Page 33 of Dagger’s Shield

“I’d pay good money to watch that.”

“No need. You’ll have a front-row seat.”

“And your mother’s list?”

“Short. She would marry us in the kitchen tomorrow, with Marthe as witness, and call it the wedding of the year. She’s never needed an audience. My father has never needed anything else.”

“Speaking of Marthe. She gave you a look, then glanced at me when she cleared the table tonight.”

“She counts the silver after every meal. It is nothing personal.”

“It was definitely personal,” he said.

“If she didn’t like you, you would know.”

“It wasn’t me she was looking at.”

At dinner, I’d talked myself out of the worry that she was on to us and called myself an idiot for it. If he’d caught Marthe’s look too, maybe I wasn’t so stupid.

Nothing got past the woman. When I was a child, and even more so when I became a teenager, Marthe somehow found out about every “crime” I committed and every secret I tried to keep. The bad part was that I hated disappointing her more than I would have my parents. The good part was that, to my knowledge, she never went to them with her discoveries. My only punishment was the guilt I felt.

“It was one look,” I said. “Go to sleep.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Bonne nuit, Dagger,” I whispered a few minutes later, in case he’d fallen asleep more easily than I would.

“Bonne nuit, Maëlle,” he responded.

After breakfast the following morning, Rémy took Dagger to see more of the cuverie. My father disappeared into his office, saying he had more calls to make, and my mother said she was going upstairs to rest.

I waited ten minutes, then followed.

From the door that was open a crack, I could see her sitting in the chair by the window. The sun’s rays were directly on her, but she still had a blanket covering her legs.

“Enter, ma chérie,” she said before I knocked.

I closed the door behind me and sat on the end of her bed.

“Maman, please tell me what’s wrong.”

She folded her hands on her lap. “I don’t want to ruin your visit when the reason for it is such a happy one.”

“Do you think my worry over not knowing isn’t doing the very thing you’re trying to prevent?”

“I know you’re right, Maëlle, but this is not an easy thing to speak of.”

“I’m your daughter. Your only child. You can tell me anything.”

Her fingers felt thin and cold when she took my hand. “In September, I found a lump on my neck, below my ear.” She touched it. “My doctor sent me to Dijon for tests.”

“And?” I pressed.

“The diagnosis is diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. It is aggressive but treatable.”

I got off the bed and knelt beside her chair.

“When did you start treatment?”