Page 5 of Whispers At Dawn
Jack released a dramatic sigh. ‘Not this again. How many times do I have to explain that I was merely concerned for your safety?’
‘Hmm, let me see.’ Lizzie raised her eyes to the ceiling and counted on her fingers as if she were trying to figure it out. ‘Until the end of days should do it,’ she announced, throwing him an impish grin.
‘You’ve got it, then. I will spend every day making up to you for the error of my ways. If it means I get to be with you like this forever, then it’s worth swallowing my foolish pride.’
‘Did you think you would always be a bachelor?’ Lizzie probed, not quite ready to let the line of questioning go.
Jack rubbed his dark stubble. ‘I was married to the job. Although I suppose the truth is, I never met the right woman. Not until you came along and beguiled me with your argumentative style of interrogation!’
Jack tickled Lizzie’s side, and she squealed as she wriggled and soon, they were kissing again and forgot the serious talk about how they met and fell in love.
As dusk descended, Jack handed her a cup of tea and Lizzie thought about her family at Regent’s Park. That morning, she told her mother she had to go into work and would be on the night shift, so she’d catch some sleep at the office and be home on Sunday. Ma rarely questioned her long hours, although Lizzie sometimes wondered that she didn’t think it strange her daughter was called to do so many night shifts in the office. But as everyone worked long hours for the war effort, and Lizzie was a FANY, she tried to make it seem normal. Her father never questioned her comings and goings because he knew the truth about her work, which relieved some of the burden of her secret life. When her mother did suspect something wasn’t quite as it should be, he would expertly lead her off the scent and wink at Lizzie.
‘I don’t like lying to Ma,’ she murmured against Jack’s chest when he slotted back into the spot next to her. ‘But it’s that or never stay over with you. I can hardly say you’re my lover, can I? She’d be appalled by my wanton behaviour.’
He stroked her hair, and the touch of his comforting large hand calmed her anxious thoughts.
Jack always made her feel safe.
‘I know, my love,’ his voice soothed, washing away her worries. ‘Although you’ve chosen the wrong line of work if you want to avoid lying. The Official Secrets Act means we lie for a living, or had you not noticed?’
‘At least I won’t need to lie to them when we’re in Toulouse,’ she said. ‘I know you think it’s strange I’m so excited for us to go undercover, but that’s one of the main reasons. I live an undercover life here, anyway.’
Jack laughed. ‘We’ll have to lie to everyone in Toulouse. And there was me thinking, you were so keen because you can’t wait to share my bed at night and ravage my body at every opportunity.’
‘You’re not wrong. I can’t think of anything more wonderful than falling asleep and waking up in your arms,’ Lizzie said dreamily, her voice overflowing with tenderness.
‘Just as well you’re staying here tonight, then,’ he said, tightening his arm around her shoulders.
‘Talking of lies, we need to create a solid cover story for me to tell my family. Have you given it any thought?’ Lizzie asked.
Jack shifted, pulling Lizzie up the bed slightly as he repositioned himself against the headboard and lit a cigarette.
‘I have.’
‘Why am I not in the least surprised? Go on, then. Fill me in. What’s the plan?’
‘I was thinking you could be called away urgently by the FANYs.’
‘What branch?’
Jack’s deep voice reverberated. ‘We’ll make something up. It’s a great cover story. Your father knows better than to look for you, and if your mother tries, she won’t find any information about the non-existent office. You can say you’re working on war records. It’s not unlikely the government would keep the exact location under wraps, given the scale and intensity of the bombing around the country.’
Lizzie nodded. ‘Nowhere’s safe. They blitzed Liverpool to smithereens.’
‘Yes, it got a terrible hammering.’
‘Alright, so we’ll go with that. I’ll start thinking about how to break it to my mother. Val said we need to prepare to stay for as long as we can maintain our cover, so we may be there a few months, unless something goes wrong.’
‘That sounds about right. We don’t know what awaits us over there. By the sounds of it, the Gaullists are recruiting new Resistance members like wildfire and building networks, but we have very little going on.’ Jack disentangled himself from Lizzie’s warm body. ‘I’m going to shave. Tell your parents you may be gone a while, and you will write. We’ll have Val arrange to send postcards from you like when you were in Paris.’
‘It sounds reasonable enough,’ Lizzie said. ‘What would have been considered immodest behaviour for an unmarried woman before the war—me being posted across the country on a work assignment—is now just business as usual in wartime. As horrendous as this war is, ironically, it’s given women freedom from being chained to the hearth.’
‘Wait until you see the château. I promise I won’t chain you to the hearth, though. You’ll love it.’
Lizzie sucked in her breath and raised her head to search his eyes. ‘You never said anything about a château …’
‘Didn’t I?’
