She would laugh a little, soft and natural. “Every day.”

He’d raise an eyebrow. “And what do you do about it?”

She’d pause. What did she do? When Sisi had fallen into the river, Helene had chosen to grow up. She’d chosen her head over her heart. And that was what she was choosing again—now—here at Bad Ischl, wasn’t it? Choosing to do the right thing no matter how she felt or how long it took her to feel.

“I suppose I err on the side of logic, Your Highness.”

“Please call me Franz.” Oh, how she would feel when he told her to abandon the formalities. “And tell me, why logic?” She thrilled at the idea of his asking her opinion, seeking her counsel.

“The heart’s an unreliable keeper.” That’s what she’d say to him.

He would nod, thoughtful. “Thank you, sweet Helene. I needed that.”

Helene opened her eyes and slipped back into reality, staring at the gauzy white of the inner curtain on the window, the raindrop-like crystals of a small chandelier hanging from the ceiling. She smiled to herself. This was what their courtship was meant to feel like. Easy conversation in a sun-kissed room between two people committed to doing the right thing—and finding love in the process. This was what it would feel like from now on.

Still alone in her room, Helene let her mind wander to something else: the other intimacy that would eventually come. Franz—even more handsome than his portrait—would do more than simply court her. She pictured his lips, traced a finger along her own. She’d never been kissed, but she could imagine it: skin against soft skin, the way the feeling would carry from lips to heart, electric.

She traced a hand along the contours of her face, down the sensitive skin of her neck and across collarbone, to breast only thinly shrouded in nightgown. What would it feel like for his hand to follow this path? Her nipples grew taut, a thrilling, terrifying urgency tickling from her abdomen, lower.

Her body shivered involuntarily. It wouldn’t be long before Franz touched her like this, before she would know where that knot of nerves and longings, daydreams and promises, could lead.

TWENTY-FOUR

AS THE AFTERNOON COOLED TO EVENING, ELISABETH slipped barefoot into the gardens, the sun-warmed stone rough beneath her feet, the leaves a richer, deeper green now that the sun was nearly set. Honeysuckle perfumed the air. The soft pink of the oncoming sunset made the surrounding garden seem to glow.

She pressed a hand lightly against the shrub to her right, ruffling its perfectly manicured leaves as she walked, breathing deep. Finally, finally, she could think. The tensions of the day ran off her skin like water.