Page 24 of The Darkest Oath

Instead, Rollant nodded. “It will be done.”

* * *

The King’sannouncement came at the end of the month, and Rollant found himself on his horse returning to Charonne in mid-September. He didn’t race along the path this time. His horse trotted, and his mind wandered—to Élise.

He wondered if she was still alive and had endured the riots and the hunger that plagued the streets of Faubourg Saint-Antoine. And if she was alive, would she remember him as fondly as he remembered her, or had the relentless grip of survival erased every memory of him?

He’d follow the King’s command. But he feared what he might find in Paris. And more than that—he feared what Paris might awaken in him.

CHAPTER11

The Cost of Jealousy

FAUBOURG SAINT-ANTOINE, PARIS, SEPTEMBER 1788

Élise pulledthe dough and folded it over, pressing her palms into the creamy, gooey mess. The ache in her shoulders told her she couldn’t do it anymore, but she pressed on. Her fingers ached as did her feet. She wanted to rub her neck but feared Gabin would return and see the flour wasted. He had taken the day to seduce another woman who wanted to be his. Little did that woman know about his raging temper.

Gabin had never been kind to her since Rollant, forcing her to work double shifts every day while he took off doing whatever it was he did. She believed deep down he knew she was attracted to Rollant and wanted to leave him. It had gnawed at his stomach. She had betrayed him and there would be no forgiveness. She had lied to Gabin, but he couldn’t prove it. It ate at his ego, and he took out his frustrations on her. She had to hurry her rounds to the children and the widows and Madame Marie, now forced to the nighttime, which cost her hours of sleep.

The days had turned into months and months into seasons. Rollant had lived with her in her mind and dreams, though his face began to melt away into memory. She knew then what he meant when he had told her Amée’s face was a blur. The wish to be able to afford a painter to capture a loved one’s likeness in a portrait to keep for all time would have been nothing short of a miracle. Though she mused, Rollant may not recognize her with the dark circles under her eyes and her waist and arms being thinner than they already were. Her lips were cracked from the heat of the oven. She wanted water, but it was empty. There was no time to fill it.

As the world spun around her, she hoped no customers would come in. She fell against the bread counter, pressing the weight of her whole body into her hands on the dough.

“Is Monsieur Roux around?” a man’s voice startled her, and she stood up straight. She rolled her neck without looking over her shoulder.

“He is out,” she said, groaning and folding the dough once more with considerable effort. “May I help you?”

“I wanted to borrow his apprentice again,” the man said, his voice becoming more familiar.

She stopped.

It couldn’t be.

It had been more than half a year. The joy in her heart sprouted, but she plugged the spring. She blinked in rapid succession, trying to clear her vision. Her arm dropped to her side as she hesitantly turned around.

Rollant’s brow furrowed as his eyes ran down and up her body. She was repulsive to him, she figured. Hollow cheeks and threadbare clothes adorned her once full face and semi-healthy body. He saw the woman Gabin had hollowed out, a shadow of what she’d been. But maybe it was better this way. It was better for Rollant to see how broken she was so he wouldn’t stay long enough to get himself hurt. Her gaze dropped.

“You don’t want me,” she whispered and turned around to the dough again. She expected his footsteps to leave, not come closer. In an instant, he was beside her—his deep eyes staring into her soul.

“Has Gabin done this to you?” he asked. “Because of me?”

She wanted to cry, but there were no tears left to fall. But she wobbled, and he steadied his hand on her lower back. There was his touch, as gentle as always. He hadn’t changed. She lowered her head to his chest. Her body betrayed her, a reminder of how little she had left to give. For so long, she had carried the weight of survival, her will being the only force keeping her upright. But it had its limits.

“I’ve missed you,” she said without answering his question. She expected his arms to fold around her, but instead, a rigidity formed beneath his shirt, and his hands remained as they were.

“What has he done to you?” His hand hovered over her cheek.

She wished for his embrace but took his lack thereof as rejection. She was too miserable to be touched. She couldn’t lean on him. Depending on anyone was dangerous. If she let herself trust Rollant, she wondered what would happen when he left.

No, she had to stand on her own, no matter how much her body screamed otherwise. She lifted her head from his chest. “Nothing to bother you with. I am just a weak woman, unable to bear life,” she said, pushing him away to no avail.

He scoffed and turned her face to him with a soft touch of her cheek. “Élise, if you believe what you just said, then you are not the woman I have been thinking of all this time.”

Her eyes softened. She had been on his mind, but she doubted she would take up space in that big, beautiful head of his any longer. She steadied herself against the counter, feeling dizzy. The heat from the oven was too much, though winter seemed to have come early, and its freeze had set in her bones.

Rollant glanced at the dough. “I have eight days until I am on a boat to the port,” he said, meeting her gaze that drifted to his. “I have saved enough to take you away from here, give you a home.”

A home. She had never had a home. She’d had a bed and a blanket on nights she was lucky.

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