Her Russian Hero (International Romance Series) (28 page)

The blood drained from her face.
Her throat became dry. She wet her lips and raised a hand but he inched away.

“Sergei, listen to me, please.
Roussov tricked me.”

Sergei threw a look at the
picture and his mouth twisted. Cecile read anger, disgust and sadness in his
eyes. He condemned her without listening. She gazed at him with love and
desperation, then turned her back and left the restaurant without a word.

Chapter Twenty-two

 So that was it. The dream
was over.

Alone in her room, Cecile slumped
into a chair and stared at the wall, her mind numb.

Her hero was gone, already
receding into the clouds of her memory—or her imagination. Did she dream the
fairy-tale story? Cinderella in love with her prince charming, her hero from
far away?

If only she had listened to
Nicolai, refused Roussov’s invitation and asked for Sergei’s help to get the
instruments. If only she had ignored her pride and her overinflated ego.

If only he had listened to her,
given her the benefit of the doubt and accepted her explanation.

Her heart thudded in her chest
and tolled the end of her romance as she battled to control her anxiety. She
felt a stabbing burning sensation in her stomach, the ulcer resurrected by
stress and she clutched her midsection.

If only she could cry, shout, or
vent her pain. But years of discipline and control had taught her to compose her
face and suppress her emotions. She unhooked the tightly fitted waist of the
skirt and took a deep breath. Right now, an antacid would help. She reached for
her purse and rummaged through it.

Her fingers stumbled across an
envelope. It was the money for the reception. She’d forgotten to pay the
restaurant before rushing back to her room. She chewed on a couple of antacid
tablets and pulled out the envelope. She would go and pay now. Cecile hooked
her skirt and walked to the door.

She heard the pounding as she
reached it. “Who is it?” she asked without opening.

“It’s Sergei. Open the door,
Cecile.”

With a sigh of relief, she
opened, unable to hide the joy that flooded her being. He had come. She would
explain and everything would be fine again.

Sergei stormed into her room, a
somber expression on his face, the newspaper still clenched in his hand. He
threw it on the bed. “How could you have dinner with him?” he asked with a
bellowing voice. “You are smiling, laughing in this damned picture. You are sitting
there in his arms, the arms of my mortal enemy. And it said the picture was
taken two weeks ago. Explain, Cecile.”

She raised her arms toward his
shoulders. He backed up. Anger flared in his eyes. “No kissing or hugging.
Don’t try to evade my questions. You are so good at that. The truth, just the
truth. Even if it hurts.” His breath came in harsh, uneven gasps.

Cecile wouldn’t let his insulting
words enrage her. One of them needed to remain calm and she’d already managed
to drain her anger.

“Sergei, you’re right. We need to
talk, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I swear to God, I will give it
to you flat and plain. But before, at the risk of having you misjudge me one
more time, I have to go and pay the restaurant. I was on my way out when you
came.”

He snatched the envelope. “Stay
here. I will do it for you and will be back in five minutes. Don’t move from
here,” he ordered.

“Sergei, there’s about five
thousand dollars here.”

“I will bring you the change.
Don’t move from here,” he repeated.

He wrenched the door open, then
slammed it behind him.

She immediately heard a loud
exclamation in the hallway and rushed to open it again. Sergei stood facing the
left of the long corridor, his face contorted with rage.

Cecile grasped his arm. “What
happened?”

He didn’t need to answer. A flash
hit them from the right side. Cecile gasped. “What the hell?”

“Stay in your room. You hear me,”
Sergei shouted. “I will get the damned photographer.”

He dashed into the corridor
chasing the man who’d already vanished around the corner. Cecile reentered her
room and locked it.

It must be Roussov. One of his
dirty tricks. A photographer ambushed on the left side of the corridor. Another
stationed on the right side. Roussov was concocting something and this time, he
was going at it full speed.

Cold and irrational fear gripped
her heart. Although she guessed he was determined to destroy Sergei, she didn’t
understand his intricate plan, or the inner workings of his twisted mind.

She thumped on the chair and waited,
her gaze fixed on the door.

Cecile checked her watch. Fifteen
minutes had passed. He hadn’t returned. She started pacing the room then paused
and changed into a comfortable warm sweat suit, wanting to be ready.

Ready for what? She didn’t know.
She had a premonition that something dreadful was going to happen. Feeling
claustrophobic in her room, she grabbed her purse and dashed to the elevator.

When it reached her floor, Paul
stomped out of it with a grave expression. “Cecile, I was coming to see you.
Sergei asked me to make sure you’re all right.”

“Sergei did? Thank God, he’s
fine.” Relief washed over her in a tidal wave.

Paul scratched his chin and
hesitated. “Yes…”

“But what? Paul, tell me.” She
grabbed the collar of his jacket and shook him.

His eyes filled with pity.

Her stomach twisted in knots.
“Tell me. I can take it.”

“There’s a big commotion going on
in the lobby. The general got into a fight with two reporters. I wanted to help
him but he yelled at me to go check on you.”

Cecile pushed him and stepped
inside the elevator. “I’m running downstairs. You can come if you want.”

“Of course, I’m coming. There’s
no way on Earth I’d leave you alone. But the general may not like you
downstairs.”

“I know. He already told me to
stay in my room. Since when do I accept orders? I’m used to giving them.”

When the door of the elevator
opened in the lobby floor, Cecile gasped and forgot to step out. Her eyes
widened at the sight of the carnage playing out in front of her. Five men
circled around Sergei trying to hit him. He had abandoned his uniform jacket on
the sofa. Like a devil with seven arms, he punched, kicked and wrestled.

Paul slid a hand to her elbow and
guided her to a far corner from where they stood to watch the scene. Except for
the registration clerk who observed the fight with cool interest, the place
seemed deserted. Cecile tried to wriggle free out of Paul’s clasp. He wouldn’t
let go.

John edged beside them. “Cecile,
don’t do anything foolish,” he tersely admonished. “I told Rob and Paul not to
interfere. We’re foreigners on an official mission here. If you get caught
stirring trouble, you can be deported and cause international problems. So far,
Fedorin seems to be managing quite well. No wonder the guy’s a general.”

Two men lay on the floor
unconscious. One doubled up and staggered to a sofa. Another fled, a hand
covering his bloody eye.

“Great, four down, two to go.”
Rob announced the score, his tone filled with admiration and respect.

Roussov materialized out of the blue
near the registration desk. He lifted the telephone receiver and dialed a
number.

“What the hell is he still doing
here?” Paul stretched his neck to see better.

Feeling her bones icing with
fear, Cecile squeaked. “Oh my God, he planned the whole thing. I knew it. My
picture with him in the newspaper. The two reporters taking a picture of Sergei
going out of my room. All of it is part of his strategy. He wanted to goad
Sergei, to make him lose his temper.”

As if to corroborate her
assumptions, two men appeared from the glass door of the lobby and flashed a
picture at the battling opponents, just as one more fell. The last one glanced
toward the door and ran away.

Sergei turned and assessed the
battlefield. Cecile tried to disentangle herself from Paul’s restraining hand
but John grabbed her other arm. “Don’t move, Cecile. You hear me.”

She focused on the man she loved
and noticed his swollen eye, torn shirt and the reddened area on his jaw.
Sergei was in one piece and still standing on his feet. She breathed a sigh of
relief. Roussov was finally vanquished.

Suddenly the place swarmed with
men. They rounded on Sergei talking in Russian and exhibiting identity cards.

“The National Security guards
probably,” John said.

Immobilized in her place by Paul
and John, Cecile watched the scene as if it was a horror movie orchestrated by
this monster Roussov. She turned a hateful look at him and then stood
petrified. Roussov was searching Sergei’s jacket.

Cecile’s nails clawed into Paul’s
palm. “Oh my God. Oh my God.”

Paul followed her gaze.
Straightening up from the sofa and beaming with triumph, Roussov waved the
envelope full of dollars. He shouted in Russian and two men came toward him. He
opened the envelope, pulled out the green currency and brandished it as if it
was the flag of a fallen warrior. One of his companions replaced the money in
the envelope and wrapped it in a newspaper.

Beside her, Paul gasped. “What
the hell are those dollars doing in the general’s jacket?”

John grumbled. “How could Sergei
do such a stupid thing? A Belarusian officer is not allowed to carry foreign
currency.”

Cecile suddenly bolted out of
their hands and darted toward the Belarusian group. Paul followed her and
gripped her shoulders, halting her. “Are you crazy? You can hurt his cause more
than help.”

“You don’t understand,” she
cried. “It’s my fault. It’s my money. I gave it to him to pay the restaurant.
That’s all. He was going to do it and come back in five minutes. Let me explain
to them.”

John held her hand. “No. They
won’t listen now. Let it go, Cecile. You will complicate things even more.”

She felt completely responsible
for Sergei’s misfortune. It wasn’t fair he stood there, surrounded like a
trapped animal.

“Someone must help him,” she
shouted, unable to withstand the sight of the man she loved all alone, with
that pack of wolves circling him, ready to attack.

Paul ran to the reception
telephone and dialed a number. He came back within two minutes. “I called
Nicolai. The colonel will be here as soon as possible.”

John raked nervous fingers
through his frizzy hair. “This doesn’t bode well. I wonder what they’re waiting
for. I’d have thought they’d have taken him away by now.”

“Taken him where?” Cecile wailed.

“I don’t know. But obviously they’re
not going to let him go.”

Rob shrugged. “You don’t arrest
the Major General of Belarus like a common thief. They can lose their heads
when he gets through with them.”

Those were the words Cecile
wanted to hear. Sergei was not their next door neighbor. He stood high on a
pedestal, respected and honored by the people of Belarus.

At the registration desk, Roussov
barked orders into the telephone. The glass door opened one more time and a
dozen policemen entered. They spread around the battered men that Sergei had
incapacitated and began interrogating them.

Roussov slammed the receiver down
and headed toward her group. He stopped two feet away from her and snarled,
“You didn’t want to deal with me. You didn’t heed my warning and stay away from
him. It was just as well. You helped bring him down.”

The man gave her the creeps. “You
can’t harm him. He’s the Major General of Belarus. The people adore him. They
will skin you alive,” she screeched.

“I know this, my dear Cecile. But
you
tarnished his reputation. The staunch and loyal
Generalle
fooling around with a foreigner, the same American Program Manager he’s working
with. Wait until you see the caption under some new pictures. And then, the
glorious
Generalle
fighting and beating the citizens who were flirting
with his girlfriend.”

“What?”

“With a little bit of imagination
and a camera, one can create a big scenario. Do you think the citizens will
continue to admire the fallen hero who betrayed their trust? People forget
quickly. Most of them love a good scandal.”

His foul vodka-tinged breath
nauseated her. “You’re a monster. I don’t think the Minister of Defense will
let you have your way.”

He bowed with a sarcastic smile.
“You think of everything. I always considered you an intelligent woman, except
when you foolishly fell into the
Generalle
’s arms. To answer your
question, I was just on the phone with the Minister of Defense. Of course, at
first, he didn’t want to believe me but I gave him enough details. He is
dispatching a deputy to assess the situation.”

If it wasn’t for John and Paul
still holding her hand and arm, she’d have scratched his eyes out. He must have
felt the extent of her contempt. His eyebrows gathered into a menacing scowl.
“You will learn to respect me,” he sputtered and left.

Rob wrapped an arm around her.
“He’s insane. Don’t pay attention to his threats. The general is a mighty man.
It won’t be easy to topple him from his position.”

“I hope you’re right.” She had to
believe in her general’s power, in order not to lose her sanity.

She heard John’s sigh of relief
and Rob’s exclamation at the same time she saw Nicolai, in full military
uniform and decorations, entering though the glass door. He ignored them and
hastened toward his commanding officer and the group surrounding him.

“It looks like the colonel will
stay away from us and play the full Belarusian card,” John said, analyzing the
situation. “The less we, foreigners, get involved right now, the better for
Sergei.”

Cecile agreed with him in
principle but her heart bled with pain. “It’s all my fault.” Her eyes welled
with tears at the extent of the damage she felt responsible for.