Jason silently motioned for him to proceed. He could use all the sound advice he could get.
“Pay a visit to the young flower seller you’ve told me of and purchase the loveliest bouquet he has,” Jean said. “Then offer them to the young lady as gallantly as possible.”
“Flowers? Are you playing matchmaker, Jean?”
“Unabashedly.”
“For that,” Jason said, “you have my undying gratitude. I have been attempting all day to convince myself that I am not about to make a blasted mess of the whole thing.”
Jean looked more confident in him than Jason felt. “She loves you,” he said. “Having been in your position, I know that is hard to feel confident about. But I have watched her and know it to be true.”
Jason fought down a smug look. He dared not grow overly sure of himself before things were more certain.
“You need not plead your case,” Jean said. “Nor ought you to worry so very much. She does not need to be convinced of your worth.”
“Then what does she need?”
“She needs to know you love her.”
Jason smiled. “I think I can manage that.”
He stopped on his way to Lampton House to purchase not one but two bouquets from Benny. Armed with such potent ammunition, his efforts couldn’t help but succeed. A few examples of inarguable failure from his past resurfaced, but he pushed them down.
Upon entering his childhood home, Jason happened first upon the youngest Thornton. Santiago eyed Jason’s floral tributes with disdain. “Flores?”
“Yes,” Jason said. “But the flores are not for you.”
“¿Para quién?”
“Who are the flowers for?” Jason guessed at the translation.
Santiago nodded impatiently.
“These”—Jason held up the pink bouquet—“are for your mother.”
Understanding lit Santiago’s eyes. He took hold of the front of Jason’s jacket and pulled him farther into the house.
“Mamá!” Santiago called out as they made their way up the stairs.
Being dragged about by his shirtfront was not precisely the dignified entrance Jason had intended to make. Still, the child was in such earnest Jason couldn’t possibly hold it against him.
“Mamá es here,” Santiago said, pointing to the drawing room doors a few paces ahead of them. “She es stuck.”
“Stuck?” Good heavens! Had no one helped the poor woman? Jason stepped around Santiago, careful not to knock him over.
“Sí.” The child kept pace with Jason, reaching the doors just as he did. “She does not want to go anywhere.”
Relief and exasperation immediately flooded over Jason. The boy’s word choice had been unfortunate. Jason had pictured Mariposa’s mother in rather dire straits, wedged behind a heavy piece of furniture or something equally as troubling. As they stepped inside the drawing room, his eyes immediately sought her out and found her quite comfortably situated near the tall windows, watching the gardens just beyond.
Santiago pulled Jason to where she sat. Mrs. Thornton looked at them, the somewhat blank, somber expression she always wore unchanged. The boy said something to her in Spanish, something that drew her eyes to Jason. He had quickly learned upon finding her in Spain that Mrs. Thornton did not speak English. Whether she did not know the language or simply refused to speak it, he could not say.
Jason held out the bouquet. “Flores para—” He could not remember what should come next.
Santiago took pity on him and whispered, “Usted.”
“Flores para usted,” Jason said, praying he’d come close enough to at least be understood.
Her gaze shifted between him and his offering. For the first time in the two weeks since she’d been found in Spain, Mrs. Thornton smiled. Hers was not the bright, full-of-life smile her daughter had but a simple show of contentment. She took the flowers he held out for her and motioned him closer.
Jason leaned down, expecting to be told something and hoping Santiago would translate. Mrs. Thornton did not speak. She touched his face ever so gently before lightly kissing his cheek. Though Mariposa had once done the same, Mrs. Thornton’s kiss felt like the countless good-byes and hellos he’d received from his own mother.
“Dios te bendiga,” Mrs. Thornton whispered before turning her eyes back to the scene outside her window.
Jason looked to Santiago. The boy shrugged, perfectly matching his sister’s signature gesture. Apparently translating his mother’s sentiment was beyond Santiago’s grasp of English.
“Aquí estás, Santiago.”
Jason turned back to face the door at the sound of Mariposa’s voice. She smiled at him, and his heart jumped in his chest.
She gave her brother a look that was 100 percent scolding older sister. “Did you wash behind your ears, young man?” she asked, miming the question.
Santiago’s expression grew instantly mutinous. “Jasón no make me wash las orejas. On his boat, he says wash las manos”—he held up his hands—“la cara”—he motioned toward his face—“but no says wash las orejas.”
Mariposa propped her fists on her hips. “You think Jasón will agree with you?”
Santiago’s grasp of the English language apparently extended that far. He gave Jason a look filled with hopeful expectation.
Jason ruffled the boy’s deep black hair. “Having once been your age, I empathize with you, but as a grown gentleman, I have to support your sister in this.”
“And what have you to say to that, Santiago?” Mariposa asked.
He waved his hand dismissively, a gesture that precisely mimicked one Jason had seen dozens of times from Mariposa. “Jasón, he uses the big words. I no understand.”
Mariposa gave her response entirely in Spanish, and it was immediately effective. Santiago sulked from the room, no doubt on his way to see to his behind-the-ear ablutions.
“I am afraid I am not the most popular sister in London just now.” Mariposa sighed. “Mamá, as Santiago has told me many times, never made him wash behind his ears.”
“Considering how he looked when we first found him in that field, I doubt she made him wash anything.”
Mariposa turned back toward him, and the frustration in her eyes dissolved.
“I brought you flores,” Jason said. He’d nearly forgotten the bouquet he still held.
“Flores. You are learning Spanish?”
“A word here and there,” he said.
She took the flowers and immediately raised them to her nose. The gesture was endearingly feminine. “You are very sweet.”
“Sweet enough to warrant a dinner invitation?”
She brushed the tips of her flowers along her cheek. “Did you wash behind your ears?”
“Would you like to check?”
Color spread across her face, but she continued to smile. “I think you can be trusted.” Her eyes focused somewhere behind him. “Are Mamá’s flowers from you as well?”
“They are.” Jason looked back at Mrs. Thornton. Though her gaze remained on the view, her fingers lightly stroked the flowers she still held. He thought she seemed more peaceful. That, in turn, would bring Mariposa a measure of peace. “Can anything be done for her?” he asked.
Mariposa laid her head against him as they both stood watching her mother. “I do not know. We never had the luxury of a doctor to consult.”
Jason put an arm about her shoulders, holding her to him. Somehow, having her there made Lampton House feel more like home than it had since Father’s death. “Perhaps a doctor might be found now that she is here in London.”
“I refuse to send her to an asylum,” Mariposa said vehemently.
Reminding himself that trust did not come easily for Mariposa, Jason did not allow himself to be ruffled by the insinuation that he would advocate institutionalization. He simply ben
t enough to press a kiss to Mariposa’s temple. The small show of support earned him a quick glance.
“You are giving me your ‘Mariposa needs to have more faith in me’ look,” she said.
“Am I?” He tried to imagine that look. “Is it working?”
She only smiled and stepped away from him, crossing to her mother. “Mamá. Las flores necesitan agua.”
Jason watched her tend to her mother, her love evident in every word and gesture. She no longer hid behind the mask she’d worn when first they’d met. Her wit and humor and zest for life had not disappeared. Rather, his understanding of her character had deepened.
“She does not wish to release her flowers long enough to have them placed in a vase.” Mariposa spoke as she crossed the room, obviously intent on summoning a servant to bring the necessary vase and water for the bouquets, both of which Mrs. Thornton now held.
Jason took hold of Mariposa’s hand as she passed, preventing her from leaving. He had come to confess a few things and, despite having been with her for several minutes, had not managed a single item on his list.
“Might the flowers wait? I was hoping for a moment of your time.”
She reached up and touched his cheek. “You may have far more than a moment, mi cariño.”
“I will, for my own sake, assume mi cariño is not a vicious insult.”
Santiago’s voice answered before Mariposa could. “It means ‘my dear.’” The boy stood in the doorway, his repulsed tone surpassed only by his disgusted expression.
My dear? Jason’s nerves actually settled a bit at that revelation. He felt less and less unsure of Mariposa’s feelings.
“Are you”—Santiago eyed them both warily—“wanting los besos now?”
Jason had no idea what “los besos” meant, but Mariposa’s eyes flew open wide.
“Vete, Santiago.” She shooed him off. “Go . . . clean some part of yourself.”
“No more cleaning.” With a determination that in any other situation might have been admirable, Santiago stepped fully inside the room and crossed to an empty chair not far from his mother’s. He sat and gave them a mulish look.
“To his credit,” Jason said, “no happily dirty boy ever wishes to clean any part of himself.”
Mariposa sighed with all the drama she usually did. “This, I have discovered, is quite true.”
“Perhaps you would be so good, Mariposa, as to tell me just what ‘los besos’ means.”
Jason didn’t think he had ever seen Mariposa blush as deeply as she did in that moment. “It is . . .” She grew rather flustered. “It means ‘kisses.’”
He laughed on the spot. “That mischievous little imp.”
“It is not so very funny,” Mariposa protested. “Why must you laugh that he thinks you want to be giving me kisses? This is not so ilógico.”
Jason kissed the hand he held. “I laughed at his audacity in posing the question. I assure you, the idea is not at all ilógico, my—How did you say that? Mi clarín.”
Her lips twitched. “You just called me your bugle.”
“What word was I trying to say?” He thought he’d remembered correctly.
“Mi cariño,” she answered. “Although if you are saying it to me”—she grew even more flushed—“you would say mi cariña.”
“And that means ‘dear,’ does it not?”
She nodded. “‘Dear.’ ‘Darling.’ ‘Love.’ It is an endearment.”
Jason took hold of her other hand. “But is it an endearment you truly meant?”
Mariposa took in a rather sharp breath. “Are you asking if I am in love with you?”
That was rather more abrupt than he’d planned the conversation to be. Still, he was not one to pass up an unlooked for opportunity. “That is exactly what I am asking.”
Abuela chose that precise moment to join the rest of the Thornton family in the increasingly crowded drawing room. The woman had the world’s best—or, in reality, worst—sense of timing. “Buenas noches, Jason.”
How was a man supposed to have the all-important conversation with his lady love when every relation she had insisted on gathering around?
“How are you, Mrs. Aritza?” He could hear the irritation in his voice. Abuela merely nodded and continued on, joining her daughter near the window.
Mariposa’s eyes were firmly fixed on him when he looked back at her. Her complexion had grown more than a touch pale, an unmistakable nervousness in her eyes.
She spoke before he could. “I do not think I can answer that question with so many people about.”
“My sentiments exactly.”
She very nearly duplicated her brother’s earlier actions, pulling him from the room but by his hand and not his jacket. As they stepped just out of sight of the drawing room, she stopped and turned to face him. “Will this do?”
He glanced around. The family was not breathing down their necks, but it was not quite the setting he would have chosen. “A corridor?”
“An empty corridor,” she corrected.
His smile was immediate. “Perfect,” he said and meant it wholeheartedly. “Now, where were we?”
“You wished to know if I love you.” Beneath her still-apparent nerves, a bubbling excitement seemed to be growing. “You would not ask that if you did not love me. I am certain you would not.”
“But we were not discussing my feelings.” She was getting a vast deal too far ahead of him.
She looked him directly in the eye, determination obvious in her expression. “I love you, Jason Jonquil,” she said quite seriously. “The how or the when”—she waved a hand—“I cannot say. But it is true.”
“I—” Jason managed nothing more than that single syllable before she kissed him.
She kissed him. He quickly joined in the effort, reveling in the joy of having her in his arms once more, of stealing a moment together without interruption, without worry and heaviness. He closed the small gap between them. Her fingers brushed his face. He kissed her more tenderly, more deeply.
Though he regretted it, he recognized the necessity of ending the exceptionally pleasant interlude. He had not actually declared himself. Another moment of her intoxicating besos and he’d forget everything he intended to say.
Though he didn’t actually kiss her again, he kept her close, enjoying the familiar scent of her. She melted into his embrace, her cheek resting against his chest. “How does one say ‘I love you’ in Spanish?”
She took a somewhat ragged breath. “That depends on who is saying it,” she answered, “and to whom the words are being spoken.”
He stroked her hair, refusing to let her go. “Let us assume, then, that the words are being spoken by a hopelessly besotted young gentleman to the lady he knows he could never live without.”
She raised her eyes to his. A single tear trickled from the corner of her eye. “Te amo,” she whispered.
“Te amo,” he said. “I love you with all my heart.”
“In spite of everything I did?”
Jason shook his head. “There is no ‘in spite of’ or ‘except for.’ All my heart, Mari. I mean that. If there were limits to my affection, I would not have run after you nor journeyed to the Continent in the midst of a war. A man does not do that for a woman unless he is entirely devoted to her.”
She raised up on her toes and whispered, “Mi cariño” in the brief moment before pressing a tender kiss to his lips. “And you will not leave me,” she said still but a breath away.
“Not ever,” he said. “If I have to chase you across every ocean, every continent, I will.”
“Are you asking me to marry you?”
“I am begging you to marry me.”
Mariposa’s expression sobered.
That look worried him. “What is it?”
“I do not think my mother will ever be
well again, and I cannot leave her. And I am responsible for Abuela and for raising Santiago. That is a large burden to ask you to share.”
“One I will gladly carry with you. I happen to know Jean is hoping to convince you to hire him on as tutor for your scamp of a brother. Abuela can help with your mother. Who’s to say your mamá won’t improve with time?”
“She might not.”
He kissed her forehead and pulled her fully into his embrace again. “We will cross that bridge when we must.”
“Where will we live?” Mariposa asked. “There are too many of us for a flat.”
“Your brother inherited a very sizable estate from your uncle,” Jason reminded her.
Mariposa nodded her understanding. “Thornton Manor. But that was Marcos’s inheritance.”
“It is now Santiago’s,” Jason said. “Your family will have a place to live for years to come. And when the war is over, which I hope it will be soon, we might consider spending time in Spain.”
“I would like that, Jason. I should dearly love to see Spain again.”
Jason stood with her in his arms, quite content with life. “What else shall we do, my dear?”
“Raise turnips,” Mariposa said. “And then refuse to eat them.”
“And I can repeat myself dreadfully, and you can threaten to fire me.”
“No, my love. Never that. I intend to keep you forever.”
“Qué es esto?” Abuela asked without warning from the doorway.
Jason kept Mariposa pinned to his side as he grinned at the knowing look in Abuela’s eyes. “Te amo.” He felt certain he’d remembered the phrase correctly.
Abuela raised her eyebrows in surprise. “You are in love with me?”
“Oh, dear,” he muttered.
Mariposa giggled. “No, Abuelita. Jasón me ama.”
Abuela clucked her tongue and shook her head in obvious exasperation. “You speak the Spanish horriblemente, Mr. Jonquil. You will have to work on that. Our butler, he will help you.” With a crisp nod, she returned once more to the drawing room.
Once she’d given up the pretense of speaking no English, Abuela had quickly become one of Jason’s favorite people. Mariposa’s entire family, in fact, had become decidedly important to him. “Did I really tell her I was in love with her?” he asked.
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