, I know your wife wanted a ch-child.” How wearying these courtesies were; Eve felt like she was struggling under a boulder. “What did you decide to name—”
He spoke softly. “Evelyn.”
Eve stared down at the sticky tabletop. “Why not Lili?” she heard herself ask. “Why not Gabrielle, or any of your others? Why was it me, Cameron?”
“If you could see yourself, you wouldn’t ask.”
“I can see myself. I’m a w-wreck.”
“Nothing could wreck you, Eve. You’ve got a core of steel.”
Eve took a shaky breath. “I’m sorry I d-deceived you. Ran out when you were sleeping and went back to Lille when you didn’t want me to return.” Her voice was thick. “I’m so sorry.”
“I know.”
Eve looked down at the table where his hand lay next to her maimed one. His shifted a little so that his thumb grazed the tip of her nearest finger.
“I wish—” Eve began, and stopped. Wished what? That he wasn’t married? Eve was too much of a mess to step into the place at his side even if that place was empty. That they could find a bed and curl up together anyway? Eve couldn’t bear to share a room with anyone; the nightmares were too bad. That they could go back a few years, to before? Before what, Siegburg? Lili? The war? “I wish you were happy,”