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He untangled the ribbon, letting the blue silk trail from his hand to her shoulder. "I cannot shield you from attention," he said. "But I can promise never to leave you alone with it."

She should have stepped back. Instead, she stood perfectly still, her eyes locked on his.

"You do realize," she said, her voice barely above a whisper, "that your method of rescue will be described in the next broadsheet as an assignation in the tropical greenhouse."

"I hope it will," Julian replied. "A far better story than being stalked by newsboys."

A silence stretched between them. His hand still hovered near her face, close enough that she could feel its warmth, but he made no move to touch her cheek, nor did she lean into him.

For a long, impossible moment, it seemed as though he might.

Then, from the far end of the Palm House, a group of voices approached—the unmistakable sound of two society matrons and a pack of debutantes. Adelaide stepped back just in time. Julian dropped his hand and moved slightly to the side, resuming the role of impassive companion.

The party swept past, the debutantes giggling, the matrons casting sidelong glances at the duke and his wife.

When the group had disappeared around a curve of glass, Julian looked at Adelaide and said quietly, "We have been discovered."

She let out a breath, half laugh, half sigh. "We shall be in the broadsheets by morning."

"Let us return to the horses," he said, offering his arm.

They walked in silence through the remainder of the gardens, neither daring to mention the near-disaster of the bonnet, nor the even closer disaster of the moment that had nearly followed. The return ride to Mayfair was a study in quiet, every word unsaid hanging in the air between them. By the time Ravensmere House reappeared around the corner, the press and the gossips had doubled. The staff at the front gate were fending off a fresh wave of note-leavers and flower deliveries.

As they dismounted, Julian looked at her and said, "Would you like to reenter by the main door, or brave the rear passage again?"

She considered, then squared her shoulders. "The front door. If I am to be immortalized in the society pages, I should at least face the artists."

He escorted her through the crowd, ignoring the shouts and questions, holding her arm with a steady, unbreakable grip. Inside, the warmth and chaos of the house enveloped them. Mrs. Rutherford, shocked at their windswept state, launched into a flurry of complaints, but Adelaide barely heard her.

She saw only Julian, who stood for a moment at the base of the staircase, looking as though he meant to speak and then thinking better of it.

"I shall be in the library," he said finally.

She watched him go, every word unsaid burning in the space between them.

In her mind, she replayed the moment in the Palm House: the warmth of his hand, the look in his eyes, the breathless possibility that had hovered between them.

You always do succeed in the end, she thought, but she had no idea if that was what she wanted most or what she feared most of all.

* * *

Rain rattled the windowpanes with steady, manic energy. Julian lay atop the counterpane, his boots unlaced, and his arms folded beneath his head. He stared at the ceiling, but the darkness behind his eyes was much brighter and much more merciless than the bedroom gloom.

He saw her, every detail of her: Adelaide beneath the shifting green shadows in the Palm House, her bonnet ribbon caught on the branch, her face so close he could see the quick, uncertain movement of her eyes. The faint, indrawn breath when he touched her hair. The way she did not step back, not at once.

You could have kissed her, Hawthorne, said the voice that had always been his harshest tutor. You wanted to. She wanted you to.

He rolled over and pressed his fist into the pillow. The scent of soap and clean linen, the same since his boyhood, should have calmed him. It did not. His blood burned with a restless, useless ache.

She is your wife, and you cannot even bring yourself to touch her.

He squeezed his eyes shut and saw Thomas—open and unafraid. Thomas with the muddy boots and the sun-ruined hat, Thomas unrolling his sleeping blanket next to Julian's in a ruined Macedonian monastery and saying, "You may have the better tent, but I have the better company."

Adelaide's laugh, bright and clear, echoing across a Kent meadow as Thomas lobbed wildflowers at her and she caught them midair, every time.

Julian sat up and ran a hand through his hair. The motion was rough, nearly violent, but the ache did not ease.

Could he ever lay a hand on her without feeling that he was thieving from his dead brother? Could he ever kiss her without the certainty that she tasted Thomas's name with every breath?