Nettie downed another round of port. “I’ll have her shot too,” she snarled.
Nathaniel held back a grin, both amused and delighted by her answer. He braced a hip on the edge of the desk and watched Nettie pace. “Well that would put Jane Kenward into the dither you’ve always wanted to see.”
“That girl is going straight back to her mother as soon as they tie this ship down for repairs in Maldon.”
He hoped not. At least not permanently. He wanted her to come straight to him—and stay. He’d caught her wide-eyed stare in the battle’s chaotic aftermath, when the crew had breathed a collective gasp of relief that the fighting was temporarily over. She’d mouthed his name—Nathaniel, not Colin. The expression on her face had been an odd combination of anger and yearning. Commands and tasks separated them, and they hadn’t crossed paths since. He was desperate to see her, to hold her. To explain.
“You’re still the best damn gunner in the fleet, dead or alive,” Nettie said, interrupting his thoughts. “But worrying over you will kill me faster than any tussle with a horrific.”
A knock at the door made them both turn. Nettie cast him an enigmatic look, put away the port and tucked the Howdah into her belt. “I know that knock,” she said. “Looks like you have some explaining to do. I’ll leave you to it. Don’t drink all the brandy while I’m gone.”
Butterflies bashed themselves to death against his ribs when he spotted Lenore standing at the threshold. What would she say now that she knew?
Lenore inclined her head as Nettie eased past her. “Captain.”
The older woman grasped her shoulder in a brief display of affection. “Go in, Lenore. He’s waiting.” The door closed behind her, leaving Nathaniel alone with the person most precious to him. He waited, letting the silence bloom until she was ready to speak.
She clasped her hands in front of her and looked down for a moment before settling her gaze on him once more. “I knew,” she said softly. “Somehow I always knew, from the first moment I saw you again.” Her lips flattened against her teeth, and her eyes turned glossy. “Were you ever planning to tell me?”
He edged closer to her. Tension made her entire body quiver, and she balanced on the balls of her feet as if she’d bolt if he moved too swiftly. “Not at first,” he admitted, hoping she heard the apology in his voice. She flinched. “Look at me, Lenore.” He sketched an invisible line down his torso. “This isn’t even my body. It belonged to a comic droll stabbed to death for the three crowns in his pocket. What was left of me wasn’t worth saving. Harvel’s experiment might be viewed as miraculous if it weren’t so heinous.”
She crossed her arms, rubbing them briskly as if she stood before him with no coat and the windows open. “You’re still Nathaniel.”
What faith she had in him, this resolute, loyal girl. “No, I’m not.”
Her arms dropped to her sides, back straightening with an indignant snap. “Yes you are. I knew it the moment I saw you again at Highgate, leaning on that cane and scaring the mourners.”
He sighed. “Lenore...”
“Don’t ‘Lenore’ me. Even before you were dropping hints a blind man could see, I knew it was you. Everything inside me that broke when they said you’d died suddenly healed.” She dragged her braid over her shoulder to worry it between her fingers. “I didn’t recognize what it was at first. Maybe if I weren’t grieving my father, I might have figured it out sooner.”
She’d have to be stubborn to defy her strong-willed mother. He shouldn’t be surprised Lenore refused to budge in her assertion he was the same man he’d been five years earlier.
Nathaniel inched a little closer, close enough to hear the sudden hitch in her breathing. “I can hear and speak to the dead, love. I don’t need to eat or drink or sleep. I can lust; we’ve both ascertained that.” He grinned when she blushed. “My blood is poisoned with gehenna, and the changes it wrought are obvious. I am no longer the man you knew.”
His eyebrows lifted at the low growl rumbling from her throat. This time she narrowed the distance between them until they were toe to toe. His armor made a dull tink-tink sound when she tapped him on the chest.
“Where it counts most, you are. The soul, the mind, the heart. The body might not be yours and changed beyond comprehension, but the small things you do—the way you tip that invisible topper, how you tilt your head when you’re considering a question, even the pitch in your voice when you’re impatient. Those things belong solely to Nathaniel Gordon.”
His grin coaxed one out of her. “You plant your feet when you believe in something don’t you?” It was one of her many charms that made him fall in love with her a lifetime ago.
She considered him for a moment. “I was more than suspicious when you told me your name was Colin, but the surname threw me off, not to mention the improbability that you weren’t actually dead. Who is Whitley?”
His dear Nettie. She’d guffawed when he told her the name he’d assumed to hide his identity from Lenore. He hadn’t missed the pleased blush that flagged her cheekbones. “That secret isn’t mine to tell. Maybe one day the person who possesses it will.”
Her hand splayed across his chest, fingers dancing up to his neck and down to his abdomen, undaunted by the hard armor. He felt her touch all the way to his bones. A hot shiver replaced the fading spasms in his back. He choked back a surprised laugh. While his protective shell might not obey his every command when he wished, Lenore’s touch had beguiled it the same way she had beguiled him. The armor began to thin and soften in random spots, transforming to fabric.
“Even the way you kissed me was Nathaniel Gordon.”
He captured her hand and pressed her palm flat over his heart. “I never thought I’d be fortunate enough to taste you again,” he said in a voice gone low and thick. Lenore’s eyelids lowered to half-mast. “Especially in a graveyard or on an airship.”
“You should have told me,” she said. “I suspected but to hear it confirmed over the Terebellum’s speaker tubes by Nettie threatening you?” She shook her head.