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cannot change your mind?”
    “You cannot.”
    “Then it would be best if you left. Now.”
    Nicholas managed a civil nod, turning away from the bitter old man. It was then he saw her.
    She must have heard almost every word that had been spoken. Her father’s request that he take her with him. His flat-out refusal and renunciation of her.
    She didn’t look like a child at all. Her face was pale, with two bright red spots of emotion on her high cheekbones. Her eyes were very dark in her white face, and her wide, mobile mouth that could tilt so enchantingly was now ashen and trembling. She looked at him, and there was misery, love, and hatred in her eyes. He was going to turn his back on her, and never see her again. And he’d never wanted her more.
    Ghislaine sat in her kitchen, the black dog curled peacefully beneath her chair, her small feet together, her strong hands clasped loosely in her lap. Sooner or later she would have another chance, and next time she couldn’t make a mistake. It had been hard enough the first time. Her hands had trembled when she added the rat poison, her brow had been dripping sweat, and one of the scullery maids had had the temerity to ask her if she was feeling well.
    She’d responded with her usual coolness, wiping her brow and hiding her trembling hands from the kitchen full of witnesses. She should have been feeling utterly glorious. The man who’d destroyed her family was going to die, at her hands. She would no longer be a victim. She would be a victor, someone who grabbed vengeance by the throat and shook it into submission. Those mesmerizing dark blue eyes would be shut forever, that handsome body would be still and cold. He would be dead, along with everyone else she’d cared about. He’d be where he belonged.
    Except that it hadn’t worked out that way. For two days and nights he’d suffered, and then, blast him, he’d recovered. Weak, barely able to tolerate much more than the broth and toast that his evil-looking valet prepared for him, he’d still managed to cheat death. This time.
    But her chance would come again—it was bound to. And next time she wouldn’t make a mistake. She’d put enough in the food to kill a horse. Make it mercifully swift for him, though he didn’t deserve mercy. And then she could either make her own meal of his poisoned food or accept the gallows.
    She was wrong when she thought that everyone she cared about had died. She cared about Ellen, about the scandal that would follow. If there was some way to spare her, she’d take that way. But short of abandoning her plans for revenge, there was nothing.
    Maybe, once she was certain he was dead, she’d run. Just disappear. There were plenty of ponds and lakes nearby, and the ocean was less than a day away, even on foot. Maybe she’d rather no one ever found her body. Just disappear.
    She’d decide when the time came. For now, all she could do was be patient, and determined. Her resolve couldn’t waver. If it did, she would remember her parents, small, shriveled, pathetic. And very, very brave, as they climbed the steps to the scaffold for their final meeting with Madame La Guillotine. Or she would think of her little brother.
    Nicholas dreamed of her that first year. When daylight came, and his thoughts were his own, he banished her presence. But at night, in sleep, she’d return to haunt him. Her slender body, her rippling laughter, her delicate hands and merry smile. And he’d wonder whether he hadn’t made a very grave mistake.
    The situation in France went from bad to worse, but he told himself Comte de Lorgny was too savvy a man to wait too long. He would get his family and his fortune safely out of France, and he’d marry his daughter off to some other wealthy foreigner. Besides, as he’d told the man, it wasn’t his responsibility. It wasn’t guilt he was feeling when word came that the king had been arrested when he tried to leave the country. That all of France was in turmoil.