by Princess
Now she knew she was doomed. She had feared the future before, but only now the very real possibility dawned of spending the rest of her dwindling youth in debtor’s prison.
Her final hope was attaching herself to Anatole and leaving town with him.
She felt confident he would welcome her as his mistress. God knew they shared more than just a common enemy. His ego was probably bruised worse than hers, she thought, encouraged, for she knew just how to make him feel like a man again.
High heels clicking, she hurried down the guest hall to his suite, passing the steady stream of Russian lackeys who were carrying away Anatole’s possessions in preparation for his swift departure. She braced herself as she neared the open door, for she could hear him bellowing in that frightening, guttural language of his all the way down the hall.
When she stepped into the doorway, he was giving orders to a few men, all of whom seemed dwarfed by him. His broad back was to her, his long, golden hair spilling down on his shoulders. She smoothed her upswept hair with a twinge of nervousness, licked her dry, painted lips, and glanced about the room.
Having received their orders, the three men bowed to their prince and left him. Anatole remained where he was, staring down at the floor, seemingly deep in thought. Julia moved aside as the three men brushed past her. Only a couple of servants remained, closing up the final traveling trunks.
“Anatole.”
He stiffened visibly at her soft call. He turned his head like some strange, mechanical automaton, his blue eyes glinting. Her feminine senses instantly sent up warnings like smoke signals to her, but she could not afford to heed them.
She pushed away from the doorframe and walked languidly toward him.
“Anatole, darling, what a farce this day has been. I can’t believe what they have done to you.”
“What do you want?” he rumbled.
She slid her hands up his brawny biceps, savoring his musculature through the dark blue broadcloth of his coat. His face hard and forbidding, he stared down at her.
“Well?”
“I was thinking you could do with a friend right now,” she murmured with a winning little smile. Hiding her fear, she reached up and gently tucked a lock of his long, blond hair behind his ear, then she trailed her fingers down his chest. “But there is something else, Anatole.” She paused, lowering her lashes.
“Yes?” he asked in impatience.
She lifted her gaze to his intensely. “Take me with you.”
“Why should I?” he asked with a sullen look.
“Anatole,” she chided with a knowing little laugh. “That ought to be obvious by now.”
He closed his eyes, tilting his head back slightly. “Julia, Julia. You understand nothing.”
She knitted her brow and started to reply.
Before she knew what hit her, he grabbed her by the shoulders in a crushing grip and nearly lifted her off the ground. “You lied to me!” he roared in her face.
“No, I didn’t!” she cried automatically, petrified. His sapphire eyes were wild, his grip bone-crushing. He looked like a madman, a berserk warrior.
“Put me down!” she gasped.
He thrust her from him.
She reeled back, barely catching her balance. She froze like a deer before the hunter, her breathing quick and shallow. He remained where he was, his hair rolling over his shoulders, his chest lifting and falling.
“You, Julia,” he spat. He took a step toward her.
Her gaze darted in silent, terrified plea to the serfs on the other end of the room, behind him. They were both white-faced, staring.
Anatole pointed to the floor, his blinding, blue stare fixed on her. “You came here and lied to me to save Santiago, and by yielding to you, I allowed you to wreck my future for me.” He took another slow, broad pace toward her, and another. Opulence and command and pure menace radiated from him. She was mesmerized and quite certain she was going to die. “Brother and sister, you said. Why did I listen to you?”
“I was only trying to help you,” she whispered, her heart pounding. She took a step backward, but there was nowhere to hide.
When he stepped up in front of her, looming like a mountain before her, her response was impulsive, unpremeditated, instinctual.
She dropped to her knees and lowered her head, taking his large hand in both of hers, throwing herself on his mercy. “Please, Your Highness, take me with you. I’ll do whatever you ask, I will take no lover but you. I am in desperate straits. Anatole, I am frightened. I swear I will never cause trouble for you again. Help me.” She kissed his hand, her voice dwindling to a pathetic whisper. “Help me. Help me.”
When at last she dared to lift her gaze, she caught only a glimpse of his blue eyes gleaming with cold satisfaction, then he pulled his hand out of hers, raised it, and struck her across the face with a mighty backhand.
She went sprawling, stars bursting across her eyes. She couldn’t catch her breath. She lay on the gleaming floor, round-eyed. For a moment, she couldn’t hear anything. She saw his huge boots at her eye level as he casually pivoted and walked away without another word.
She caught her breath with a gasp and slowly dragged herself up to a sitting position. The two servants were still standing there, frozen, staring at her, looking shocked and yet somehow essentially unsurprised. When she lifted her trembling hand to her mouth and touched the trickle of blood there, the two serfs turned away quickly and went back to their work.
In a state of complete shock, Julia climbed unsteadily to her feet and left Anatole’s suite. Walking down the hall, her hand pressed to the trickle of blood, her stricken stare was straight ahead.
She scarcely knew where she was, walking as one in a trance. She passed countless rooms with people in them whom she knew. Some called out greetings to her, but she couldn’t respond, completely inside of her dazed, empty self.
He hit me. He hit me. She couldn’t seem to make herself believe it. At the end of the main corridor, she stopped, not knowing where to go or what to do.
She started shaking.
A wave of unbearable pain rose up from within her. She gulped it down, feeling clobbered, and walked numbly into the nearest empty room, a small salon. She closed the door behind her and walked to a chair, but instead of sitting, she crumpled slowly to the floor and stared at nothing. Then the first long, quiet sobs came, and she was weeping as she had not since she was a small child.
As the afternoon shadows lengthened, then bled into dusk, her sobs quieted to streaming tears, the salt of her tears stinging as it mingled with the cut on the corner of her mouth. Anatole had split her lip against her teeth. In the darkening room, she cupped her swollen cheek, wondering if he had blackened her eye, as well. What did it matter?
Just then, the door opened, the small salon flooded with light, and into the room swaggered half a dozen of the young bucks and the crown prince, all making stupid male jokes to each other.
She cringed in utter, shaking humiliation, seconds before anyone noticed her there. Sitting on the floor by the chair, she drew her knees up and clasped her hands around them, burying her face against her arm.
“By Jove, look who’s here!”
“We’ve stumbled on hidden treasure, boys! It’s our lucky night.”
“La Divine Julia!”
“What are you doing alone here in the dark, my love?”
She turned away as they neared, covering her face. “Go away,” she said, her voice muffled by her arm.
“Julia?” She recognized Prince Rafael’s voice.
“Leave me alone.” Like a trapped rabbit, she did not move. In her downcast field of vision, all she could see was shiny black boots all around her. She shivered with the frightening, irrational sensation that any moment now all these males were going to start kicking and tramping her.
She could feel the prince looking down at her curiously.
“Leave us,” he said suddenly to his mates.
At once, she heard the usual
sly remarks, laughter. “Ah, ha, ha, shall we leave you two alone?”
She wanted to cry again for sheer rage that this was what was always assumed.
“Go!” Rafael ordered, cutting them off in a tone of curt authority.
In moments, his cronies were gone.
She heard the door close and felt a few degrees of relief, but he was still there, intruding on her humiliation. She smelled the clean scent of his carelessly expensive cologne as he crouched down before her. She refused to look at him.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded quietly.
“Nothing.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Julia. Look at me. I want to help you.”
I’ll bet you do, she thought bitterly.
The boy had the audacity to touch her face—the uninjured side—for the hurt side she kept tightly tucked against her arm. When he touched her, she was not expecting it, however, and she jerked, and he saw. He swore.
“Julia, look at me.”
She swallowed hard and lifted her head, meeting his angry, assessing stare. He was only a boy, someone she barely knew, and yet she felt as though one wrong word from him could make her crumble.
No one saw her in this state. No one.
Yet, for all her brains and wit and sophistication, she couldn’t speak a word. She was too lost to hide.
“Who has done this to you?” he whispered fiercely, his eyes filling with youth’s holy fire as he tenderly touched her face.
She winced in irritation and pulled away. “No one. I ran into the door.”
“Who, Julia? I command you to tell me.”
She turned to him, world-weary, her voice laced with bitterness. “What are you going to do about it?”
“Kill him,” he replied.
She looked away. Shaking her head, she began laughing as fresh tears rose in her eyes. “Dueling is against the law, Your Highness.”
“Tell me his name.”
“What are you going to do, protect me?” she said dully. “Defend my honor?”
“Yes.”
At last, she looked at him, studying him for a long moment. Maybe he was more of a man than she had thought.
Prince Rafael Giancarlo Ettore di Fiore had sun-kissed, tawny hair streaked with gold, and thoughtful, gold-green eyes with gold-tipped lashes. He was comely and well formed, his elegantly athletic body suntanned from hours at play, sailing his yacht around the Aeolian islands and Sicily. He was known as a hellion, but his antics were looked upon with smiles and winks; he was the unquestioned darling of the kingdom, the apple of the queen’s eye, the king’s pride and joy.
They kept a close eye on their golden boy. He could probably count on one hand the number of times he’d had a woman, she thought. And, God, he was rich.
Moving slowly, she reached out and caressed his face, a motherly gesture. His cheek was like velvet. His innocence pained her somehow. When she spoke, her voice was softer than she’d ever heard it. “You’ll get yourself killed, loverboy.”
“The hell I will,” he said evenly. “Who was he? Because he’s not going to get away with this.”
Dangerously moved, she dropped her head, debating, debating. He was the heir apparent, just a boy, and she did not want him getting hurt, yet, oh, how she longed in some tiny, vulnerable corner of her heart for somebody, just once, to protect her.
“Name him, Julia.”
She took a deep, shaky breath. “Tyurinov.”
“Fine,” the prince said smoothly, a flicker of wrath in his eyes. “I will call on you when it is done.” He rose and headed for the door, shoulders squared.
She looked up, stricken. What have I done? Frightened, she tried to call him back. She forced lightness into her tone. “You don’t need to risk your life to sleep with me, darling. Everybody knows that.”
He stopped, came back, and bent down toward her. He cupped her face in strange tenderness. “Sad, pretty Julia.” He gazed gently at her. “Perhaps you have forgotten, but I’m aware that there is more to you than that. Stay here. I will send the physician to care for you.”
He kissed her forehead and left.
At six that evening, the cavalcade arrived before a quiet country church three miles west of the yellow villa.
The axles squeaked as the carriage halted. Pia looked at her uncertainly. Serafina said nothing, withdrawn, her arms folded over her bosom. The carriage door suddenly yanked back and there he stood.
“Out,” Darius ordered, gesturing her maid away.
Pia fled him. When she was gone, he stepped up into the coach.
He tossed a black velvet box into her lap and sat on the seat opposite her, folding his arms, mirroring her pose, his face cool, sharp, and rude.
“What is this?”
He flicked an insolent gesture of impatience with one black-gloved hand.
She opened the box and found three beautiful rings: one with a single, heart-cut ruby; the second a rich cluster of amethysts and diamonds; the third a plain gold band.
“Pick one.”
She lifted her gaze to his tense, angular face. “Why do you have all these rings?”
“I just do.”
“Ah,” she said coolly, stung. “Top secret. I guess I should get used to it.”
“That’s right. Pick one and let’s get on with it.”
Remembering the monstrous diamond Anatole had given her, she promptly chose the plain gold band. She slipped it on her finger and furrowed her brow to discover the ring fit perfectly. She slid him a suspicious look.
“It fits. Good,” he clipped out. “Then let’s get this over with.” He jumped down from the carriage, not waiting to help her down. As he walked toward the church, he tossed the velvet box to her maid. “Catch.”
“What’s this, sir?” Pia asked in bewilderment.
“Something to put away for your retirement. Loyalty, Pia,” he chided. “Some of us do know how to reward it.” He jogged up the steps and strode into the church.
Serafina gritted her teeth and followed him and they were wed. Alec and Pia were witnesses. The only guests were the guardsmen and a few other servants, plus one pious old widow who happened to be visiting her dead husband in the church graveyard. Serafina’s emotions were in an uproar. At the altar, she held on to Darius’s arm because now he was all she had.
Even as she sought his strength, she chafed under the knowledge that now he was her guardian in earnest, her lord and master, too. He’d better not even try pulling rank on her, she thought.
As the plain ceremony progressed, she watched the priest’s lips moving but could not quite absorb any of it. She had gotten her way, but it sure didn’t feel like it.
When the moment came for Darius to slip the gold band on her finger, he glanced at her for a second, meeting her eyes. She thought of making love with him last night, the way they had stared at each other then, when they had been one with each other. Heat, longing rushed through her body. She saw in his eyes a flicker of some raw, fiery turmoil, but he veiled his expression and turned away, tall and gorgeous, ever unattainable, his profile perfect and emotionless. The man of her dreams—hers forever now—and he hated her.
“I now pronounce you man and wife. Well, go on, kiss her,” said the kindly old priest.
Santiago jolted a bit as if he’d been dozing on his feet through the whole thing. She clenched her teeth, knowing he was deliberately baiting her.
Her new husband leaned down and gave her a perfunctory kiss on each cheek. The gesture was so smooth and meaningless, she felt as though she had been slapped, not kissed. Tears of hurt and anger sprang into her eyes, but she was determined to be as coolly unemotional and in control as he. She took his arm when he politely offered it and led her from the church, his mask of aloof correctness firmly in place, neither of them smiling.
Back into the carriage again, and she was beginning to hate herself for ever thinking he would let her get away with this vile deed—trapping him like a
common country wench out to snare the squire’s son.
She tempered the guilt with reminding herself of his lies. Surely what she had done was no worse than his many falsehoods. She stared out the window while the coach rolled on toward the yellow villa.
Earlier, Darius had snarled at her that he had bought it from the crown before leaving for Milan. Why a man who had thought he was going to die needed a house, she did not know, but what was the point in asking when she knew he would only lie?
Morbidly, she found herself dwelling on horrible images of the war to come. Blood on her hands. Their demon-love was cursed, like her cursed face.
When they arrived, her husband of half an hour ignored her to deal with his men, his horses, anyone but her. She walked slowly up the wide, shallow steps to the villa, glancing morosely at the misshapen, overgrown topiaries and the peeling yellow paint. She stopped inside the foyer, remembering the way it had looked when she had last seen it—smoke-filled, blood-spattered, chaotic. Wounded and dying men strewn over the floor, it had been a battleground.
Her gaze wandered over the walls, where curling streaks left by soap remained from the cleanup job afterward, but there was no blood or ashes left to see, thank God. She went heavily up the stairs to the pink bedroom.
Standing in the doorway, gazing at this room, she suddenly wanted to cry, wanted that beautiful, blackhearted liar to hold her. She walked over to the bed and sat down on it. Last time she’d slept here, she had been a virgin.
In misery, her gaze fell to the floor and wandered across the tapestry rug of the pastoral idyll, the celebration of youths and maidens dancing around the maypole. She remembered the hiding place beneath it. Nothing in her world was what it appeared, she thought. Nothing.
A lump of sorrow rose in her throat. Who were they fooling? This marriage was never going to succeed.
Why hadn’t she seen the obvious before she undertook so rash a feat? Last night, blind love must have had her intoxicated, relief and desperation must have muddled her wits. Just because he was her husband now did not mean he couldn’t leave. It only meant he’d have to make up some unassailable excuse before he could walk away without compunction, then he would be free to go. God knew he was resourceful at making up excuses. She supposed she had better start bracing herself somehow for his exit. She would have to be strong, because his last vanishing act had nearly destroyed her, and she could not, would not go through that devastation again.