A Dangerous Collaboration (Veronica Speedwell, #4)

by Deanna Raybourn

“I am not your nanny, but if required, I will put either of you over my knee,”

Is there any feeling as delicious as the beginning of a new adventure? To be perched upon the precipice of a fresh endeavor, poised for flight, the winds of change ruffling the feathers, ah, that is what it means to be alive!

“I have always said that it is interesting people who find others interesting.”

“I am not interested in moths,” he admitted. “But I am interested in you.” “That,” I told him without a blush, “is entirely apparent.” “Good.”

He looked the sort of gentleman England had made a speciality of producing, stalwart, principled, and with an air of dutiful determination about him, the kind of man who would have been in the first charge at Agincourt.

“We have, both of us, acknowledged that our bond is unlike any we have shared with another on this earth. This friendship, this strange alchemy that knits us together, it is too fine a thing to let it be tarnished with whatever corrosion she has left behind. I think there can be nothing more between us until and unless all ghosts from the past have been exorcised.”

It was as peaceful a place as any I had seen, and I felt a curious somnolence steal over me. It was like walking into a storybook village, a sleepy place where folk never changed and life went on as it always had throughout the centuries.

“My, my, Miss Speedwell,” he said after a long moment, “what sharp eyes you have.” “The better for hunting butterflies,”

“‘Met.’ So tame a word for it. It was not a meeting, Veronica. I was introduced to her and it was like finding part of myself that had been somehow walking the earth without me. She was my other half when I had not realized I was incomplete.”

“What would you have done for me?” He shrugged and took his own step closer. “Whatever the situation required. I would have traveled with you to the furthest ends of creation. I would have delivered the child. I would have married you and given the damned thing a name if you wanted.”

She would exist for so short a time, but her existence brought something irreplaceable to the world. Perhaps her beauty was all the greater for the fact that it was fleeting.

“Come back whenever you like,” she told me softly. “There is a spare key in the stillroom if you want to let yourself in.” “That is very kind,” I replied. “It isn’t kindness to give a thirsty man water,” she said. “It is human decency.”

“I know when a person has been born in sunlight and when they’ve been born in shadow. You are a child of the moon, poppet. That darkness never leaves you. It is your constant companion, and it always will be. And you know it, don’t you?”

“I would not risk Veronica’s life,” Stoker said simply. “Why? Because you love her?” Tiberius jeered. “Much good your love will do her now, brother. She dies with the rest of us.” “But for now, she lives,”

“You think that is love, brother? That I should kill for her?” He shook his head, his eyes locked with mine. “You are the fool, Tiberius, because you still do not understand. I do not love her enough to kill for her.” He stepped to the edge of the rock. “I love her enough to die for her.”

“Veronica Speedwell, I meant it then and I mean it now and I shall mean it with every breath until my last. I love you.”

He grinned. I kissed him again. I did not think of Caroline. She was in his past, buried the moment he dove into the sea to save me. She would not haunt us again.

It was a lie told for the noblest of reasons, and in that moment of duplicity, I had never counted Tiberius higher in my esteem.

When she had been laid neatly, we each took up a handful of the piled earth and dropped it onto the shimmering cloth, offering a peaceful passing to the young woman who would rest forever in the garden at the edge of the sea.

I half expected him to protest, but I should have known him better than that. Adventure roared in his blood as it did in mine, and once more we would embark together.

“So, another adventure,” he said, a slow smile spreading across his features, illuminating his face like a pagan god. “Shall we begin? Hand in hand?” “And back to back,” I added with a grin. “The better to see our enemies.”