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And Isolde breathed in the humid air of the hothouse, the rich loam, the green sweetness of growing stems, the impossible warmth of February flowers, and felt the shell she had built around her heart break open at last, falling apart in pieces as she accepted his esteem.

When Angelo finally raised his head, his eyes were bright with unshed tears of his own.

“My broken tulip,” he murmured, his voice rough with love. “My treasure. My heart.”

And Isolde believed him.

CHAPTER 18

“They danced, I thought they exhibited a perfect model of the beauty of either sex; and if I mistake not, they are inspired with a mutual admiration.”

Ann Radcliffe

* * *

Angelo raised his head from where he had been pressing kisses to the stained petals of Isolde’s cheek and found himself staring down into the face of the woman he loved.

She was gazing up at him with an expression that stole his breath, wonder and hope, something fierce and fragile all tangled together in her luminous eyes. The late afternoon light filtering through the hothouse glass caught the gold of her hair, the rose of her marks, the crystal tracks of tears still drying on her cheeks. She was, in that moment, the most beautiful thing he had ever beheld.

And she had come out in the daylight to greet him.

The realization struck him, making his chest ache with a tenderness so profound it bordered on pain. Isolde, who had spent years hiding in shadows. Isolde, who had believed herself too monstrous to be seen. Isolde, who had run from him in the garden because she could not believe anyone could love her as she was.

She had stepped into the light. For him.

They stared into each other’s eyes for a long moment, the silence broken only by the distant cry of gulls and the whisper of wind against the hothouse glass. Angelo could feel his heart pounding against his ribs, could see the rapid flutter of Isolde’s pulse at the base of her throat. The air between them was charged with something electric. Possibility, perhaps. Or the dawning recognition that everything was about to change.

At last, Isolde drew a shaky breath and sighed. “I suppose,” she said softly, “that I should reciprocate.”

Angelo’s brow furrowed slightly. “Reciprocate?”

“You have given me so much.” She gestured vaguely toward the broken tulip, still glowing on the table behind them. “You searched all of Cornwall for a flower to prove that my flaws are treasures. You came back when I gave you every reason to leave. You have been patient and kind and …” She swallowed hard. “And I have repaid you with silence and suspicion and the sort of behavior that would make any sensible man flee in the opposite direction.”

“Isolde—”

“No, let me say this.” Her voice was quiet, but firm. “My lack of trust has made things more difficult than you deserved. I reacted as I did because I was afraid. I thought the world would always reject me, and I could not believe that you might be different. But that was not fair to you. You have done nothing but show me kindness, and I … I am sorry. Truly sorry for the way I behaved.”

The apology hung in the air between them, fragile and precious as the tulip’s streaked petals. Angelo felt something loosen in his chest, some knot of tension he had not even realized he was carrying. She was apologizing. She was acknowledging his efforts. She was, in her own quiet way, opening a door that had been barred against him for so long.

He cleared his throat, suddenly uncertain how to proceed. He did not wish to press her, did not wish to demand more than she was ready to give. But there was something he needed. Something that would mean more to him than any apology could.

“Isolde,” he said carefully, “I am grateful for your words. Truly. But there is something I would ask of you, if you are willing.”

A flicker of wariness crossed her eyes, but she did not pull away. “What is it?”

“I have been a guest in your house for nearly two weeks now, and yet I have seen nothing of your world. The passages, the hidden stairs, the grates through which you have watched me …” He paused, searching for the right words. “I want to understand you, tesoro. I want to know the life you have lived, the spaces you have inhabited, the secrets you have kept. Will you show me? Will you let me into your world?”

For a long moment, Isolde remained silent. She bit her lower lip, a gesture he had come to recognize as a sign of internal debate, and her fingers twisted together in the folds of her gown. Angelo held his breath, terrified that he had pushed too far, too fast. It must be a formidable thing to contemplate for such a private woman.

Then, slowly, she nodded.

“Come,” she said quietly. “I will show you.”

She led him from the hothouse, through the walled garden, toward the kitchen entrance of Grimsfell Hall. Angelo followed in silence, acutely aware of the significance of what was happening. She was letting him in. She was trusting him with that which she had guarded all her life.

They passed through the kitchen, empty now in the late afternoon lull between tea and dinner preparations, and into the pantry beyond. It was a small utilitarian space, lined with shelves of preserves and dry goods, nothing remarkable to the casual observer.

But Isolde moved to a particular shelf on the far wall and, with a sequence of movements so practiced they seemed almost unconscious, manipulated something Angelo could not quite see. She lifted the shelf, pushed down, then lifted it twice more. A coded sequence, like a combination lock.