Cannes was merely a temporary idyll. Two glorious days of sun, sand, and Laura in his bed. But it wasn’t all holiday with them. Little by little, Alex shared with his wife the details of his meeting with Tom Finchley. He told her about his childhood in the orphanage. About Sir Oswald Bannister, and Leonard Cheevers. About Crenshaw, and Morley.

“I never wanted any of this to touch you,” he said one night as he held her in his arms. “All this sordid history.”

Her cheek rested against his shoulder. The gaslights were turned down low in their hotel bedroom. They cast a soft shadow on the curve of her face.

“I thought I was protecting you from it. Keeping you separate and apart.” He took her hand gently in his. The ruby in her ring glinted in the dim light. “And yet, I gave you this cursed thing.”

“Why did you?”

“I don’t know.” He frowned. “I suppose a part of me wanted to marry my past with my future. To reconcile them somehow. A nonsensical impulse. At the time I’d no idea that it was possible.”

“I don’t believe it was nonsensical,” she said. “Indeed, I have a theory.”

He stroked his thumb over her knuckles. “Have you?”

“Mmm. I think this ring is a symbol of who you really are. Not the gambler. Not the man who came to Lower Hawley to woo Henrietta. The real Alex Archer. The boy who saved Neville Cross from drowning. The man who saved me. I think, in giving me this ring, you were pledging yourself to me. Your true self.”

Alex swallowed hard.

“Have I got it right?” she asked. “Or am I being too fanciful?”

It took an effort to find his voice. “You’re not being too fanciful.”

The next morning, they went for a walk together on the beach. It was early hours. So early that Laura felt free to discard her hat and gloves. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “No one is about.”

Alex didn’t have the heart to scold her. He was too enamored of her. Too indulgent by half. “If you stay in France much longer, you’ll get in the habit of flaunting propriety. And then what will happen when you return to England?”

Laura came to a slow halt. “When I return to England?” She faced him on the sand, her shawl slipping down her arms. “You make it sound as though you’re not going back.”

“As to that…” Alex suppressed a grimace. He hadn’t intended to tell her just yet. Not until he’d had a chance to study more on the subject. But there was no keeping it from her now. “I’ve had an idea. Something that will affect Hayes’s perfumes—and the Hayes family, as well.”

A shadow of worry crossed her face. “Go on.”