Gypsy Jewel

by Patricia McAllister

  With an oath, he leapt behind the sleigh for protection, shouting through the open window to the unknown woman, “Get down on the floor and stay there.”

  He didn’t know if she heard him, or if she was alive, for the screams had stopped. But then he heard the thump of a body inside the coach and trusted that was enough.

  The street was empty now as other people had fled into shops or around corners. Only Damien was foolish enough to run after the gunman, but then he had a desperate need to know who it was.

  Had he been found out after all? He had just released his second pigeon to Lord Raglan, and although he had taken care to be discreet, there was always the possibility that he had been seen. Unknown enemies were the worst kind.

  Damien moved toward the hidden gunman, carefully edging around corners, tasting the sour taste of fear in his mouth. He had no weapon, and right now the allies depended heavily on his reports.

  Prepared for confrontation, Damien pressed flat against the cold stone of a building as he inched slowly toward his attacker. Finally he heard the man’s harsh breathing just around the next corner. His only hope was to grab and disarm him in one smooth move. Taking a deep breath of his own, Damien plunged into action.

  A startled grunt was all the man managed to get out before Damien knocked the gun from his hands and then, in turn, dashed the fellow against a glass window that shattered explosively. The gunman’s form was buried in bulky fur, his face covered so that only his eyes showed. He slid down in a sorry heap at the earl’s feet, moaning painfully.

  As Damien bent to uncover the unconscious man’s face, a sudden outcry caught his attention. The sleigh that had been shot at was now open and a woman wearing rich red fox that matched her Titian hair was striding toward him now.

  “Get him,” she ordered her footmen, and they sheepishly rushed to grab the fellow passed out at Damien’s feet. As the woman came closer, Damien felt memories clutch him like a vise.

  Dear God. He instantly recognized that lovely, brittle face, though the years had not been kind to it. Princess Tatiana Menshikov had first initiated him into the ways of love when Damien had been only seventeen, on a tour of Moscow with his father. Tatiana was still regal, still arrogant, and obviously still vain. She eyed him boldly, but there was no trace of recognition in her eyes — yet.

  “I must thank you,” Tatiana said softly as the footmen hauled the gunman off between them. Damien could hardly quell his frustration, wanting to tear from her probing gaze as much as he needed to tear the face cover from his attacker.

  “Don’t worry about him,” the princess said as she followed Damien’s gaze, “I can assure you the filthy Cossack will never see the light of day again. This is twice this month that there has been an attempt on my life.” She shrugged philosophically. “Such is the price one pays for being rich and beautiful, I suppose.”

  One thing had certainly not changed: Tatiana’s supreme conceit. Damien found it hard to believe that he had ever found her attractive. He was trying to figure out how he could gracefully exit her attentions, but she was examining him closely and apparently liked what she saw. He could only hope she was jaded from enough lovers that she wouldn’t recognize him after so many years. Still, he held his breath.

  Then Tatiana said, “You don’t look Russian. Are you visiting Moscow?”

  He nodded, trying to disguise his voice when he replied. “I am Romany. A roving musician looking for work.”

  She said thoughtfully, “You saved my life, you know. I owe you something …”

  Tatiana licked her lips in anticipation. He was a handsome, if crudely garbed fellow, and she was always one to spot potential a mile away. “What would you say to a hundred rubles?”

  He raised a brow, considering. Yes, Princess Menshikov had the power to give him that and more, and Damien would be mad to let this incredible chance slip through his fingers. He knew that, yet the cool touch of her fingers on his hand made him uncomfortable, and he had to think of April instead when he gave his reply.

  “I say you can keep the money if you can give me an audience at the Kremlin,” he stated boldly.

  Tatiana’s arched brows raised, and her red lips pursed on the verge of rebuke. He was terribly insolent, this one, not knowing what an honor she paid him by merely deigning to speak to him at all. But he had the most beautiful blue eyes, seductive under those long dark lashes, and she had always had a weakness for blue eyes.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” she began hesitantly, but Damien started to turn away, suspecting that would force the decision. Suddenly she was grabbing his coat sleeve.

  “All right. But there are conditions attached … I must have a private audition first, just you and me.” Tatiana smiled like a hungry cat and pressed against his side as she led Damien to her waiting sleigh.

  Damien had no time to demur, nor to curse when he saw the gunman break free from the lax footmen and sprint off running down the street. Now he would never know who wanted him dead. That, coupled with Tatiana clutching him in her claws, made Damien wonder if the odds against his success now were getting too high.

  “SO IT’S TRUE THEN.”

  A familiar voice spoke from behind April as she stood gazing at her reflection in the golden pier glass. She whirled and gasped, dropping the heavy white satin skirts looped with tiny golden bows. She had been holding them up in order to admire the matching embroidered silk stockings and white satin shoes.

  “Damien!” Her cry was one of joy and relief, but something in his look stopped her. He stood at the entrance of the Gold Room, gazing at her with the coldest blue eyes she had ever seen. Then, faltering, she asked, “When did you get back? And what is true?”

  He smiled a humorless smile. “I came back here only to get my violin. The truth I speak is obvious. You are Ivanov’s whore.”

  He saw hot color rush up April’s cheeks, and she pushed back her mass of golden hair with an angry gesture. “Why would you say such a terrible thing to me?”

  “Because it is true, even if you don’t know it yourself yet. Why else did you show yourself on his elbow all about town yesterday?”

  So he had seen them. April’s admittance caused Damien’s mood to plummet further. “There was nothing wrong with sightseeing,” she said. “I was not on his elbow. We were in the sleigh the entire time. Nobody noticed us or spoke to us.”

  “No doubt they were too busy gaping at Ivanov’s latest doxy to find their tongues,” Damien sneered, hating himself as the poisonous words poured out and now April grew paler and paler. “Look at yourself. Draped in all this finery.” As he spoke his hand swept up a flowered brocaded silk dress draped across a chair, and he tossed it angrily at her. It fluttered to the floor like a broken butterfly, and her green eyes filled with tears.

  “Is this what you want, April? Because you must know I can never give it to you. If you want to live a rich and idle life, then you have married the wrong man. Ivanov can offer it to you. I can’t and I won’t.”

  He was cruel, testing her love like that. But not knowing the reason, feeling only the pain and bewilderment, April came to him and sank in a puddle of white skirts at his feet.

  “Please,” she whispered brokenly, “don’t be angry, Damien. I love you. I just wanted to try on the pretty clothes and play a little at being a lady. I-I used to pretend sometimes that I had lovely dresses and could parade around town.”

  “You used to pretend you were boyar,” he put in harshly, knowing what it had cost her to admit such a thing.

  “Yes,” she murmured, ashamed. “But it’s only a dream, Damien. I don’t want this life. I want to be with you.”

  “Do you? Can you imagine life with me, year after year, traveling in a broken old wagon and eating hand to mouth?” There was a bitter twist to his mouth now, for he despised this final lie most. “You are not being fair to yourself, April. You are clever and beautiful and far better suited to this life than you think. Here, there will always be a roof over your head and f
ood in your mouth. You are still young …”

  She raised a tear-streaked face to his, her eyes ravaged with pain. “Are you trying to tell me you don’t want me anymore?”

  God, no, he wanted her more than anything at this moment; wanted to sweep her into a fierce embrace and shelter her from everything but his love. With a start, Damien realized that he did love the gypsy waif, this innocent siren with the sea-green eyes who could make a man act rashly. He had wed April in a spurt of impulsiveness, taken her to wife and never regretted it, except for those bitter moments when he was forced to remember the ugliness of war and what he must do to end it.

  Now as he laid a trembling hand upon that bright gold hair, feeling its silken texture for perhaps the last time, he felt a new grief and frustration rending his very soul. “Yes,” he rasped at last, pausing to clear his tight throat. “I cannot want a woman who is destined for another path. Who aims for the world of gaje, which I gladly left years ago. You know of Romany ways as I do. We can part as friends still …”

  April let out a sob, and clutched his hand. “No. Damien, please don’t go. I love you. Whatever I did, I’m sorry … please, take me away from here. Tonight. Now. We will go fast and far away. Don’t think these things of me.”

  But tenderly, for he could do no less, Damien pried her steadfast grip from his fingers, trying not to feel the hot tears scalding his flesh where they fell from her eyes like glittering diamonds. The Countess of Devonshire, if only she knew it … God, he ached so bitterly for her and what he must do.

  “I’m sorry, April,” he said at last, and in the awful stillness of the room her beautiful features faded to misty gold shadows under the soft glare of the gas lamps. The Gold Room. He would remember it always with rage and regret. Somehow he sensed it had served its evil purpose in the end. For this was where he had surrendered April to another world, to a lush silken prison where she would be forever lost to him.

  He could say or do no more. When he left, he did so as quickly as he had entered her life, and April never moved, because she was too dazed to yet believe that Damien would ever leave her. He was the only thing that mattered. For him, she had left her people. For him, she had come here. And for him, as she had just discovered, she would suffer greatly.

  “YOU CANNOT LICK YOUR wounds forever,” Ivanov said, staring at April intently as she paced before the crackling fire in his study. She was a vision in violet silk this night, the patina of the material reflecting the firelight when she turned. Her golden cascade of hair swirled down to her waist, over a tiny bolero jacket of deeper purple velvet with silver trim. As always, she stirred his memories with her haunting resemblance to his Katya.

  “There is a grand ball being held at the Kremlin this eve, and I would be honored if you would be my partner,” he said.

  She did not seem to hear him. “I will not give Damien the satisfaction of driving me into another life,” she murmured as she paced. “I will always be Romany.”

  She paused to look at him and stated firmly, “I do not belong in this world. On the surface you may see a gaje woman, but I am still of my people inside.”

  “Of course,” he soothed her hastily. “I did not mean to offend you, my dear. I thought perhaps a little distraction might be welcome while you waited for news …”

  Ivanov paused thoughtfully. His henchman, Dmitri, had returned cringing like a whipped dog after the first attempt to murder Damien had failed. But of course, Ivanov would send a competent fellow next time. He had no doubt that Alexei, a professional assassin, would be equal to the task. When Damien was dead, and April had no possible avenue of escape, then he could make his own move.

  Taking a deep breath, Ivanov said, “Who knows, Damien may yet come back. Why deny yourself pleasure when he is hardly doing so himself?”

  At the implication of Ivanov’s words, April stopped pacing and tensed. The image of Damien in the arms of another woman made her burn with secret fury. Had he been so quick to turn to someone else?

  “What do you mean?” she whispered, her voice shaking slightly.

  Ivanov looked abashed. “I’m sorry, it was indelicate of me to mention it like that … but one of my men, Dmitri, mentioned that he had seen Damien in the city with another woman …” Pausing to let the brutal words sink in thoroughly, he added hastily, “Of course, it could be perfectly harmless.”

  April knew the count did not believe that, and neither did she. Had she ever truly known Damien? He had been so vague about his past, and mentioned nothing of previous lovers, though there must have been some. He was too handsome and appealing to have escaped women’s attentions that long.

  April furiously rubbed her arms when she realized she was shaking. Not from cold, though she hoped the count would think so. She was overcome with raw, bitter hatred, a sensation so powerful and dizzying she tasted the hard metallic edge of it in her mouth.

  “Yes,” April suddenly said, startling Ivanov as well as herself. “Yes, I will go tonight.” And if nothing else, she would have the satisfaction of proving that a gypsy could pass for a gajo as easily as the other way around.

  VASILI SMILED WITH TRIUMPH. He could hardly believe it himself, but watching April descend the stairs with one hand running along the smooth mahogany banister, he could have sworn it was Ekaterina returned from the grave after all these years.

  He made a mental note to congratulate the dressmaker he had hired in town. She had transformed a gypsy wench into a perfect courtesan. April’s gown, a French import that proved even in wartime Paris was still the center of haute couture, was guaranteed to turn heads at the Kremlin. They would all wonder who the stunning woman was, all but those who remembered Ekaterina, and those few would be shocked.

  By design, he had taken Katya’s portrait to the dressmaker at Valenkov Square, and insisted that she use the painting as a model. Though April did not know it, she was wearing a nearly identical replica of Ekaterina’s most famous gown, the one which she had chosen for her portrait.

  Of course, the style was updated, so it was not precise. The original gown had vanished with his fiancée, or he would have insisted that April wear it. This near duplicate, however, was close enough to his satisfaction.

  Instead of the high waistline of the earlier period, the gown had been modified to emphasize the tiny perfection of April’s waist. The neckline was French, and low off the shoulders, showing a tantalizing glimpse of her breasts. The full skirts were scalloped with velvet roses, a large one nestled at her bosom. But for those slight differences, the gown of midnight-blue velvet was as striking as it had been all those years ago.

  At his specifications, April’s hair was smoothly drawn up on her head, where a shower of golden ringlets cascaded to touch her bare shoulders. Days out of the sun had faded her skin to an acceptable pale golden cream, more enticing than the powder-white flesh the other ladies possessed. Around April’s throat, a glittering web of dark blue sapphires in gold filigree gleamed. It was like looking into the past again.

  April smiled, searching for Ivanov’s approval. He had been kind to her, and she wanted to please him.

  “Lovely,” he said huskily, forced to swallow his emotions and mask his intense desire. “Didn’t I promise you that blue would be the perfect foil for your hair and eyes? I was fortunate I could find the material in time for tonight.”

  “But how did you get the dress made so swiftly?” April asked, reaching the end of the stairs and looking up at him curiously. “It must have taken twelve seamstresses all week to finish this for me.”

  He shrugged modestly. “My connections occasionally assure me small favors in town. I merely convinced them to set aside other less pressing projects for this one. I kept hinting it would please the czar, and that was enough for them.”

  April waited while Ivanov produced a wrap of beautiful silver fox and eased it about her bare shoulders. Snuggling into the soft fur, she only half-listened to Ivanov’s narrative as he reached for his own coat by the door. At every
opportunity he gave her a history lesson. This time it was about the czar himself, but April was too distracted by the evening to come to concentrate upon his words. Instead, she found herself looking at Count Ivanov as a lady would assess her escort for the evening.

  As always, the count was impeccably dressed, this time in a dark blue swallow-tailed evening coat and trousers. His smoke-tinged hair was neatly parted on the side, accenting the masculine cut of his features. When he leaned close to assist April to the sleigh, she could catch the faint whiff of ambergris he wore. It was a pleasant, musky smell that reminded her of the earthy smell of the woods, and a sharp ache seared her as she thought of her mountains so far away.

  “You must not be melancholy tonight,” Ivanov said as they settled for the ride into town. It was already dark as midnight though early, and bitterly cold. He urged April to lean into him for warmth. “I intend for you to have a wonderful time. That will not be possible if you keep thinking of things that distress you.”

  She looked at him and tried to smile, but there was a sadness in her lovely green eyes that was impossible to ignore. Ivanov knew the cause of it, but he did not wish to deal with the ghost of Damien any longer. Instead, he suggested gently, “You are young yet and have your whole life ahead of you. I am offering you a chance to start anew. Do not throw it away, April. I sense you have the inner strength and resolve to be whatever you wish to be. Few souls can claim that right. You are destined for greatness, if you only reach for it.”

  Now she laughed, but with faint disdain. “I will always be Romany. That ends all chances for me before they begin.”

  “It is a fact you can easily hide, with your hair and eyes. Your skin is so fair …” Ivanov hesitated, almost touching her hand resting between them. He decided against it and fought back his own inner ache. “What I suggest, my dear, is that you let me do the talking tonight. Court circles move swiftly, and I do not wish you to feel crushed in the madness. Just smile and nod and look as lovely as you do right now, and no one will be the wiser.”