Anna-Maria tried it, wishing she was more aware of the cheese than the blade it came on. She made the requisite compliment. ‘It’s delicious. Are you a dairyman at heart, Captain?’ She tried for a congenial laugh. She had to relax. It wasn’t fair to judge the man without cause. He’d gone to a good amount of work to arrange all of this.
But you do have cause, her conscience whispered. Stepan told you so, that should be reason enough.
And yet, if Stepan had his way, no man would ever look twice at her for fear of Stepan’s blade running him through. Anna stiffened her resolve. She had not come to Shoreham simply to replace Dimitri’s well-intended tyranny with another’s.
‘I suppose most of us from Derbyshire are. Cows and cheese are a way of life.’ The captain chuckled, his eyes twinkling his unmistakable interest in her.
‘Derbyshire sounds bucolic. You must miss it, being away so much.’ Anna tried to remember Evie’s instructions about conversing with a man. Ah, yes, ask them to talk about themselves. That would be far better than talking about her. ‘Tell me about your work, Captain. What brings you to Shoreham?’
The captain grew serious, his gaze intent on her in a way that had nothing to do with personal interest. Anna had the uncomfortable notion he was watching her for a reaction. ‘I am here to put a stop to the rampant smuggling up and down the coast. Shoreham is a hotbed of illegal activity,’ he explained. ‘People will smuggle anything that turns a profit: silk, spirits, spices even.’
‘I had no idea,’ Anna replied. It was mostly true. Other than what Evie had told her second-hand, she knew nothing about the depth and detail of smuggling. Denning knew she was new to the area; what sort of reaction did he expect her to give?
‘Oh, yes,’ he expounded. ‘The smaller the item, the harder it is to catch because it can be transported in small packages: cloves and cinnamon from Singapore, saffron from the Middle East.’ He gave a self-deprecating chuckle. ‘I learned that the hard way. Just last week, a shipment of anise and saffron came through illegally, much to my regret, the night of the assembly. It is easy to hide spices from customs officers.’
His voice softened. ‘Enough talk of work. What of you, Miss Petrova? You’re a woman far from home. There must be a tale there.’ His tone implied confidentiality. ‘I should very much like to hear it.’
Was this interest or interrogation? Anna had to wonder. Regardless of the captain’s intentions, she could not refuse to answer. Anna smiled sweetly and gave a delicate shrug. ‘There’s not much to tell. We are from Kuban. My brother is Prince Dimitri Petrovich, the famous archaeologist.’ She let the import of her brother’s title linger between them. ‘When he was on a dig in West Sussex to restore a Roman villa a few years ago, he met a girl and simply decided to not come home. He sent for me instead and here I am.’ Perhaps the captain would take the brevity of her tale as a sign of maidenly modesty. Any gently bred girl knew better than to talk about herself at great length.
Anna was not so lucky. The captain’s pale blue eyes roamed her face. ‘Ah, a true romance, then.’ He smiled, perhaps to disarm her as he asked his next question. ‘That explains your brother, but what of the others, Miss Petrova? You did not come alone. More bread?’
She took the bread and more cheese to buy time for her answer. ‘I could hardly make the journey alone. They came as my guard. It is a good opportunity for them to see a piece of the world.’
‘You are loyal, Miss Petrova. It is an admirable quality, but you needn’t stand on pretence with me. I’ve heard rumour the princes were exiled. It’s safe to say they came because they had no other choice.’
Anna stiffened. Nikolay and Illarion had been exiled, but Ruslan and Stepan had not. They’d come out of affection for their friends. The English could not seem to grasp the depths of Russian friendship and the loyalty that went with it. Friendships were for life. ‘If you know so much already, you needn’t have asked me.’
‘I did not mean to offend’ the captain was quick to apologise. ‘I merely sought to know you better. I confess a certain curiosity where Prince Shevchenko is concerned. What is his relationship with you? Or is the relationship merely on your brother’s behalf?’ He glanced away, dissembling. Anna fought back a wry smile. That was a very good question these days. She felt herself soften towards the captain at last, touched by his subtle addressing of the delicate question. ‘I suppose what I’m really asking and making a hash of, Miss Petrova, is what is your attachment to the prince? Is there any impediment to my interest? I should not like to importune you with unwanted intentions.’
He shrugged. ‘I am a man who has struggled for every scrap of luxury and status he possesses. Those things have not come easily to me, so in my mind they are not things one would give up, yet Prince Shevchenko has. I find it difficult to imagine sacrificing those worldly goods to come to England. It seems almost preposterous and illogical unless...’ Here, he stopped to slant her a knowing gaze. ‘Unless there was something, or someone, a man coveted more than riches?’
The suggestion struck her rather strongly. Was he implying Stepan had left Kuban for her? That he’d stayed in England specifically for her? Those were powerful thoughts. She could not afford to contemplate them at the moment, however. Anna shrugged, dismissing the captain’s enquiry with a vague response. ‘I think you read too much into it. They are all good friends and loyal to one another.’
Something flickered in the captain’s eyes. ‘Then might I hope to see you again?’ Whatever the captain’s motives for today’s outing were, there was an overt request for courtship that must be dealt with. How could she possibly agree to it? If she did, he would call again and she would be in direct violation of Stepan’s command. More than that she’d be in direct conflict with her own feelings. Was she the sort of woman who kissed one man and allowed herself to be courted by another, even if the man who’d done the kissing had asked nothing of her? But how could she refuse the captain? And on what grounds? It was an impossible situation.
Anna looked at her hands. ‘I am flattered by your attention, Captain. Truly, I am. But I am to make my debut in London in the spring. My brother has hopes for me.’ She fluttered her lashes. ‘Even if I wish it could be different, Captain, I am not at leisure to decide where to place my affections at present.’ Evie would be proud of her. It was a skilful refusal.
‘I see.’ The captain stiffened and she immediately felt bad. Perhaps her wariness had been for nothing, after all. He was simply a man trying to court a girl and she’d rejected him. He rose, signalling the end of the picnic and Anna felt even worse. She’d spent the picnic imagining this was all a grand plot of the captain’s to expose some other grand plot of Stepan’s—neither of which she had any inkling existed—and perhaps neither of which truly existed, all because Stepan had told her to stay away from the captain.
He met her eyes with admirable courage, she thought, considering she’d just rejected him. ‘Despite the outcome, I’ve had a delightful time today, Miss Petrova. You are a fascinating young woman. I think you and I might have much in common if we’d had the chance to know one another better.’
His gallantry broke her reticence. She was not so hard-hearted as all that. She had to offer him something. ‘Please, Captain, don’t feel that we cannot be friends.’
‘I appreciate your sensitivity, Miss Petrova.’ He smiled congenially and held out his hand. ‘In that case, would you walk with me before we go? I want to take in the view.’
The view was spectacular and windy out on the edge of the headlands. Anna put a hand to her hat as the breeze pulled at it, her skirts pressed against her legs. ‘A man could see for miles from here!’ she exclaimed, taking in the rugged beauty of the deserted coastline with its empty beaches. ‘I think it is rivalled only by the view off Seacrest’s veranda.’
‘That’s exactly what I was thinking.’ The captain gave her a sideways glance. A cold frisson went down her spine
. Anna had the impression she’d just given something away. But what?
Chapter Twelve
What had she given away? Anna could not shake the sensation. She brooded on it long after the captain had gone. She kept thinking about his reference to the spices during their picnic. The saffron, shafran in Russian, had got her attention, but it was the anise, anis, that had kept it. The two spices were rolling around in her thoughts long after Captain Denning had taken his leave. Both were grown throughout various regions of Europe, but southern Russia was known for its saffron and Russian anise was preferred by connoisseurs because of the quality of its oil.
Anna-Maria ate her dinner in the library near the fire, not wanting to spend another meal at the long dining table alone. The spices could have come from anywhere: China, Italy, Portugal, Turkey, and any number of destinations in the southern Mediterranean. But had they? And who had brought them? Not Stepan. He was not smuggling, not stoic, strait-laced Stepan who regretted the slight misdemeanour of kissing her.
Besides, hadn’t his own ship put into port and hadn’t he paid duties on the goods? That paperwork had kept him out of the house for days. If Stepan had imported spices, he had done so legally and paid for them. What worried her most was that clearly someone else had brought the spices in illegally. She didn’t want Stepan blamed simply because he was a foreigner with Mediterranean and Russian connections.
Of course, her rational self recognised that her fears were putting the cart before the horse, as the saying went. But those who counselled such practice had the luxury of patience. They had not lived in Kuban. They had not seen powerful families brought low because of one well-placed whisper. They had not seen a Tsar witch-hunt his own supporters out of fear for his crown.
Anna-Maria pushed her plate away, not hungry any more. She had been fourteen when the persecutions had started—old enough to know what was going on, but naïve enough to think it had naught to do with her. She’d not paid attention when the first noble disappeared or the second. She’d believed the stories of their unfortunate accidents—one on a hunting expedition and another at his estate cleaning a firearm. She’d heard Dimitri and the others talk in hushed tones about the changing climate of Kuban, about the new levels of tyranny executed by Tsar Peter. But she had not thought they affected her family or her friends. The greatest fear in her life had been Dimitri going away. Even the thoughts of her upcoming marriage had seemed far off. When one was fourteen, eighteen seemed a lifetime away. Anything might happen between then and now.
And it had. Anna-Maria stared into the fire and tugged the sheep’s-wool blanket more securely about her legs as she remembered. Illarion had begun writing poetry—inflammatory poetry, not his usual love sonnets or odes to nature that the Tsar adored so much. Illarion’s ‘friend’ Katya, a court beauty, had married a high-profile general in the army, a man named Ustinov. She’d committed suicide. That was when Nikolay had begun speaking out, too, adding his voice to Illarion’s. Stepan came to call more often in those tumultuous days, looking stern as he checked in on her in Dimitri’s absence. He and Ruslan would exchange worried looks over her head. Shortly afterwards, they’d banned Nikolay and Illarion from calling at the house for some reason she didn’t understand until later—to protect her.
Then came the horrible dawn when Stepan had come to the door, arguing with her father. She’d watched from the alcove at the top of the stairs, seventeen and gangly, dressed in a nightshift with a blanket thrown over her shoulders. Nikolay had been arrested; he was wounded and perhaps dying. Stepan had brandished a letter from Dimitri with instructions. ‘I am to bring you and Anna-Maria to London. It is what Dimitri wants. Your son is not coming back,’ Stepan had said firmly. He was the only one who could take that tone with her father. Her father had argued he would not leave his country as his wife’s grave was here. He could not leave her. Stepan had looked up the stairs and seen her. ‘Give me Anna-Maria and you may stay with your own foolishness, but you cannot condemn your daughter to the same fate. You know what will happen to her with Dimitri gone.’ Her father did not relent. Stepan’s last words had been for her alone. ‘We have three days. Gather what you can, Anna-Maria, gems, jewellery, any money you have, sturdy clothes and boots for travel. Be ready when I come.’
Her blood had thrilled at his strong words, at the thought of adventure. More, though, it had thrilled at what Stepan was asking her to do: to defy her father, to embrace her own freedom. In the end, her father had come with them. The lure to see his son again had proved too strong to resist. The thrill of adventure had been short-lived. There had been no joy in seeing Nikolay injured and barely conscious, hands tied to the pommel of his saddle so that he wouldn’t fall off. She’d learned that night she’d been naïve to think she and her family were immune from witch-hunts. Watching Nikolay struggle to live, she’d vowed she’d never be taken unawares again.
So here she was, sitting before the fire and imagining the worst possible outcome from the captain’s visit. What had he come for today? Just her, as his overtures suggested? Or had he thought to investigate Stepan? Perhaps she should let him and then he would be forced to exonerate Stepan. The captain would find nothing aboard the ship or at Seacrest, a home that belonged to a civil prevention officer. The idea that Stepan was smuggling was laughable. That he was doing it out of Preston Worth’s house was downright hilarious.
Or was it? The fire and her memories were raising all nature of ghosts tonight. Little things started to emerge that had escaped her attention earlier. Paperwork had kept Stepan busy when the Lady Frances had put in, except for the one day when it hadn’t. Add to that, Stepan had been absent from Dimitri’s for weeks before the Lady Frances had arrived. Where had he been then? What things had Stepan being referring to when he’d said this was about more than kisses? Why didn’t he want the captain here at Seacrest?
She was not entirely naïve on that account. She understood part of the reason Stepan didn’t want the captain here had to do with her. Whatever his other reasons, the fact remained that Stepan had kissed her. Twice. And the second time there had been far more than kissing. The second time couldn’t be brushed off as a much-needed lesson in deportment. The captain had asked to court her. Any girl would have been pleased with his attentions, but she’d not hesitated in her gentle refusal for the simple reason that the captain did not inspire in her the feelings Stepan raised.
There was a certain twisted irony in that choice. The captain had been well mannered while Stepan had raged at her: Stepan, who was by turns strict and surprisingly tender; Stepan, who stormed off hardly bothering to tell her where he was going or why. And yet, it was Stepan she clung to, Stepan whom she would champion, apparently without question. Because there was no question. He was her rock, her moral compass. He knew right and he did right. He championed the needy and protected the weak. Stepan was all that was noble. Whatever she knew or didn’t know about him, she knew that at least.
It occurred to Anna-Maria befriending the captain might come in use, however, if he suspected Stepan of any illegal behaviour. One could never have too many friends, as the old fairy tale went. Friends had saved Nikolay and Illarion back in Kuban when others had been happy to let them suffer as long as it kept the Tsar from looking their way. A plan came to her. Tomorrow, she would go into Shoreham and make amends with the captain. If she could protect Stepan in this small way, then she would do it. Her friendship, and whatever else might lie between them, demanded no less.
* * *
His friendship with Anna-Maria demanded more from him than what he’d given. The thought was as unshakeable from Stepan’s mind as the mud of the road was from his horse’s hooves. Early spring, or late winter, depending on how one looked at it, was an awful time to travel. He’d had no choice, though. One of the returning tub men had brought word the merchants in London were nervous about the situation in Shoreham. They wanted to meet with him, wanted to have his personal assurance
that supply would not be cut off and that his goods could get through.
Stepan had gone. He could argue business required it of him, but in truth his temper had required it more. He’d needed to cool off and he’d needed distance from Anna-Maria. He’d needed time to think rationally, something he wasn’t doing well with her nearby day and night, tempting and torturing him by turn. Anna-Maria felt it, too, only she was willing to explore it whereas he sought to resist it. For that reason, he’d come to the only logical conclusion he could. He had to send Anna-Maria home. He would tell her today and send her back to Dimitri where they would both be safe.
‘Hoy, sir! Halt in the name of the King!’ Two soldiers were positioned at a makeshift stop in the centre of the road. It looked more like the cross-rail jumps Nikolay had in his riding arena than a substantial barricade, but it was enough to stop a wagon and a rider would be forced to jump it, something that would not appeal in the mud.
Stepan pulled up his horse. ‘Good day.’ His tone was jovial, but his eyes were busy assessing. It had only been five days. Captain Denning worked fast. He wondered how many other roads were blocked. He shouldn’t be surprised. Denning had warned them all at the meeting.
‘State your purpose,’ one soldier requested. He was not much older than Joseph, Stepan thought.
‘I am returning home after business in London.’ Courtesy and compliance went a long way and Stepan was happy to supply them both up to a point.
‘Do you have papers? A pass?’ The other, slightly older, put in with grave seriousness.
Stepan gave a friendly smile, but inside he was registering alarm. This was far more intense than he’d anticipated. ‘I left before there was any such requirement.’ He feared they were quickly reaching that point where he would not be able to comply. ‘As you can see, I am no threat. There is just my horse and myself. You may search my saddlebags.’ He winked. ‘Although, for future reference, smugglers are usually interested in getting things out of Shoreham, not into it.’ The younger one smiled at the jest and gave a nervous laugh. The other one did not see the humour. Stepan wished he had.
Seduced By The Prince's Kiss (Russian Royals 0f Kuban Book 4) Page 11
