Page 68 of The Bachelor Spy
Which was likely true. So what was she hiding? “Then why are you here?” His body grew rigid in preparation for the confrontation. “Why take up a disguise in a manor house where you know a traitor works?”
“Would you believe me if I told you I’ve chosen to give up spying and take up domestic service?” Something flared in her eyes. “It’s almost the same, isn’t it? Treated as indispensable. Taking orders without recourse.”
He narrowed his eyes in answer. What was that about? “As I recall, you had very little interest in domestic life.”
“People change.” She shifted her weight, readying her body for an attack, he guessed. “Some are forced into change.”
Her words sliced through him. “And exactly how much have you changed?” He held her gaze. “Enough to threaten the lives of thousands of soldiers to the highest bidder?” He needed to force her hand, loosen her emotions. “Like brother, like sister?”
“I amnotmy brother.”
“Last I saw, you left right alongside him, abandoning me to a bloody shoulder and a sinking ship.”
“You know nothing.” Her jaw twitched. Her eyes held almost a wildness to them.
Ah yes. He readied himself. There was something wounded behind her defenses. Something he needed to poke at to get to the truth because—blast it all—she was devilishly good at keeping her composure.
Or always had been.
“I know you’re a coward … or so it seems.” He took a deliberate step closer. “I know you ran when things became—what should we call it—complicated?”
Her hands clenched at her sides.
“And I know,” he continued, infusing enough sarcasm into his voice to inspire her ire all the more, “that whatever excuse you’ve concocted for yourself these past months—whatever pretty lie you’ve been telling yourself to sleep at night—it doesn’t change the fact that you chose your traitor brother over your country.”
“Stop—”
“Does the truth sting? Or is it easier to play house and pretend you were never Agent Montgomery at all? That you didn’t nearly kill me?”
Her breath hitched. “I saved your life.”
“By leaving me to die?” He scoffed. “I do wonder—did you ever think of me? Did you wonder if I’d bled out while clinging to debris? If I even made it off the ship?” His voice turned cold, each phrase a calculated cut. “Or was it just some amusing story you and your brother laughed about afterward? ‘Remember that fool Blake? Wonder if the sharks got him.’”
Her face went white.
“I never thought you were so much like your brother until then.”
She came at him like a bolt of lightning.
Fast—faster than their first encounter in the servants’ corridor—and this time there was no restraint. No testing. Something powerful fueled her. Was it guilt? Fury due to her brother’s betrayal?
Grief?
Whatever the source, it was all aimed at him now.
Blake barely blocked her first strike, the impact jarring his arm. She followed through with a fist aimed at his ribs, which met its mark enough to incite a grunt from him, but he snagged her arm. She was already pivoting, using his momentum against him to hook his ankle.
He kept his feet—barely—pulling her off-balance in the process.
Her strikes came with desperate energy, almost wild in their execution. They fought in the moonlit room with a ferocity their first encounter had lacked. This wasn’t exploration. This was anger and hurt turned physical.
Self-protection was on his side, at least. And perhaps a little disappointment.
That she would fight as if she were the traitor.
“Whose side are you on, Evie?” he demanded, catching her wrist as she struck again.
“I can’t believe you’d even ask that.” Something frantic hung in her voice. “You, of all people. You who have known me best of all.”
