Golden Paradise

Chapter Thirteen

Walking through the informal English gardens facing the sea, Stefan found his coachman visiting with the other drivers near the stables and had himself driven to the Yacht Club. Settling into a club chair near the windows, he had a servant bring him a bottle of brandy, watched as the man filled a glass to the point indicated by his finger and then, thanking him with a smile, began drinking. There was no possibility he could sleep tonight, and the liquor might help to mitigate the distasteful sense of affront and self-reproach assailing him.

He shouldn't, of course, have forced himself on Lisaveta.

Yet she had responded like a practiced tart, damn her. How many other men had enjoyed her favors the past few weeks…? The thought of other men touching her maddened and inflamed him, made him resentful, made him covetous.

He hadn't known exactly how he'd proceed once he saw Lisaveta again. He had intended to make love to her and by so doing exorcise his burning need for her, feel nothing but relief and return to Kars, although beneath his pragmatic resolve had been the more realistic possibility that he would, if necessary, bring her back with him.

Since he wanted her still, there was no question now of what to do, only of methodology.

He would simply have to carry her off, he decided, draining his glass and staring into the clear crystalline bottom. As he had before. And once she was settled in the mountain lodge, she'd be happy and content… as she had before. He would see to it.

Other men had wives and established mistresses; the practice, in fact, was prevalent. And while the inclination to install a confirmed mistress had never tempted him before, there was no reason why he shouldn't.

At this time of night the club chairs were deserted. The gaming tables two rooms away were the site of all activity, the brilliant lights and noisy play removed from the quiet of the parlor fronting the sea. He poured himself another drink and looked out the windows for the first time since he'd come into the room. The slips and docks and pier stretched across the flat horizon. Masts of sailing craft and smokestacks of larger yachts were silhouetted against the moonlight. The breeze had dropped off so the banners on the outside deck only flapped occasionally on their standards; the stars were radiant in the sky.

As he gazed at the tranquil scene and vast sparkling sky, his mood seemed to alter. He was less restless now, perhaps the liquor was taking effect, and the chaos of his feelings was sorted out… a decision made. The Golden Countess was about to be taken off the market-whether she liked it or not.

He hadn't been at the Yacht Club long because the brandy bottle was only half-empty when Nikki walked into the lamp-lit room. He stood for a moment just inside the doorway, surveying the large area punctuated with leather chairs and sofas, writing tables, newspaper and magazine racks and silk-shaded chandeliers. His tawny eyes narrowed momentarily when he caught sight of Stefan lounging in his chair near the window, and with purposeful stride he walked over to him.

"I've been looking for you," he said, not bothering with social amenities. He'd been to Stefan's palace on the Fontanka first, and then to several cafes Stefan favored, before thinking of the Yacht Club, and he was irritated and badly out of temper.

"So you found me," Stefan idly replied, not inclined to be chastised by anyone. He knew why Nikki was here, and glowering like some wrathful deity, but the woman was available to the entire city. Surely he needn't bear the brunt of Nikki's censure.

"What did you do to Lisaveta?" Each word was a ground-out challenge.

While cognizant of Nikki's temper, Stefan matched him in his own terse resentment. "Only what, from the sound of it, every other man in Saint Petersburg's doing," he drawled casually, his sardonic expression masking his indignation at her popularity.

"If we hadn't been friends so long, I'd kill you for that remark." Nikki's golden eyes were hostile. "I'll say instead, you're dead wrong."

"Not from what I hear." Stefan hadn't moved from his comfortable pose, the glass of brandy in his hand resting on the chair arm, his eyes only half-open, as if their conversation were of negligible interest to him.

"Your informants are mistaken," Nikki retorted, his voice so soft it was almost a whisper, his stance vengeful, his Saint George medal and ribbon the only splash of color in the severity of the evening dress. "You could have hurt her."

One dark brow lifted in the studied calm of Stefan's expression. "She didn't appear to be in pain. To the contrary-"

"She's pregnant."

It looked for a moment as though Stefan had stopped breathing, but he quickly recovered and carelessly said, "So?"

Nikki's golden eyes flared like brilliant flame, his features took on the menace many men had seen across the dueling field. "So," Nikki murmured softly, "I understand you're the father, she's my cousin, and I'd like to know what you're going to do about it."

"Can you prove it?"

"I can kill you," Nikki breathed, his voice between a growl and a whisper, "and then it won't matter."

"Perhaps not a satisfactory solution for the lady, though," Stefan replied in an equally soft tone. "Do I understand she wishes to marry me?" His inquiry was insolent.

"She claims not to. She also claims she's not pregnant."

Stefan's brows rose. "And yet you're hounding me."

"She's apparently an innocent, although-" and it was Nikki's turn to raise one dark brow "-I'm sure you're more aware of that than we."

Stefan had the grace to acknowledge his responsibility there but took issue with the timing. "If she's not sure," he went on, no longer lounging, his glass put aside, his dark eyes intent on Nikki, "why couldn't it be someone else's. She's been here nearly a month."

"The girl is chaste as country air."

"Remember to whom you speak." Stefan's drawl was remonstrance.

"Present company excepted," Nikki said, his well-considered gaze taking in the altered posture and attitude of his friend.

"Then why is it," Stefan said, his voice intense with jealousy, "I've heard such contrary rumor?"

Nikki smiled for the first time. "Rumor only. She's flirtatious. Everyone wants her. It doesn't necessarily follow they were successful. And they weren't. Don't tell me," he went on, his mouth quirked in irony, "you deserted your cavalry corps for Lise and her gallants."

"The munitions and artillery are bogged down," Stefan muttered. "We're weeks off schedule. How do I know," he demanded, his tone different now, his dark glance keen, "it's untrue about the other men?" He wanted verification. He wanted assurances. He wanted absolutes, this man who'd lived his own life so differently.

"Because she came home with us every night in our coach and Alisa tucked her in and said good-night. Is my word sufficient against your jealousy?"

"Every night?" Stefan wouldn't so easily relinquish the maddening gossip concerning the Golden Countess.

Nikki gazed at Stefan from under his dark brows, the golden Kuzan eyes almost translucent in the lamp glow, his voice when he spoke significant in its utter lack of emphasis. "Every night," he said.

"She's exactly the same," Stefan said very quietly, trying to sort out the confusion and disarray of his thoughts. "I don't know if I believe you." How could she respond as she had with him and not fuel the rumors and gossip for the exact same reason?

Nikki shrugged. "That's your problem, Stefan. I can't obliterate your jealousy." Stefan's gaze widened.

"You might as well face it," Nikki said with a grin. "That's a hell of a long trip you just made."

"Don't remind me," Stefan grumbled.

Pulling over a chair facing Stefan, Nikki sank into it and smiled benignly. "She'll be flattered to know you relinquished duty for her."

"You misunderstand," Stefan protested.

"How long have we known each other, Stefan? Since we were fifteen? Tell me honestly that you're here for other reasons." He waited, feeling vastly better than he had when he'd first confronted Stefan.

"I could be here to visit my fiancée."

"Appalling thought," Nikki replied, his smile sunny. "Were you sober when you proposed to Nadejda?" he asked with masculine bias.

"No."

"I didn't think so."

"It wouldn't have changed things, had I been."

"Because the House of Bariatinsky-Orbeliani needed an heir."

Stefan sighed. "Yes, because of that."

"But, good God, Nadejda." Nikki's own sigh was weighty with rebuke.

"It didn't matter who it was." Stefan swirled the liquor in his glass and then gazed across at Nikki from under his heavy brows. "I was tired of looking," he slowly said. "Masha had been nagging me for nearly two years," he added with a negligent shrug. "And I only had a week in town."

"Also, Vladimir has court influence sewed up."

"Which overshadowed points one through three," Stefan sarcastically murmured.

Nikki wasn't unrealistic. Vladimir was powerful. "So Vladimir was the deciding factor."

"With my family background," Stefan concluded, images of their years of wandering in Europe and his father's painful decline vividly recalled. "Or was," he added, all his carefully considered plans for a conventional engagement, marriage and family in jeopardy. Nikki would be adamant about marriage, he knew, if Lise was pregnant, and even he was beginning to question the merits of an arrangement he'd deemed extraordinarily suitable only months ago. All because of a beautiful Countess he'd just been brutish to because he was jealous of every man who looked her way. "Merde and bloody hell," he swore, realizing he was indeed jealous, "now what?"

"Exactly why I'm here," Nikki cheerfully replied to the gloomy man sunk into the brown leather chair. "First ask her to marry you."

He was offered a slow and searching look. "And what of Nadejda?"

"Engagements are made to be broken." A bland smile accompanied the platitude.

"At the risk of upsetting your plans," Stefan neutrally said, "I should point out the contracts are rather lengthy and signed."

"You can afford to buy her off. You own half of Georgia. And remember to be persuasive when you propose. Lise is curiously independent."

"I'm supposed to beg her to marry me?" For someone who'd only considered marriage a final necessity, the prospect was dumbfounding. "Maybe we should rethink this. She's probably not pregnant. She probably doesn't want to marry me if she is."

This reasoning received a scowl from Nikki, who viewed family honor as quite apart from other of his casually held beliefs regarding male-female relationships.

"She will?" Stefan said, responding to Nikki's scowl. "You don't know if she will," he went on, answering his own question.

"If she's pregnant," Nikki very quietly said, "you're marrying her."

"And if I don't?" Stefan as softly inquired, thin-skinned and touchy when given ultimatums.

Nikki lifted his hands in a gesture of goodwill. "Let's not ruin a pleasant friendship. You care about her or you wouldn't be here causing a scandal at the Gagarins'."

"I cm," Stefan wryly admitted, "a hell of a long way from Kars."

"Exactly," Nikki said.

"All right. I'll talk to her."

"Do you want to come back with me?"

"Now?" It was evasion pure and simple. Stefan had been a bachelor too long.

"Tomorrow morning," Nikki pointedly said, and rose to leave.

"Tomorrow morning," Stefan agreed, and reached for the brandy bottle.

Why was it, he reflected, the subdued heat of the brandy sliding down his throat, more daunting to contemplate marriage to Lise than to Nadejda? He answered his question without a flicker of delay. Because he cared about Lise, cared enormously if he faced the hard facts of his motivating influences in coming north. Unlike Nadejda, if they were to marry, he couldn't ignore her. He couldn't continue in his current style of independent living as he'd planned to do with Nadejda. Until this moment, he thought with a startled sense of discovery, he'd never realized need for a woman could be so confining.

On that morbid note, he refilled his glass, only to reflect on further restrictions should he marry Countess Lazaroff. She could be a demanding woman and insistent; she also had an imperious streak, due no doubt to her Kuzan blood, and she argued with him often and vehemently if she disagreed. He wasn't in the mood that evening to contemplate the more positive side of their relationship. He saw only in this marriage, so different from the kind he'd contemplated with Nadejda, the absolute end to his freedom. The thought prompted him to swallow the contents of his glass, necessitating another refill, a sequence that continued into the wee hours.

Stefan wasn't in the best humor the next morning, touched as he was with a slight headache, nor was the recipient of his call in any better spirits. Lisaveta had spent a sleepless night debating the appalling negatives in her attraction to Stefan. Both were uneasy, also, considering the circumstances of their last meeting.

Why had he come? she wondered when the footman came to fetch her from the library. Surely there was nothing to say after last night. Had she not thought she would appear cowardly to refuse his card, she would have.

He automatically rose to his feet when she entered the drawing room, but slowly, to favor his throbbing temples, and immediately apologized. "Forgive my actions last night at Gagarin's," he quietly said. "I was entirely at fault."

Since Lisaveta's sleepless night had to do with the humiliation of her unrestrained surrender to the irresistible Prince, she wasn't in an absolving mood. "Yes," she said with censure and disapprobation, "you certainly were…but then, you and shameless excess are synonymous."

Stefan opened his mouth to speak, about to remind her of the nail marks she'd left on the back of his neck, but decided against it and said instead, "I'm extremely sorry."

Lisaveta scrutinized him sharply, since his tone was much too contrite for the Prince Bariatinsky she knew. But perhaps he had manners after all, or perhaps a conscience. Regardless, this visit was over. "If you came to apologize, consider it done. Good day, Prince Bariatinsky."

"Wait."

Her hand was on the door latch. "Yes?" she said in stern inquiry, as a teacher might.

She was dressed in a morning gown of cucumber green, plainly cut, and she looked quite different from the seductive beauty of last evening. She looked…scholarly, he decided was the proper word. Even her chestnut hair was braided into a coronet, enhancing her puritanical image, and she wore only Militza's pearls in her ears for jewelry. Why did he find her chaste and virtuous appearance so sensual? Was it because her unornamented frock was suppressing what he knew lay beneath? Or was it her cool and distant attitude he found challenging? He wished, he decided, to take down her braids and unbutton her high-necked gown; he wished to touch her soft warm flesh and bring her to life.

"You had something more to say?" she prompted as the silence lengthened, but there was demand in her tone rather than geniality.

Restored to his purpose, he said, "Yes… actually I do." He found himself at a loss momentarily on how exactly to begin. How precisely, he wondered, do you politely ask, Are you pregnant, and if so, is it mine, and if so, should we marry, and if I propose, will you accept, and do you really want this or find it as embarrassing and awkward as I? Not to mention the overriding fact he still had a fiancée, who might or might not be easily disposed of, Nikki's nonchalance notwithstanding.

He didn't contemplate asking questions about love, because in the current circumstances it was irrelevant. But the thought of love did enter his mind in a strange and elusive way, because he had faced last night the solid truth of his journey north and he hadn't been able to place the impetus on lust alone. As the brandy in the bottle declined he had had to admit that assuaging his lust could have been accomplished with infinitely less effort in Aleksandropol. And he could have saved himself eight days of travel.

"Am I supposed to guess?" Lisaveta coolly asked into the new small silence, not in the right frame of mind to parry verbally with the man who'd entered her life with the abruptness of a meteor, made himself essential to her without even trying with the same casual charm he extended to all women, and then as abruptly took his leave-only to disastrously repeat his performance in an abbreviated version last night. She was bitterly resentful of his charm and her attraction to his careless seduction.

"I talked to Nikki last night," he said in way of gentle introduction. "And?"

Apparently she wasn't going to make this easy. He took two steps forward so they wouldn't be conversing across so great a distance and, editing the bluntness of Nikki's statements of last evening, said, "He mentioned, or suggested… that is-he's aware we spent some time together before you arrived in Saint Petersburg."

He had gone home from the Yacht Club soon after sunrise and bathed and breakfasted. An early-morning ride had helped marginally to clear his head and he'd come directly to the Kuzan palace afterward, as some men ascend the scaffold briskly in order to speed the inevitable. His hair was still damp from the sea mist that lay over Saint Petersburg in the mornings.

Lisaveta knew he'd been out riding, dressed as he was. And she took issue with the even tenor of his life. Presumably a morning ride was routine in Saint Petersburg. Last night's events might have disrupted her life wretchedly, but his customary practices obviously remained unchanged. Her voice was mildly peevish when she said, "I didn't make a particular secret of my knowing you, although rest assured, Prince Bariatinsky, I didn't make an issue of it, either."

"Stefan," he prompted, and sighed. "Good God, Lise, stop standing there like some avenging angel. Look," he said, moving close enough to take her hand, "come sit down so we can talk."

She resisted for the briefest moment because the simple act of holding his hand was doing disastrous things to her heart rate. And what could they possibly have to discuss? she thought, after last night. She said exactly that the next moment, and his voice was solemn when he replied, "I'm abysmally sorry, dushka. I was jealous and that's the honest truth."

She looked up at him, surprised, and he was startled himself at his admission.

"So we should talk," he said, tugging at her hand, and this time, touched by his candor, she followed him. They sat on an Empire sofa, rose-colored like the carpet, with a careful distance between them, both cautious and circumspect, both plagued by a sleepless night… and touchy.

"Since there's no way to lead urbanely into this," Stefan said, feeling more like a young lad than the Commander of the Tsar's Cavalry, "I'll simply say-" he took a short extra breath for courage against the coolness of her eyes "-Nikki told me you're pregnant."

"It doesn't concern you."

He should have been ecstatic with her temperate reply; it had in fact been his own first reaction to Nikki's disclosure. Inexplicably, he wasn't. He was annoyed. "Of course it concerns me," he said, sounding pompously stuffy even to himself.

"Look, Stefan…" It was the first time she'd used his Christian name since she'd walked into that room, and it gave him pleasure, as if somehow he were succeeding against her cool reserve. "Nikki may not have told you…the-" Her hesitation over the word pregnancy charmed him. She was in many ways too sweetly naive for the brutality of the world, and a novel sense of protection overcame him. "The…situation," she went on, "may not develop into anything you need concern yourself with."

"Are you pregnant?" Suddenly he wanted to know rather than be left out with her equivocation.

"I don't know," she said, a blush pinking her pale cheeks.

"What do you mean," he inquired, his voice hushed, "you don't know? Have you or have you not missed your menses?" he asked bluntly.

The flush on her face deepened, but her voice when she spoke was firm. "I don't answer questions like that." She thought he looked tired, his dark eyes underscored with faint shadows and half-lidded, as if it were an effort to hold them open, and he was here this morning because he'd talked to Nikki last night. Because Nikki had talked to him. About her. And she resented the notion that Prince Bariatinsky was trying, under duress, to distinguish what his minimum responsibilities were.

"Actually," she said decisively, "I don't answer to you at all. As a matter of fact," she added, "I'm quite independent of you. As you no doubt prefer, since I don't recall any discussion of a future when we parted after our holiday at your lodge."

"Hell, Lise, you're making this difficult."

"On the contrary, I'll make it very easy. Shall we drop the subject?"

"Maybe I don't care to drop the subject."

"And maybe I don't care whether you care or not."

"Dammit, I'm just trying to get to the bottom of this."

"And then what, Prince Bariatinsky, will you do?"

There was a short silence. "Nikki says I have to marry you."

Lisaveta's eyes took on the gelid glint of an arctic winter. "Is this a marriage proposal?" she inquired in a sherbet-sweet accent.

"Yes, dammit, it is," he growled, exasperated at her evasion, frustrated with her disinterest.

"Well, then, dammit, I refuse your gracious offer," she snapped.

"You can't refuse me," he snapped back, this man who only hours before had been appalled at the prospect of marriage.

"But I just have and that, I think, concludes our conversation. If you'll excuse me, Prince Bariatinsky. Your fiancée, perhaps, would be a more suitable recipient of your charming proposals." And she abruptly stood.

As abruptly his hand closed around her wrist and he dragged her back down. "You'll leave when I tell you to leave." He hadn't traveled five swift and fatiguing days across the Empire to be dismissed like some servant.

"You forget, General, you're not dealing with a subaltern," Lisaveta wrathfully flared, struggling to free herself from his steely grasp. "Your orders mean nothing to me."

"Does this mean something, then?" he asked, and pulled her roughly into his arms and kissed her, something he'd been wanting to do since she'd first entered the room.

She fought against his strength and his encroaching mouth and tongue, but she was effectively imprisoned in his arms despite her violent efforts. And unlike last night, when only consummation was a priority, Stefan lingered and teased, he tasted the sweetness of her lips as if she were new to him, as though young ladies wearing coronet braids were an untried flavor, as though he'd traveled five days and nights to exchange kisses like a proper gentleman.

She was surprised at first, after the initial shock of his aggression, because she'd expected his anger again and found instead a tenderness and restraint. He only kissed her, dulcetly, delicately, on her mouth, her cheek, her eyes, on the tip and slender fine bridge of her nose. And only when at last, at long last, she began kissing him back, did his mouth slowly drift downward over the silky curve of her jaw onto the warming flesh of her throat.

He carefully released her arms, which he'd been restraining at her sides in measured degrees until she leaned into him of her own accord, and he began breathing again in a normal rhythm.

"I shouldn't let you kiss me," she murmured above his bent head, her hands resting lightly on the solid muscle of his shoulders.

"But you are," he answered, his deep voice a husky low resonance against her throat, his slender dark fingers beginning to slide the small jet buttons at her collar free.

"You're too practiced…I should resist," she whispered, her eyes half-shut against the tremors of pleasure rushing through her senses.

"And you're not practiced at all," he whispered back, raising his head to look at her. "I find it arousing." He smiled then, a small faint smile of gratification. "Although resist if you like, Countess. I'd find that arousing, as well."

"I hate your licentiousness," she quietly said, her tawny eyes accusing in a curiously erotic way. Perhaps it was the feline quality of her slightly oriental eyes or the manner in which she surveyed him from beneath the lacy fringe of her lashes.

"I can tell," he said, brushing his palms over the tips of her hardened nipples visible through the cucumber-colored silk of her gown.

"And I hate your damnable assurance," she added hotly, but her voice was husky with a desire he recognized.

"I, however," he murmured, his hands moving upward to slip two more buttons free, "adore your temper." His fingers slid inside the eight inches of open neckline he'd freed and he slowly stroked the mounded fullness of her breasts. His hands were as warm as she remembered, and gentle and skilled. Lisaveta's eyes briefly shut and she moaned in warming bliss as luxurious sensation flooded through her body.

But a moment later she sharply said, "No," steeling herself against the pleasure he so easily roused, refusing to willingly surrender again, wishing to save herself from the humiliation she'd experienced last night. Her eyes were focused once again and aggressive, her hand coming out to rest on his wrist. "Don't touch me."

His wrist, muscular and strong-boned, dwarfed her small hand. "I want to," he replied, no aggression in his voice, only patience and courtesy.

"You must allow me my prerogatives," she said quietly, and waited.

His wrist moved under her hand and drawing back, he shook her hand free. "Your obedient servant, mademoiselle," he said in a parody of good manners, but his voice was tinged with surliness, like a restive boy called to order.

"You're sulking," she declared, her tone suddenly teasing, because he was moody and scowling, his large frame sprawled against the pink feminine sofa like some great dark thundercloud.

"I don't sulk," he said with unmistakable sulkiness.

"You can't always have your own way," she said, thinking how very beautiful he was even when he was scowling.

"But I always have," he replied with neither apology nor ostentation. He smiled then, because she was studying him as though he were an archaeological oddity. "I recommend it."

"What happens when you don't have your way?"

He shrugged rather than answer her, for he wished to avoid further argument. "Why so polemical, dushka," he said instead. "There are pleasanter ways to pass the time."

"Making love, you mean."

"Precisely."

"And if I don't wish to?"

"Come, darling," he murmured, "you always wish to."

"I don't right now."

He surveyed her for a moment as she had so recently him, and then said mildly, "If you take your dress off, I'll marry you." His remark was facetious and blasé and remarkably genuine.

"According to Nikki," she reminded him, "you'll marry me whether I take my dress off or not."

"Hmm," he said.

"Yes, exactly." Her smugness was genial, not malicious.

Another short silence and then he said, "How emphatic are you about your prerogatives?" He was smiling now with a buoyant cheer that made him even more appealing, and she was suddenly jealous of all the women who'd seen that particular smile. It was an intimate smile of exceptional grace and charm, like a promise of personal fulfillment.

"About as emphatic as you are about yours."

"Hmm," he said again. Her honesty was always demonstrably plain.

"Is this difficult, this style of courtship in which a woman doesn't fall immediately panting into your arms?" Her golden eyes were amused.

" 'Difficult' wouldn't be my choice of word. I'd say time-consuming," he drawled, his grin boyish. "But then I've still a day and a half before I have to go back."

Fleeting surprise showed on her face. "Back?"

"To Kars, of course. You didn't think the war was over?"

"Are you going to win?" she asked in an intemperate rush of words, fearful suddenly she might lose him after all, not to Nadejda or a multitude of other women but to something far worse. It altered her perspective instantaneously and made his presence in Saint Petersburg treasured.

"Of course," he replied with his usual expansive confidence. "I always do."

"The undefeated Prince Bariatinsky," she said softly. He was heralded not only as the youngest commander in the Tsar's army but as the only undefeated general in Russian history.

"At your service, mademoiselle…" Out of uniform he looked vulnerable suddenly, not a symbol of the Tsar's Empire or the strength of Russia's army but simply a man, who was smiling at her and teasing her. A man who'd come a great distance and quite plainly wanted her. A man she loved beyond reason or sanity. "You will be careful, won't you?" Lisaveta said gravely, her mood transformed by a stabbing reassertion of fear.

"Darling," Stefan said, his smile intact, untouched by her anxiety, "you survive by not being careful. Don't worry about me."

She attempted an answering smile of reassurance but a tiny shiver ran down her spine as if some unseen specter had tapped her on the shoulder.

"Are you finished now?" he asked. She looked at him blankly.

"Talking," he said. "I've only a day and a half." His grin struck away her last vestiges of apprehension.

"Some men subscribe to a touch more gallantry," she mockingly chastised.

"They probably have more time than I," he retorted, un-chastised and smiling still.

"Is that my cue to fall willing into your arms?" A coy and teasing response.

"I'd like that." And while his dark eyes were amused, his voice was suddenly serious. "You own my heart, dushka," he added very softly, acknowledging at last the feelings he'd fought so long, the feelings that had taken him from Kars. "And I'm helplessly in love."

Tears welled in her eyes and she swallowed once before answering. "Oh, Stepka," Lisaveta whispered, reaching out to touch his hand, "what are we going to do?"

"I'm marrying you," he said simply, as though he'd understood that eventuality always and not only in the last few revealing moments, and then he sighed a little because he could ready feel the burden of the past engulf him. All the bitter memories came rushing back, all the whispers ignored and uncertainties felt, the malice and hurt surrounding his parents' grand passion recalled as if it were yesterday. And now he was doing what he'd sworn never to do; he was letting love for a woman compromise his future plans.

Consciously shaking away his reservations, he drew Lisaveta into the curve of his arms, the feel of her warmth next to him mitigating the jarring foreboding. "And you're marrying me," he whispered, her soft braids like silk under his chin. "Do you like the sound of that as much as I?"

"We shouldn't," she murmured, distraught. "I shouldn't. It's asking too much of you." She understood he was relinquishing all his carefully wrought plans, the ones so painstakingly arranged to overcome the shadow of his father's disgrace, the ones he'd considered a logical solution to the pain of his own unorthodox childhood. He was risking, too, his own illustrious career if Prince Taneiev were vengeful. Men had fallen from favor with the Tsar for smaller infractions. And since Alexander was insulated from the world, his information often censored and altered in the political cauldron of court intrigue, there was never any certainty one's case would be presented objectively.

"Nonsense," Stefan said, "everything can be resolved." A striking statement from a man who'd vowed never to love a woman so madly that it affected his life or career.

"You don't have to marry me," Lisaveta quietly declared.

"But I wish to, dushka, and besides," he said, drawing away so he could look at her, a faint grin lifting the corners of his mouth, "Nikki will kill me if I don't."

"Vladimir Taneiev might kill you if you do." No levity infused her remark.

"True. However," Stefan briskly went on, "I understand his greed outstrips his ethics. I'll offer him large sums of money."

"Could I help?" she said then. "I could at least do that."

He looked at her in mild astonishment because he'd never had a woman offer to pay his way. "You were raised differently," he said in murmured wonder, "but thank you, no. I've plenty." An understatement from the heir to two family fortunes that individually could have run the Empire for a decade. "And now that I've offered you my name, my wealth, my future, do you think you could say yes out of consideration for my feelings?" The laughter in his eyes reminded her of a young boy intent on play.

"Oh, yes," she said then, young-girl breathless with suffocating happiness. "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes…" she whispered, feeling a joy so profound she trembled. She loved him beyond the normal scope of emotion, she loved him with an incoherent, jubilant elation that stacked pleasure upon pleasure to the rooftop of the world.

She had made her objection, offered him a chance to reconsider his proposal out of decency and a kindly courtesy. He didn't have to marry her because Nikki was insisting or because of the possibility she carried his child. She knew, too, how much his previous plans for marriage were based on the sadnesses in his past.

But when she'd made those required objections and he'd refused them all in his teasing, smiling way, she'd allowed the full measure of her happiness to invade her heart, so she felt now a rosy warm magic, as though she could touch the whole world and make it smile with her. She couldn't have accepted him had he been coerced or reluctant. She was too prideful herself to take a husband who didn't love her immensely. And he did, it was plain. Beyond his teasing and irony, it was clear he loved her so much he'd come across Russia for her and would marry her even in Vladimir Taneiev's shadow.

"I'll make you happy, Stepka," she whispered, her face alight with love, "always."

And he knew with that certainty reserved for those rare and perfect unions, she would. He'd searched for her, blasé and unknowing, too long to doubt it.

He knew it with that blinding flash of mystic revelation.

With a Zoroastrian belief like burning flame.

With a shaman magic-he knew it.

He smiled, thinking of an additional intuitive reason more: she said "Stepka" with the exact inflection that his father had, and in all the world he'd found someone to love again. Or perhaps she had found him, he thought, considering how they'd met.

"And I'll try, little mother," he murmured, "to make you both happy."

Her eyes showed a small startled reflex and she said very softly, "It's a very new thought…"

"The way it works, darling," he said, his smile so close she could feel its warmth, "you'll have time to get used to the idea."

He kissed her then, and she him, with a giddy smiling kiss that tasted of love and delight and wonder. They had both found the illusive prize of life, the spilled-over love chalice of everyone's quest, the insupportable marvel of requited, deep and perfect love…and it seeped like blissful sunshine into every corner of their mind.

Their kiss in the normal sequence of events turned in time from sunshine into licking flame, and it was then Stefan gathered Lisaveta into his arms with effortless strength, rose from the sofa with a fluid grace and began walking toward the doors leading into the hallway. As if already mated in mind and spirit, he said, "I'm taking you to my palace," before she could ask her intended question.