Once a Princess

Chapter 42

The first thing Tanya noticed when she came out of the house was not all the servants scurrying about, getting the last of the baggage loaded into the coaches lined up there, nor the twenty guards already mounted, nor even Stefan standing by the first coach, waiting for her with his three personal guards around him. What she noticed was that Alicia wasn't there.

Well, she wasn't going to ask why not. If Stefan had decided it would be prudent to be discreet now and not travel with his mistress in tow, it was just too late, as far as Tanya was concerned.

"You're late," Stefan said tersely as she reached him.

"Fat lot I care," she shot back. "I'd just as soon not go at all."

He dismissed the others with his hand probably because he hadn't expected her to be as testy as he was. Serge, she noted, didn't look guilty, so at least he hadn't told Stefan what she didn't want him to tell.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Stefan demanded as soon as they were alone.

"You figure it out, your Majesty. You're rather good at drawing conclusions, after all."

She started to climb in the coach without aid. Stefan jerked her back around. "Why didn't you tell me what you told Serge?"

So that's what had him growling? "You weren't in a mood to believe me."

"You managed to convince him. You didn't even try to convince me."

"As I said, you weren't in a mood—"

"Tanya, you are my responsibility. Mine! If I doubt what you tell me, you damn well tell me again, and again, until I believe it. Something as important as this—"

"Shouldn't have been doubted in the first place," she retorted.

"I agree." When her eyes widened, he added, "If I had been completely sober last night, I likely would have believed you at the start. I apologize for being less than clearheaded in your time of need."

Was that a double entendre? No, he had taken her last night. He hadn't bothered to ask if she wanted him to. And he hadn't noticed any need in her response, just the opposite — he hadn't noticed anything.

"I don't think I can accept your apology. Stefan. Your drinking did a lot more damage than your merely doubting me. It helped you, along with your anger, to take something from me that I was prepared to give you, but you don't even know what it is. And you don't even know what I'm talking about, do you? Well, I could have forgiven you if you did, but since you don't, forget it."

She turned toward the coach again. This time he caught her shoulders and drew her back against him. She stiffened, but all he did was issue a warning. "If you think you are going to get away with that cryptic little riddle, think again. I will have an explanation from you, Tanya, and I'll have it now."

"Or else?"

"I might just turn you over my knee again."

Hot color rushed into her cheeks to accompany the ire his warning provoked. "Then I might just throw another knife at you."

He sighed and let her go. "All right, Tanya, get in the coach. You have delayed us long enough this morning. "

"Because I didn't get much sleep last night, thanks to you and my wouldbe killer," she retorted.

That got her a boost up into the coach that almost sent her into the opposite door. He followed her in, taking the seat across from her. And there was the glow in his eyes that she'd been looking for, sparking fire.

"I promised it wouldn't happen again, Tanya. What more do you want from me?"

Damn him, he was sober and saying it now, telling her as plain as day that he was never going to touch her again. "Not... a... damn... thing! "

She turned toward the window before she started crying. He didn't say another word. For nearly an hour that simmering silence continued between them.

And then Tanya felt a weight dropped in her lap.

"Those are for you."

It was a small, jewelencrusted chest. Those? She opened it and stared at diamonds, pearls, emeralds, dozens and dozens, set in necklaces, rings, bracelets. She could buy a hundred taverns with what she was holding, but all she saw was what it represented. In a kingly fashion, Stefan was paying her for last night — because whores had to be paid, didn't they?

The gesture made her so furious she could have thrown that chest out the window — or at his head. But her fury didn't come through in her tone, merely in her words. "This ought to pay for my passage home." He snatched the chest back so fast, she blinked, then shrugged. "So I'll find another way. Don't think for a minute that I don't know how to earn money."

She was delighted to see him go red in the face. She had meant working in taverns, but she knew that wasn't what he thought.

"They told me you were at least resigned to the marriage," he gritted out.

"That was before I was reminded what a devil-spawned bastard you are."

His eyes flashed molten gold. "I will be eternally sorry for last night, but you are going to marry me, and live with me, whether you like it or not!"

"I am?"

She didn't mean it as a taunt, but he must have taken it as such. Before she even knew what he was doing, he reached over and yanked her onto his lap, slipped a hand into her hair to utterly destroy her coiffure, and took her mouth with an exquisite sort of hunger. Waves of giddy relief shot out to her extremities and came back in tides of sweet pleasure. He was touching her again, kissing her again, making her forgive him everything in her relief that he couldn't keep his promise, that what she could make him feel transcended even his given word.

She didn't notice that this kiss was skillfully calculated, designed to melt her resistance and leave her clinging to him. Clinging she was, and she hadn't even thought to resist. She would probably think later how unfair it was that he could do this to her when she was so spitting mad at him, but right now all she did was kiss him back.

And then he was only nibbling, at her lips, her earlobes, her neck, and she knew instinctively that what he was doing now wasn't going to lead to anything more. She felt a disappointment that helped her tamp down her rioting senses. She could protest at any time now; he was allowing that. But since she didn't want to anyway, she decided to wait to see what else he would do. Besides, the way he was leisurely toying with her was sinfully delicious, just stirring enough to keep her senses alert and hoping, but inducing a languor that had her melting into his body.

Finally he looked at her, tipping her chin up so she couldn't avoid his gaze. His eyes were merely sherrygold, about as mellow as she'd ever seen them. And he didn't say a word. That alone brought her back to full reality. But she didn't stir from her position, half reclined in his arms, her right hand curled around his neck.

With a degree of smugness, she asked, "What happened to your promise?"

"I was only a little angry."

"The hell you were," she snorted.

He smiled down at her. "Then let me rephrase that. I was in perfect control."

"You wanted to kiss me?"

There went his smile. "Why the devil do you sound surprised?"

"Your promise—"

"Had nothing to do with it."

It didn't? Confusion reigned, until she thought to ask, "Stefan, what exactly did you promise me?"

The subject wasn't pleasing him, if his new expression was any indication. "I thought I was quite specific."

"Then refresh my memory."

"I gave you my word I would never take my anger out on you again."

Her relief was there, jumping up and down inside her, but there was another thought that had her brows drawing together in a scowl. "Then who will you take it out on?"

"I suppose I will have to find another outlet."

"Alicia?"

She could have bit her tongue for asking that, especially when he grinned. His mood might have suddenly improved, but hers didn't.

"You weren't jealous of Alicia, were you?"

"Not the least little bit," she lied. "Where is she, by the way?" You weren't going to ask that, missy. Oh... shut... up.

"On her way to Cardinia, I would imagine. She left quite early."

"I thought she was going to travel with us."

He stared at her for a long, pensive moment and then he frowned. His hold on her tightened. His scars twitched.

She was confused again, increasingly so when he demanded, "Did you want her along? Perhaps to keep me from kissing you when I damn well feel like kissing you?"

Now, what brought that on? she wondered in vexation. Her innocent remark? Not likely.

"Whatever gave you that idea?"

"It's what you told her, isn't it?"

Tanya gasped in outrage. "I told her no such thing! In fact, that sounds pretty much like what she told me—that I ought to be grateful for her existence because I couldn't possibly want you bothering me in that way, and she would make sure you didn't. She had the unmitigated gall to assume, assume, to know what I want. What other lies did that bitch say about me?"

Stefan didn't answer. He didn't know whom to believe at that point — Tanya, who said such outlandish things sometimes that he never knew what was true or not, or Alicia, who had never lied to him as far as he knew. And Alicia hadn't told him anything he hadn't already agonized over himself.

That was what had driven him back to the bottle last night after he had unwrapped Alicia from his body and sent her packing. He hadn't been gentle about it, either which he regretted now that he was sober. And now that he was sober, he realized that telling Tanya that Alicia had been with him when she screamed — when Alicia actually had returned to her room some thirty minutes earlier — had merely been his pain trying to inflict a like pain on Tanya. Obviously it hadn't worked, since her reaction had been fury that he might have been enjoying himself while she was in danger.

The accusation Tanya had made against Alicia, however, he still couldn't give credence to. Alicia might be petty and spiteful, but she wasn't capable of murder.

The hardest thing he had ever done was to finally ask Tanya outright, "If you don't want her around, are you prepared to accept me as I am, scars and all?"

Tanya didn't know how important her answer was to him, or how much frustration she could avoid if she would just answer yes. She was too annoyed to answer yes.

"Your scars again? You and Alicia are two of a kind, aren't you? You're both obsessed with those damn scars."

All he heard was that she had evaded his question, which was all the answer he needed.

He abruptly set her from him, waiting only until she had settled back in her seat to say stiffly, "You may not like my touch, Tanya mine, but you had best get used to it. But then we both know that once you're being kissed, you don't care who is doing the kissing, or the touching. Do you?"

"I honestly wouldn't know," she shot back, only to realize that that particular taunt was the truth.