“It will have been quick,” Gabriel said. It was a small mercy. He’d seen Galezzo’s body lying twisted on the bloodstained gravel. Doubtless the man’s back had broken, along with his head.

Effie’s shoulders shook as she wept for him.

Gabriel encircled her with his arm, drawing her firmly against his chest. She came to him willingly, dampening his shoulder with her tears as he held her.

The situation was far from ideal. He in an agony of frustration at his inability to protect and console her, and she overcome with emotion at having seen the wire walker fall. Some rogue, treacherous part of Gabriel’s brain nevertheless marked how perfectly they fit together. It whispered in his ear and in his heart, a devil come to tempt him, telling him that she had been fashioned just for him. That she was his missing piece. The other part of his soul.

Despite her tears, despite the circumstances, he was overcome by a powerful feeling of rightness.

He turned his face into the raven coils of her hair, inhaling the intoxicating fragrance of honey and black currants. He was no good at comforting people. But this was important. She was important. “It’s all right,” he said. “It’s over. I have you now.”

The storm of Effie’s tears slowly subsided. Gabriel held her until she grew still and quiet, rubbing her back and murmuring into her hair. She took a deep, unsteady breath. Her tears had ceased, but she made no attempt to withdraw from him.

Gabriel supposed he should have acted for both of them, setting her away from him and speedily returning her to her friends. But decorum counted for nothing when weighed against the sensation of Effie in his arms.

The faint strains of violin music floated over the darkened gardens as the orchestra resumed playing at the pavilion. Gabriel recognized the melody of Schubert’s “Serenade.” It felt leagues away, somewhere in the vast distance, far removed from the darkened, tree-shrouded sanctuary where he and Effie had withdrawn.

“Mannering shouldn’t have brought you to such a display,” he said.

“He wasn’t to know what would happen.”

“What do you imagine becomes of wire dancers, sweetheart? They inevitably fall. It’s a danger of the job.”

She murmured something in reply. Gabriel couldn’t fully hear it—her voice was muffled against his chest—but it sounded as though she’d said, “I feel as though it was me who fell.”

His jaw tightened, recalling her face as she’d watched Galezzo take his first steps out onto the wire. “You should never have been here in the first place,” he said. “What madness compelled you to accept Mannering’s invitation?”

“I promised Miss Compton I’d include her the next time he invited me anywhere.”

A frown darkened Gabriel’s brow. “You and your scheming. Look where it’s ended you.”