Page 36 of The Darkest Oath

Again,they walked too close, their hands loosely intertwined and hidden in the folds of their coats. As they nearedAu Pain Roux, the sun was on course to set.

Rollant gave her a surge of strength. His grip was steady, his calloused palm firm yet warm against hers. The faint roughness of his skin spoke of labor, but his touch carried a gentleness she had never known before his.

Gabin’s grip, like that of her father’s and aunt’s, had always been rough, cold, like a vice meant to control. Rollant’s hand was different—it lingered like an ember, radiating a heat that seeped through her fingers and traveled up her arm. Even as the chill of evening bit at her exposed cheeks, the warmth of his hand made her forget the cold. It made her miss his touch before he even left.

For a moment, she let herself imagine what Rollant had given her for a few days—a quiet room of her own, the freedom to rise and rest without Gabin’s fists dictating her every move.

But it was temporary—a dream, and dreams had no place in her life. Every time she tried to escape, she had been dragged back—first by her father, then her aunt. Each return was worse than the last. And what if Rollant held something darker behind his promise?

His deep voice broke through her thoughts. “If I could give you a life without fear, I would,” he said softly. “I can still give you another life somewhere else, Élise. You don’t have to go back.”

Her tears blurred the sight of him as he stepped between her and the bakery down the street. His warmth left her as he withdrew his hand to keep any observers from witnessing their touch. He was a man doomed to be bound to the shadows of her life.

She studied him, searching for cracks in his words, for the hidden cost she’d always expected. But there was only sincerity in his eyes. Her fingers tightened around her new coat. For the first time, doubt wavered—not in him, but in the walls she had built around herself.

A sudden swelling in her chest told her that what Rollant offered didn’t have to be a dream. She could still leave, but she had waited too long. Rollant had to return to port in the morning. There wasn’t enough time, and even if there were, her hand would be empty as it had always been. She pulled the coat’s collar around her chin. Her gaze drooped; the new wool did not hold his scent of old wood and candle smoke.

“I don’t know when I will be on leave again, given the current environment,” he continued as if reading her mind and assuming her dissenting answer. “But I will provide you a respite again should you want it when I return.”

“Ifyou return,” she whispered, reminding herself why she could not take his offer.

He swallowed visibly. A quiet quiver wrapped his balled hand. “Élise, do you want me to stay away? I will if you desire it. If I—if I am making life harder for you?—”

The hot tears burst from her eyes, and she quickly wiped them away. A man who asked such a question could not wish her harm. “Yes, my life has been harder since you entered it, but . . . I can’t imagine the rest of my life without you being a part of it in some way.”

The weight of her new dress and coat mirrored the dread gnawing in her belly, either at returning to the bakery or at the chance she would never see Rollant again.

“The thought of making your life harder hurts me deeply,” he whispered. “Promise me, next time I come, you will not be in the same state I found you in.”

She took a chance, grabbed both his hands, and stepped into his space. She wished for him to kiss her lips, her forehead, anything, but he remained a sentinel, protecting her from prying eyes and maybe even heartbreak should he not return.

“I will not let Gabin destroy me,” she promised with an ache in the back of her throat. “I will find the strength you say I have.”

“You’ve already found it,” he whispered, leaning in. Her gaze dropped to his bottom-heavy lips, but he turned and gestured toward the bakery. “May I escort you in and see to it you are well before my departure?”

She nodded with her lips pressed thin. “Thank you, Monsieur,” she whispered and took the arm he offered, embarrassed at her actions. What was she thinking? What if someone saw them and told Gabin? He’d beat her to death.

The wooden sign above the bakery door flapped in the wind. Each hit on the stone façade echoed like Gabin’s fists against her flesh, jolting her nerves.

Élise hesitated in the shadow, hearing an inner door slam. Rollant stopped beside her, and she drew his gaze. Her eyes closed. “I have survived worse,” she whispered.

“It’s not too late,” Rollant offered. “You can leave.”

She shook her head. Without Rollant there after the morning, what would she do until he came back;ifhe came back?

Shadows loomed from the bakery entrance. Her fingers turned cold; her stomach rolled. The world spun for a moment.

Curse her life.

She only had to choose: certainty with Gabin or uncertainty with or without Rollant. Envisioning the pain and the hunger that awaited her from within the bakery almost made her choose the latter. But her friends needed her if they were still alive.

Madame Marie. The orphans. Their hungry faces haunted her. If she left, who would care for them? But maybe, just once, she deserved to choose herself.

She only had to choose.

Deep within her heart, she knew she wanted to leave Gabin. She spun to face Rollant and opened her mouth to accept his offer, but Malo and Yves approached the bakery’s entrance.

Before she could accept, Yves shouted with a glint in his eye, “Élise! Good to see you back. You all well now?”

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