Chapter 20 Isabella
Isabella
"Ihave something for you."
Matteo's voice cuts through the morning quiet of the kitchen, carefully neutral. My coffee cup pauses halfway to my lips, steam curling between us like a question mark.
He's standing in the doorway wearing dark jeans and a gray henley that clings to his chest, auburn hair still damp from his shower. He looks cautious. Uncertain. Nothing like the man who poured his heart out in desperate, broken words just hours ago.
*I love you. Christ, bella, I love you so much I can't breathe when you're not in the same room.*
I force those words away, bury them deep where they can't crack the careful composure I've rebuilt this morning. "What do you mean?"
Instead of answering, he gestures toward the sunroom with his chin. "Come with me?"
My bare feet are silent on the hardwood as I follow him through the house.
The air smells of rain-washed pine and something faintly sweet from the vanilla candle burning on the windowsill.
Everything feels too clean, too bright after last night's storm.
Like the world has been scrubbed raw and left to dry in the gentle morning light.
His voice echoes in my memory as we walk: *I love the way you look at art like it holds secrets only you can unlock. I love how you take your coffee black because you think adding anything is cheating the bean.*
The way he catalogued every small detail I thought no one noticed. The way he said my name like it was something sacred instead of just sounds arranged in a particular order.
Stop. I can't think about this. Can't let those impossible words take root in the hollow spaces of my chest.
The sunroom is bathed in golden light, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the forest where puddles catch sunlight like scattered coins. A small table sits beside the window seat, holding a wrapped package that makes my pulse stutter.
Nothing elaborate. Just brown paper tied with natural twine, the kind of wrapping that suggests the contents matter more than the presentation.
"You mentioned it once," he says quietly, staying near the doorway like he's afraid of spooking me. "I remembered."
My hands start trembling before I even approach the table. The paper tears under my fingers, making small sounds that seem too loud in the quiet room. And then what emerges steals the breath from my lungs in a sharp gasp.
It's a painting. Oil on canvas, executed in the exact style of my Unknown Woman. The same rich colors that speak of secrets and shadows. The same dramatic lighting that makes every detail seem alive with hidden stories.
But the face looking back at me is my own.
"Oh my God," I whisper.
My knees almost buckle. I'm painted as if I belong in that lineage of forgotten women, dressed in midnight blue velvet with pearls at my throat.
My hair is arranged in the same elaborate style as the original, swept up to reveal the long line of my neck.
The background matches perfectly, all dark shadows and mysterious depths.
But my eyes. My eyes hold the same defiant fire, the same refusal to be diminished or ignored. The same quiet strength I've spent my whole life hiding behind careful smiles and professional composure.
This isn't just expensive. It's intimate. Personal. It proves he sees something in me I've never dared to claim for myself.
*I love that you cry during thunderstorms and pretend you don't, like showing vulnerability might crack that perfect surface you wear.*
His words slam into me again, and suddenly I understand why my hands are shaking. This gift proves every word he spoke was real. Not adrenaline. Not the heat of the moment. Not things people say when they think someone they care about is in danger.
Real.
"You spend your life giving forgotten women their place in history," he says softly from behind me. "I wanted you to have yours."
The words steal what's left of my composure. This isn't just about the painting. It's about being seen. Really seen. Not as Chase Callahan's respectable niece or the Iceflower who curates pretty things for wealthy people to admire.
As someone worth remembering.
"You shouldn't have," I whisper, unable to meet his eyes. If I look at him now, I'll fall apart completely. I'll believe those words he spoke with such raw honesty, and that way lies madness.
"I wanted to." A beat of silence, then softer: "You deserve to be seen."
My walls are cracking. The careful distance I rebuilt this morning is crumbling under the weight of this gift, this gesture that proves his confession wasn't just beautiful lies wrapped in desperate need.
He loves me. Really loves me. Enough to commission an artist, enough to remember a casual comment about a painting I admire.
Enough to see the dreams I've never spoken aloud and make them real.
And that's exactly what scares me.
*I love you so much it's killing me, tesoro. It's eating me alive from the inside out.*
I set the painting down with shaking hands, my movements precise and controlled even as my world tilts sideways. When I finally look at him, his dark eyes are watching me with an intensity that makes my pulse race. There's hope there, carefully hidden but unmistakable.
Hope that I'm going to destroy.
"Thank you," I say, and lean up to press a soft kiss to his cheek. Just a brush of lips against warm skin that smells like expensive soap and something uniquely him. The kind of polite gesture I've perfected for charity galas and museum openings.
But when he leans closer, when his breath catches and his eyes drop to my mouth with unmistakable hunger, I step back. Put distance between us before I do something foolish like believe this could be real.
"This doesn't change anything, Matteo." The words cut my throat raw, but I force them out anyway.
His face goes carefully blank, but I catch the flinch he tries to hide. The way his hands curl into fists at his sides before he forces them to relax.
"Of course not," he says quietly.
"You don't know me the way you think you do." Each word feels like swallowing glass, but I can't stop. Can't let him see how thoroughly his gift has wrecked me. "Whatever this is, it won't last."
He's silent for a long moment, just watching me with those dark eyes that see too much. Finally, he nods once. Sharp. Final.
"I understand," he says, but his voice is rough around the edges. Scraped raw.
I turn and walk away, clutching the painting against my chest like armor. Each step feels like walking through quicksand, but I don't stop. Don't look back. Don't let him see the way my hands are shaking or how my vision blurs with tears I refuse to shed.
I make it halfway up the stairs before the first sob escapes.
The painting is perfect. More than perfect. It's everything I never knew I wanted, proof that someone sees me as more than a curator who smiles prettily while powerful men make their deals. It's a gift from a man who claims to love me, offered without expectation or demand.
And that's exactly why I can't keep it.
Because men like Matteo Rosetti don't fall in love with women like me.
They fall in lust, in possession, in the thrill of breaking something beautiful and claiming the pieces.
But they don't fall in love. Not with museum curators who carry blood on their hands whether they know it or not.
Not with women raised by killers, shaped by lies, hollowed out by years of performing for audiences who would destroy them without hesitation.
*I don't know how to love you without being terrified of losing you.*
His confession echoes in my chest, and I press my face against the painting, letting myself cry for the woman staring back at me. The one who looks fearless and defiant and worthy of being remembered. The one who believes she deserves to be seen and loved and chosen.
The one I can never let myself become.