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And yet, he’d been so proud of her. He hadn’t been close enough to hear what she’d said to the cameraman, but he’d seen every move she made, could almost have predicted everything she’d do because he would have done exactly the same thing under the circumstances. He’d grabbed the Glock from the camera that she’d been forced to leave behind, and had joined her in the sacristy as soon as he could. Not because he didn’t think she could handle things—he hadn’t been lying yesterday when he told her she had everything under control. But because he’d wanted to be with her for whatever happened.
The clock’s minute hand, the one that had seemed frozen in place for the past half hour, finally clicked onto the twelve. Five o’clock. Time to go.
He said good-night to his administrative assistant and was gone before she could reply, and then he made the five-minute walk to his apartment in less than four minutes. He showered, shaved and dressed swiftly—jeans, a long-sleeved polo shirt in a deep shade of forest green and a brown tweed blazer. He was out the door again in ten minutes, which left him plenty of time to walk to Angelina’s apartment.
He passed the flower shop almost without seeing it, but then backtracked quickly. The flower arrangement that had caught his eye in the window seemed to have been made just for her. Lilies, he thought, remembering her middle name. Perfect. Lilies of the valley—with their small, white choral bells hanging upside down from their stalks—tiny blue forget-me-nots and jasmine. Sweet-smelling jasmine. He paid for his purchase and waited impatiently while the florist wrapped the arrangement in tissue paper and placed it carefully in a box.
He was a minute late when he finally arrived, but it was worth it when she promptly opened the door, as if she’d been waiting for him. She wore jeans and an ice-blue sweater that matched her blue-gray eyes and reminded him of the robe she’d been wearing last night. As if he needed a reminder.
The complete surprise on her face when she unwrapped his floral offering touched something deep inside him. Had no one ever given her flowers before? Was he the first in this way, too?
“They are beautiful,” she told him with just a hint of shyness. “Thank you.”
“When I saw them in the shop window, they whispered your names to me—Angelina Zuzana. I had to stop, even if it meant being late.” He touched one tiny bell on a stalk of lilies of the valley. “My mom loves these, and always has them in her garden. They’re a perennial, you know. And when they bloom, she goes around singing that children’s song about lilies of the valley.” He smiled at the memory. “My mom was always singing to us when we were kids. She still does to my niece, Alyssa, and she still has her garden.”
“My mother loves flowers, too,” Angelina confessed. “But her garden is a bower of roses she tends as if they are her children.”
“She’s still alive?”
“Oh, yes. Both my parents. I see them every week, if I can. She is not so old—just fifty-four. My father is much older—almost sixty-six. But I...” She trailed off.
Alec wanted to know what she’d been going to say. “But you...?”
“But I am not close to them. They do not...that is...they are very old-fashioned, even for Zakhar. They wanted me to marry young. To give them grandchildren. Especially since my brother died when he was a baby, and I am my parents’ only remaining child. They do not like that I am still unmarried at twenty-nine. And they especially do not like that I am on the queen’s security detail. The danger, you see. If I were to die without giving them grandchildren...”
Alec correctly interpreted this, and stated flatly, “So they don’t know about yesterday, do they? They don’t know you were involved.”
Angelina shook her head. Not sadly, just with acceptance of something she could never change. “I cannot tell them. They would not understand. Not just because it would be a reminder of the danger to me, but...to have killed a man...that is a... It goes against tradition, you understand. Not a womanly thing to do.”
Alec cursed under his breath, but he was starting to understand Angelina a little better. Not just the woman she was, but the forces that had shaped her, and how she’d had to fight to overcome those prejudices. How she’d had to fight for everything she was.
In many ways she reminded him of his younger sister. Keira had always fought for acceptance—as the only girl in their family, in the Marine Corps, in the agency she worked for. Had always fought for respect. As he’d told Angelina, when he was younger he hadn’t seen it, hadn’t realized he was perpetrating a stereotype with regard to his sister. But that didn’t mean that was how he saw things now. He’d learned in the years since then, and was still learning.
