Gypsy Jewel (30 page)

Suddenly his smile faded. His brow creased, and he said in a low voice close to her, “However, I did not approve of Prince Andrei dancing such close attendance upon you tonight. It seems you encouraged him, Katya. Have you forgotten so quickly that you are my betrothed?”

“I’m not —” April began in a desperate attempt to pull Ivanov back to reality, but he misinterpreted her words and cut her off with a savage growl.

“You are mine. Mine and no other’s. You may flirt with princes all you please, Katya, but in the end you will be my wife. Must I impress this upon you again? I have respected you and bowed to your wishes to hold off my attentions until our wedding night, but whenever I see you playing the coquette with other men, I burn to have you myself.”

April had no chance to scream, only whimper, when Ivanov suddenly yanked her fiercely into his arms and crushed his hard lips into hers. Struggling wildly, she tried to throw him off but could not. He gave her a painful, punishing kiss, roughly kneading her breast all the while, as she quivered with revulsion and rising hate.

Only one brute before had dared to treat her so — and Nicky had gotten his just due. Though she was too close to the count to kick effectively, April whipped her elbow between them and punched him sharply in the solar plexus. With a muffled grunt, Ivanov broke off the attack.

April whirled to run, her long skirts hampering her again. She dashed gasping from the study into the dark empty hall, her blood surging in her ears. Behind her he called, “Katya! Come back. You cannot hide. If you persist in annoying me, I shall lock you in the Gold Room again.”

Her head throbbing with urgency, April glanced right and left for escape. She knew it would be foolish to head out barefoot in the darkness and the merciless snow. She would not get far. Then, remembering a series of rooms she had wandered through before on a tour, one of which led indirectly to the stables, she turned left and ran for all she was worth.

Behind her footsteps rang out in the dark hall as Ivanov looked for her. “Katya. I am getting angry!”

Quelling a sob, April continued to flee. The last she heard was the count cursing and searching for a lamp as she finally found a doorknob and yanked open the entrance to what appeared to be the conservatory.

To her surprise, a series of candelabra had been lit and rested upon the black harpsichord in the corner. The candles were low but the light served to guide her directly across to another door that linked to yet another passageway.

Suddenly a scale of notes tinkled out as someone ran a hand over the harpsichord keys. April jumped in fright and whirled around, startled, to face the grinning visage of Pavel.

She had not seen the dwarf sitting there. Pavel had chosen to don the bizarre spangled costume of the black and white harlequin. Though he still repulsed her, for once April was glad to see him.

“Pavel,” she cried softly. “You must help me!”

“But of course.” He jumped down from the bench and gave her a ludicrous bow. “I am always happy to help a lovely lady in distress.”

“Please listen. Count Ivanov is coming after me. He seems to think I am someone else. He has been saying the strangest things tonight, and Zofia too.”

“Really?” The dwarf acted genuinely concerned. “Then certainly we must see you to safety.” He hurried to precede her through the door she had found. “Follow me.”

Sobbing with relief, April followed Pavel through a dark passageway and down a series of narrow, spiral stairs. She did not consciously decide to trust Pavel, but merely wished to escape the madness she had left behind. Her thoughts were whirling wildly as she remembered the things Zofia had said. If she could have stopped and gotten sick, she would have done so. Her nerves were on razor-edge and she could not think straight.

“Here we are,” Pavel announced. “It is dark but we shall find our way. I will light a candle. There is one in the corner, as I recall.”

“Hurry!” April whispered, disliking the feel of damp, cold stone under her feet where she stood. “What is this place?” she called after his retreating figure.

There was no answer. A sudden flare from a wick lit what appeared to be a gruesome stone cellar of sorts.

“Just a moment,” Pavel called back reassuringly before she could panic further, “I will bring the candle to you and you can hold it over my head as I lead the way out.” He came back toward her and with trembling gratitude April took the taper-holder in her hands.

As she concentrated on keeping the wick alight, Pavel slipped past her and back through the door they had entered. Abruptly it banged shut behind. She cried out and whirled to grab the knob, but there wasn’t one. Then she heard an oily chuckle as the dwarf slid the bolt home on the other side.

“Sweet dreams, princess,” Pavel crooned to her. “You’d best hope Vasili calms down before I tell him where you are. There will be no reasoning with him then.”

April felt her fear give way to a surge of rage. “You little rat!” she cried.

“You’ll know more about rats before the night is through down here,” Pavel sniggered back. “If I keep Ivanov from killing you, you will owe me. I intend to make you pay dearly for the favor.”

“Never,” April hissed, sensing his implication and feeling the chills streak up her spine. But there was only the sound of retreating footsteps, light and mischievous as a troll’s, and then only terrible silence.

With despair April saw the candle was hardly a stub. It would not last more than a half-hour. What then? In this house of madness, who knew what would happen next?

W
HEN
D
AMIEN ARRIVED WITH
Tatiana at her estate on Poltava Circle, the mansion was fully ablaze with the entire staff waiting up for her safe arrival from the ball.

Along the way, the princess had been desperately trying to persuade Damien to spend the night. He finally agreed, letting Tatiana think it was the lure of her overripe body that drew him into her private bedchambers after she haughtily dismissed the servants for the night.

While Damien toyed with her bright hair upon the huge bed strewn with fur pelts, Tatiana complained about the war and he listened sympathetically. He found several bottles of vodka, and kept filling her glass as they talked. Tatiana drank it down like water and was quickly philosophical. They talked for an hour without making love.

At first, the princess was annoyed, but when she realized he was showing the first genuine interest in her that any lover ever had, she was touched and content to let him just stroke her head.

Finally, when she was drunk enough to talk about anything, Damien risked the most dangerous questions of all. He found Tatiana knew a great deal of Menshikov’s plans, since her uncle came and went frequently to her house. She raged about Czar Nicholas’s threat to replace her uncle with someone he considered more suitable, Prince Michael Gorchakov.

“Can you imagine? Gorchakov,” she snorted with disdain, lolling about on the bed beside Damien, red hair askew. “That weak-kneed Cossack and his horse-faced wife have never done anything of note, certainly not at court. And they both look down their noses at anyone who cannot trace their lineage back a thousand years. What matter when you go back to a plow horse and a rutting Mongol anyway?” Tatiana shrieked with laughter at her own wit and Damien was forced to bring her back to the subject.

“I am sure your uncle’s and your bloodline is much finer,” he said.

Tatiana stopped laughing, and her dark eyes gleamed with anger. “Some say —” she began, and hiccupped indelicately, “— some say that I am not fit to be a princess. Can you imagine? Cruel, jealous peasants that they are … like Ivanov and his ilk.”

“Count Ivanov?” Damien prompted, interested to hear what she had to say about the mysterious nobleman.

Tatiana made a face. “Mad old fool. He lost his wits long ago over Katya.” At Damien’s puzzled look, she seized eagerly on the tale, asking, “Didn’t you notice that little whore he paraded around tonight? The blonde in the blue gown?”

“She was striking,” he admitted cautiously.

Tatiana sniffed. “Straight from the grave, that one. I’ll admit she gave me a start at first. It was like looking at a ghost.”

Damien felt a prickle of foreboding at her words. “What do you mean?”

“She looks just like a girl named Ekaterina — Katya — who held sway over Ivanov’s heart years ago. The fool was obsessed with Katya. But so was half the city.” Tatiana was obviously miffed by the memory. “Anyway, Vasili decided to marry her. He pursued her relentlessly. I think Katya was frightened of him after awhile.”

“What happened?” Damien urged her go on, thinking of April still living under a madman’s roof.

Tatiana shrugged indifferently. “Katya left. It was right after she told Vasili that she was going to marry a prince — I can’t remember his name — and they wed and were off to his estates somewhere south. I heard years later that they had been killed in their travels by brigands. I can’t help but wonder if Ivanov had a hand in it … he was so obsessed with her.”

Tatiana yawned hugely, starting to drift into sleep, and Damien started to rise from the bed. His heart pounded with a nameless dread. He had but one thought: to get out of there and find April, to wrest her from that madman’s grasp. For he knew with a horrible certainty that he had uncovered the reason for his own uneasiness at Samarin House — Ivanov was possessed by demons from the past.

When Damien rose and made a move to go, Tatiana reached out with claw-like fingernails to clutch his sleeve. “Make love to me, Demetros.” Her gaze momentarily cleared as he plucked her hand from his arm, and suddenly she focused on his dark blue eyes.

Tatiana had never believed that his name was Demetros, for she had seen him fail to respond to it several times. It had not mattered to her what he called himself, as long as he was a good lover. But as she stared up at him, the alcoholic haze suddenly lifted, and the knowledge of what she had just told him rang throughout her head.

“Damien,” she whispered. “Damien Cross!”

“You’re drunk,” he said, taking a step back away from the bed. “You need to sleep it off, woman.”

Tatiana did not fall for it again. “I never forget a face,” she repeated, rolling over onto her elbows, her dark eyes narrowing on him. “What are you up to, Damien? Why are you trying to get me to betray my country?”

Damien did not answer her for a moment. Looking down at the once-vital woman with the glorious red hair, he saw only the shell of the beauty she had been. Drink had taken her looks as well as her soul, and for that he was sorry. But he would not allow her to interfere with his mission.

“If you do not answer me, I will scream for my guards,” Tatiana threatened softly. “They are just down the hall, and they will not bother to ask questions. Or perhaps I should just turn you over to my uncle, hmm? He knows how to make spies speak.”

“What do you want to know?” Damien asked her, with a resigned air.

“First, what you are doing in Moscow? Are you with your father on this trip also?”

“Edward is dead,” Damien informed her flatly.

“Then you are Lord Cross now.” She licked her red lips greedily. “Oh, Damien, I can be very good to you, if you don’t anger me. We can help each other —”

“You’re right, princess.” He looked thoughtful as he raked a hand through his thick black hair, and then returned to her side. “I’ve never forgotten our time together, and I will make it better tonight … if you let me.”

Tatiana smiled with triumph, catching him by the lapels to pull him down over her body. “I still don’t know why you’re here,” she whispered fiercely, “but I don’t care. Make love to me, Damien. Tomorrow is soon enough for matters of war, but tonight, the only thing that matters is love.”

B
EFORE HER CANDLE WENT
out, April made a brief and useless search of the cellar room in which Pavel had locked her. As she suspected, there was only one door, and that was the one he had slammed behind her. But she was not the only living creature trapped in the awful, musty prison.

Soon after Pavel had gone, she heard the tell-tale scurrying and thumping of rats nearby. In her search to escape she saw old crates of broken wine bottles and various junk that had been tossed down here by the house staff over the years. It was there that the rats had made their home, and they came and went by way of a broken air vent across the room.

Fortunately April was not afraid of rats as Pavel assumed all women were. When an indignant thump came close to her bare feet, she raised the candle high and looked down at a rodent eyeing her in apparent interest.

It was not a sewer rat but a wood rat, with a fluffy tail and large round ears that gave it a comical appearance. It regarded her for a moment with its large, curious eyes, then darted off to join its companions in searching for interesting bits of glass and shiny objects to carry back to its nest.

As a gypsy, April had long grown used to a variety of animals and she was glad of the company in comparison with that of the people upstairs. Were all three of them trying to drive her insane? It could not have worked better if they had planned it.