Read Cold Lonely Courage (Madeleine toche Series Book 2) for Free Online

the man’s face as she placed the pillow against his right temple. In sleep the scowl was gone. He looked peaceful, hardly capable of the rape he had committed.
    The sound of the pistol report surprised Madeleine, even though she had pulled the trigger. She didn’t remember the conscious thought to do it. Yves torn body and her helplessness during her rape were the last images in her mind. The gun’s report sounded like a small firecracker but to her it seemed deafening. Everyone in the neighborhood must have heard it, she thought as she froze waiting for someone to raise the alarm, listening for the sound of footsteps.
    Several tense moments passed as Madeleine listened to every creak and moan the old building made. When nothing happened she realized that the room had largely contained the sound of the gunshot. She turned and looked at the corpse, noticing a few feathers drifting down into the blood soaking into the sheets beneath his head. She reached down feeling for his pulse and found nothing. She looked down at his lifeless eyes and knew he was dead. Madeleine was amazed how easy it had been to take a life. It had been easier to kill him than to be raped, and to live with the marks he had left on her body. She raised her skirt, tucking away the pistol.
    Madeleine checked the room, making sure that she left no trace of her presence. She listened at the door a moment, but no one in the small rooming house had stirred. She left the house and went into the street, glancing in both directions. The town was asleep. She made her way down to the docks, keeping her face focused on the road so that anyone remembering a person passing would not be able to describe her accurately.
    After a few minutes, the road opened into a cobblestoned boulevard leading to the place where the fishing boats were moored for the night. She saw her father walk up, coming out of the shadows farther down the dock away from the nearest street lamp. The dark water lapped against the wooden posts, draped with fishing nets and cork floats, heavy with the strong smell of fish. The familiar odors mingled with the smells of the sea, and a whiff of fuel oil. The smell had a character all its own, personal to people that lived with it daily, depending on it for their livelihoods and identity. Madeleine savored it, wondering when she would be able to do so again.
    “Well, soldier?” Jean-Pierre asked as he walked closer, awkwardly limping with his false leg.
    “He won’t rape anybody again,” Madeleine said, hugging him fiercely.
    “Always remember that he was an animal, Madeleine. There are more to kill. God’s work will be done,” Jean-Pierre said. A lump formed in her throat. The time for the hardest part of the plan had come. It was time for her to leave.
    “I could hold you forever, Madeleine, but that wouldn’t be safe. It is time for you to leave and carry on the fight from wherever the English lead. They are a resolute and determined people. The men and women of England will all die before they let Germany take over their country.”
    Together they turned and Jean-Pierre led her to the far end of the dock facing the open sea, stopping in front of a boat, a lantern burning faintly on a pole hung from its bow. The boat was a trawler. Jacques, a fisherman whose catch had often been served in the Toche restaurant, was readying the boat. He looked more weathered than the rough wooden boards of his deck. Without comment he took Madeleine’s hand in his. She could feel the immense strength in his gnarled fingers as he gently helped her aboard.
    “Jacques will take you to safety,” Jean-Pierre said in a strained voice. “He’ll take you to some friends in Spain. They’ll get you to Gibraltar.”
    She hugged him on the pier and reached up to clasp his hand one last time. Both of them were in tears as he spoke.
    “You fight for us now Madeleine,” he said. The sight of tears on her father’s face made her cry harder. “Come back when Germany