“Don’t forget yourself, lass,” Nolan said. “You lost him too.”
She leaned her head against his shoulder as they walked. He nuzzled the crown of her head.
“I should probably stick around as well. For Chelle,” Nolan said, then tacked on, “And Vander.”
They were mourning Grayson, yes, but Vander had lost something else. It was no longer a secret, not within the Alliance or the Dispossessed, that Ingrid had fallen in love with Luc, and he with her. Things were still tense and uncertain, but so far, the Dispossessed had not acted against Luc in any way. It could have been because he was their new elder. Marco had confided in Gabby earlier that the majority of the gargoyles seemed willing and open to a new way. Or, Gabby considered, they could have been willing because of who Luc’s chosen human was. After Ingrid had unleashed that electrical firestorm into Axia in the Champs de Mars, no gargoyle could believe it wise to cross her.
“Gabby.” Nolan pulled up short of the rectory’s front door. “I know you were having second thoughts about joining the Alliance, and if you decide not to … if you don’t want to go through with it …” He cradled her scarred cheek in his palm. He always reached for that side of her face. Always ran his fingers along the track of scars. He loved every inch of her. Even her flaws.
“Whether you’re Alliance or not, I’m staying with you, lass.”
She leaned into his touch and sighed. “We are a good team, aren’t we?”
“The finest. Although I think I’ll have to be even more disciplined than I was before. I anticipate being more interested in kissing you than hunting demons.”
Gabby laughed, and she imagined Grayson would like the sound of that more than he would all the sobbing. So she laughed again. “I don’t think my father will approve of that.”
Nolan scowled. “Your father and I will have to come to an understanding, then, because I intend to kiss you every day for the rest of my life. Starting now.”
Without checking to see if they were alone, Nolan took her mouth in a fast, fervent kiss. After a week of feeling cold and lost, it made Gabby feel alive again. Grayson would want her to live—he’d died so that she might.
This was her life. The one she wanted. And for Grayson, for all he was and all he could have been, she would live it.
Ingrid shouldn’t have been smiling. She shouldn’t have been feeling so happy and proud. But as the abbey’s fan-vaulted ceilings captured the animated voices of the gallery’s first patrons and organ music breathed from the copper pipes, she couldn’t stop.
The gallery was filled to overflowing. Opening night, so far, was a smashing success. There were oil portraits and bronze sculptures alongside woven tapestries and Impressionistic landscapes, and even works by that awful painter of women’s dimpled backsides whom she and Gabby had so unfortunately met at a salon once.
Ingrid stood mostly to the side, avoiding conversation and waving away Marco when he came around in his crisp tuxedo offering champagne and colorful commentary on the well-heeled guests. His mood had improved in the days following an unexpected visit from Irindi. The angel had repaired Marco’s back, erasing the burns that Axia had wrongly inflicted. The mending had been almost as agonizing as the initial burns, Marco had said, and he’d gleefully shucked his shirt for Ingrid and Gabby—and unfortunately Mama—to show off the return of his smooth, bare skin. Mama had been quite flummoxed, which Ingrid imagined had been Marco’s intent.
The gallery opening had been delayed by a week, for obvious reasons, but more tourists for the exposition had begun flowing into Paris. Mama had hired an entirely new staff to replace those who had abandoned the rectory, and her energy had returned. As brokenhearted as she was, she’d whisked into the dining room one morning for breakfast, Papa seated at the head of the table with his paper, and made an announcement.
“Grayson worked tirelessly to get this gallery under way for me,” she’d said, fighting back tears. “I will not disappoint him.”
And that had been that.
Ingrid caught sight of her mother now, milling about the nave, her black bombazine dress the only indication that she was in mourning. Papa stood with her, and though he looked as starchy as ever, at least he was there. The grin fixed on her mother’s lips as she spoke and laughed looked genuine to Ingrid, and her own smile felt real, too.
“It’s nice to see that.”
Ingrid startled, stepping aside and brushing against the carved wooden frieze of the twelve apostles near the transept door. Vander had joined her, his gaze following hers.
“Mama’s smile?” Ingrid guessed.
Vander cut his eyes to hers. “And yours.”
She hadn’t seen him since Grayson’s funeral. She’d missed him but understood why he’d stayed away.
“So, Reverend, are you enjoying the gallery?” she asked, stressing his new title.
It earned her a groan.