“She’s right.” Jack spoke up then. “Having the boat organized is one thing, but getting us out of here?”

Elise didn’t answer. Instead, she rocked back and forth for a moment, then collected some of the plates and left the room.

Addy hurried after her. “Elise, wait!”

But Elise only held up her hand without turning. “Just give me a minute, Addy. I need time to think.”

Adelaide didn’t return to the attic, instead going to her parents’ room and standing at the dresser to look over her mother’s things.

I miss you so much, Mama, she thought as she lifted her bottle of perfume and inhaled deeply, feeling traitorous that she’d dabbed a drop to her wrist before going to meet Wolfgang. She lifted her mother’s pearls then, holding them, needing something, anything to connect to her again, guilt washing over her as the day’s events unfolded in her mind. She should have put an end to Wolfgang’s advances, should have kept him at arm’s length instead of letting him get so close. But Elise had been right. Her sister was always right, and this time was no different. Only this time, Adelaide had lied instead of admitting the truth.

Because the truth was, she was falling in love with him, no matter how much she tried to remind herself of who he was or what he was capable of. Because when she was in his arms, with his whispers in her ear and his eyes dancing over hers, it was impossible to believe he was a monster. He made her feel alive; he was like no man she’d ever met before, and she couldn’t stop thinking about the last time she’d seen him.

“You came.”

The surprise on his face was genuine as she skipped across the grass and ran into his open arms. The cool buttons of his jacket crushed against her chest as she lifted her face to him, no longer thinking about what she was doing. In the beginning, she’d been careful; but now she was following her heart and little else. It had started out as a dangerous game, and she’d just made it even more dangerous.

“Did you think I’d leave you waiting here for me?”

Wolfgang laughed. There was a vulnerability about him that hadn’t been there before. Every other time she’d been with him, he’d been almost impossible to read, slightly guarded perhaps, but today she sensed something almost boyish behind his smile. Maybe for once they’d both dropped their guards to show their true selves.

“My men are going to stop respecting me if they find out I’m sneaking off to see you so often,” he grumbled, but he was anything other than grumpy when he bent down and brushed a kiss over her lips.