Page 18 of Restored

Perhaps Jean-Jacques was simply being discreet. That would be the sensible thing to do, after all.

Once outside, they made their way to the waiting carriage.

“Theconversationswere delicious,” Marianne said wistfully. “I swear I could eat a half dozen for breakfast every day.”

Henry chuckled. “Shall I buy you some more to take home?”

“Oh, yes,” Marianne said, perking up. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

Henry’s heart began to race a little.

“Let’s get you settled in the carriage,” he said. “Then I’ll go back and fetch some.”

Marianne beamed at him. “Thank you, Papa.”

In short order, Henry was entering the tea room again. The same young woman greeted him, and he placed the order with her, assuring her he was happy to wait a few minutes.

He opened his mouth then, to ask if he might speak to her father, when Jean-Jacques himself emerged from behind the counter, visibly startling at the sight of Henry.

Henry stepped toward Jean-Jacques. “Monsieur Mercier,” he said. “I wonder if I might beg a word in private while I wait for the order I just placed.”

Jean-Jacques scowled—actuallyscowled—but after a moment he gave a short nod. “Very well,” he said succinctly. “Follow me, please.”

He led Henry behind the counter and through a narrow corridor that Henry presumed ultimately led to the kitchens, given the mingled scents of caramel, caraway, ginger, and orange that drifted towards them.

Before they reached the kitchens, however, Jean-Jacques opened a door and led Henry into a small office. He closed the door behind them and turned to Henry, his expression cool.

“What do you want, your grace?”

“So, you did recognise me.”

“Of course,” Jean-Jacques said, giving a familiar Gallic shrug that Henry recognised as a gesture of his from the old days. “Though why you wish to speak to me after twenty years, I can’t imagine.”

“Can’t you?” Henry asked, somewhat taken aback by the man’s faint hostility.

Jean-Jacques’s expression tightened. “No.”

Henry eyed him uncertainly for a moment, but he had to ask now, having come this far. “Do you—that is, are you still friends with Christopher Redford?”

Jean-Jacques’s gaze hardened, and for a long, terrible moment, Henry wondered if he was about to tell Henry something awful. That something had happened to Christopher, perhaps. Henry’s heart squeezed painfully in his chest.

But then, to his relief, Jean-Jacques said coolly, “Yes. We are still friends. Why do you ask?”

The relief was so huge that, for a moment, all Henry could do was exhale a long breath. “I thought you were going to tell me something had happened to him,” he said.

Jean-Jacques seemed unmoved by this confession, standing silently as he waited for Henry to answer his last question.

“Can you tell me how he is?” Henry asked at last, shocked by how breathless he sounded.

Jean-Jacques frowned. “Forgive me, but I find the question very strange. It has been twenty years—”

“Eighteen,” Henry interrupted.

Jean-Jacques eyed him curiously. “Close enough,” he said, shrugging. “The point is, it is many years since you left Kit, and you did not ask after him then—and not in any of the years following. But you see me today, and suddenly you want to know?”

Henry swallowed hard. “I behaved rather shabbily, I know,” he said. “I should have said goodbye to him in person, but in the circumstances, I thought he would understand.” He broke off at the sight of Jean-Jacques’s furious expression. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Jean-Jacques turned away, giving Henry his back. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said roughly.