Chapter Eighteen #3
When you phrase it that way, I sound stupid.
You were stupid.
Yeah.
She almost smiled.
Then Corwin sent another message.
I thought I was smarter than the danger.
That hurt more than the joke.
Because it sounded true.
Corwin had always been the smartest person in most rooms and had eventually begun behaving as though intelligence could substitute for permission, backup, or the possibility that someone else might understand a risk better than he did.
Isolde typed the question that had been waiting since the Harbor Pilot opened beneath her hands.
Why did you give me the book?
The longest pause yet followed.
Eventually:
Insurance.
Her throat tightened.
You made me insurance.
I told myself no one knew I'd given it to you. If I disappeared, you would eventually open the repair and somebody honest would have the archive.
Isolde stared at the message until anger pushed through the hurt.
You put me in the middle without telling me.
I know.
Stop saying you know.
The typing indicator lingered.
Then Corwin wrote, You're right. I don't get to make that smaller. I thought I could control who knew what. I thought giving it to you was the safest option. I was wrong, and you paid for that.
Tears came again.
Quietly this time.
Nothing dramatic happened. She did not sob or collapse onto Taddeo's pillow.
She simply sat with tears sliding down her face because too many incompatible truths had finally reached the same place.
Corwin was alive. Corwin loved her. Corwin had used her.
Corwin had committed the theft himself. Corwin had also uncovered something real, something dangerous enough that men came into her museum with guns, and now he was apologizing from somewhere outside Northglass without being able to tell her where.
Footsteps stopped beyond the bedroom door.
Taddeo.
Twenty minutes.
He did not knock.
He did not enter.
Isolde looked toward the door, and the fact that she knew he was standing there while choosing not to cross the boundary she'd set affected her more than she wanted it to.
The phone vibrated again.
Listen to me. I can fix the part that involves you.
Isolde wiped her face.
What does that mean?
I can get you away from Malfatti.
The room seemed to narrow.
How?
I have people who can help. Not Bellandi. Not anyone from the museum. They can get you somewhere safe.
Her heartbeat accelerated.
Who?
Can't tell you here.
Then I'm not going anywhere with them.
Corwin answered quickly.
They're safer than staying with Taddeo.
Something inside Isolde snapped into place.
The tone was so familiar.
Not the words.
The conviction beneath them.
Corwin deciding that because he loved her and understood a danger she did not, he was entitled to settle the solution before asking what she thought.
Taddeo making security decisions because he believed responsibility gave him authority.
Different men, different worlds, the same instinct to turn concern into control.
You don't get to decide that for me.
The typing indicator appeared.
Stopped.
Returned.
Finally Corwin answered.
I'm trying to get you out of a house you were kidnapped into. I think I'm allowed to have an opinion.
Isolde pressed the phone against her forehead for a second and closed her eyes.
She remembered Corwin changing the locks after their father died because he decided her apartment building wasn't secure enough.
Corwin handling pieces of the estate before mentioning them because he thought she had enough to deal with.
She did not need ten childhood memories to understand the pattern anymore.
It was sitting inside her hand.
She typed carefully.
An opinion isn't the same thing as deciding for me.
This time Corwin did not answer immediately.
When he did, the message surprised her.
Fine. You're right. I can't decide.
Isolde stared suspiciously at the concession.
A second message appeared.
So I'm asking.
Her chest tightened.
Outside the door, Taddeo remained silent.
Beyond the gates were her apartment, her museum, Linnea, her own car, her own phone, her own bed, and streets she could cross without anyone keeping track of how long she was gone. Everything she had wanted during the storm still existed.
Corwin's final message appeared.
Do you want me to get you out?
Isolde read it once.
Then again.
A week ago, the answer would have required no thought at all. On the night she ran through the storm, she had wanted nothing more complicated than distance from Northglass. She had wanted the road, a phone, police lights, anyone who could put the gates behind her.
Now someone she loved was offering exactly that.
Escape had stopped being an abstract possibility beyond a security fence.
It had become a question.
And for the first time since Taddeo Malfatti put her into his car, the person asking was willing to let her answer for herself.
Isolde stared at the screen until the words blurred.
The frightening part was no longer whether Corwin could get her out.
It was that she did not know what she wanted to tell him.