He trembled, too!
“Are you well? Did they hurt you?” he said softly, his voice rumbling inside his chest, just beneath her cheek where it was pressed against his shoulder. He wore a regimental uniform, something red with braid and epaulets and rows of medals which put the English regiments to shame.
Elise shook her head, as much as she could with his hand cradling her head. “I don’t know what is happening here. I came because of your letter–”
She felt him check, his body stiffening. “Letter?” he repeated and lifted her chin so she was looking at him. “What letter?”
“Then you didn’t write it…?” Horror touched her and she twisted in his arms to look at the man with the gun. “You fooled me into coming here.”
“Oh, the letter is quite genuine,” the man told her, looking very pleased with himself. “It is how we knew you would be enough to bend the Prince to our demands.”
Maria had shut the door and now stood next to the man, her gaze and her gun steady.
“Aloysius…damn the man. I will have his guts for garters,” Danyal ground out.
“Ah, now he remembers the letter,” the man said happily.
Aloysius was Danyal’s private secretary. Then the letter hadn’t been sent by Danyal…yet he had written it. Elise looked up at Danyal. “You cannot give them what they want. Not over me.”
Danyal stroked his finger over her cheek. “Slaten, here, understands more clearly than you, my sweet Elise. Let me speak to him, for now we must come to the meat of it.” He turned her so she was facing Slaten, her back to Danyal. She could feel his warmth behind her.
He had written the letter. The words in it were true, then. He had poured his heart upon the page, knowing it was safe, that it would not break their agreement. Slaten and his brethren were using the letter against Danyal now. The letter…and his feelings for her.
Elise realized that she was merely a pawn in this affair. She had been lured here. They knew nothing about her other than that she was useful.
Well, they were in for a surprise, she decided.
Danyal forced himself to put aside the deep pleasure welling in him at seeing Elise once more—and here in Pandev, of all places. She was warm and soft against him, the ultimate distraction.
He turned her so her back was to him and he could not see her expressive face and the warmth in her eyes when she looked at him, so that he might concentrate upon the next few minutes. “Name your terms,” he bid Slaten, in English.
Slaten didn’t like being ordered around. He scowled. “It’s simple enough, Prince,” he began.
“In English,” Danyal growled. “It is only fair that Miss Thomsett hears what we say, so she fully understands what you have pulled her into.”
“Very well, English, then. If the lady is offended by what I have to say, remember that you insisted upon her hearing it all.” Slaten spared a single glance at Elise, dismissing her and her possible sensitivities. “The people of this land are about to rise up against you and your English sympathies and British lovers. They think you have been lying to them all along, lulling them with false sympathy for their cause.”
“The Resistance is rising up?” Danyal asked blankly. “I do not believe it. I know the Resistance leader well. Neofit Georgiev has played chess with me more than once, and I know his mind. He would not believe such slurs, not without evidence, or without asking me first, which he has not done.”
Slaten nodded. “You understand what makes a man’s mind work. I have heard this about you. So you should know, Prince, how fury-filled a man can become if he believes he has been fooled by a man he thought he trusted.”
Danyal scowled. “As I thought I could trust Aloysius?” he asked dryly. He considered the possibility that Georgiev had been fooled into believing Danyal had played a double game all along, lulling the Resistance into thinking he would work for their cause, while never intending to address any of their issues. Yes, a man, a leader, learning of such a betrayal, might decide to strike out for himself. A violent revolution…exactly what Danyal had been working to avoid. “Very well,” he told Slaten. “The Resistance wants my head. Had they confronted me with their demands, I would have listened and worked to find solutions to their grievances. I always have. Why bring Miss Thomsett into it?”
Slaten shook his head. “You don’t understand, I see. When the Resistance confronts you, probably with pitchforks and cudgels in hand, you are to agree to abdicate–”
“Abdicate?” Danyal repeated, truly shocked.
“Yes, and you will pass on the title and the land to the Emperor–”
“Wait, wait,” Danyal breathed. “You have worked to bring Miss Thomsett here, merely to ensure I abdicate? Is that not excessive, Slaten? My political leanings are well known. If the Resistance had called for my abdication, I would have seriously considered it, and abdicated if I thought it would give them what they need…but this…” He shook his head. “I don’t like being forced to do anything. Call it my privileged air, Slaten. You’ve miscalculated twice now—in thinking this overwhelming force was necessary in the first place and in thinking that extortion would work on me in the second.”
“Nevertheless, those are the terms.” Slaten spoke as if Danyal had not said anything at all, although he scowled heavily. So did the woman with the gun. They didn’t like being called fools.
As Slaten spoke, Elise’s fine fingers curled around Danyal’s wrist. He nearly jumped—nearly—by the unexpected touch. She had not appeared to have moved, yet she had reached around behind her, blindly seeking his hand.
He moved it so his finger tangled with hers, thinking she merely wanted the comfort of his touch in this moment.
She steadily and slowly drew his hand forward, brushing through the folds and tucks and pleats of her gown, which hid her movements.
Danyal forced himself to act as he would naturally. “I do not understand your role in this, Slaten.”
“You have no need to understand, Prince,” Slaten said. “You are to do what you are directed to do. The lands, the mineral rights, the title, must be forfeited to the Emperor.”
Cold shock slithered through Danyal.
Mineral rights.
With almost a physical impact, everything shifted and suddenly made sense. Danyal drew in a breath, as awareness spread calm through him. He could see it all now.
“You made your last mistake, Slaten,” he said coldly. As he spoke, Elise pushed his fingers into another deep fold of the dress. Tweed suiting brushed over the back of his hand, while cold steel touched his fingertips.
A pocket. And by the feel of it, a gun. A Deringer.
Danyal resisted the need to cheer, or even smile. The last piece was in place. He knew what he had to do, now. “You aren’t with the Resistance,” he told Slaten. “You’re an Ottoman agent.”
Slaten just smiled. “I’m an Anarchist,” he said simply. “One not above earning his keep by whatever means comes my way. The Emperor thought what I did in Romania would earn me the sympathy of the right people here, and he was correct. It was ridiculously easy to ape your pathetic Resistance, to make them think I was one of them.”
“And to make them think I was betraying them,” Danyal added. “You are a fool, Slaten, and so is the Emperor, if you ever think I would betray my people. That was your very last mistake.” He pulled the gun out of Elise’s pocket and fired over her shoulder.
The little bullet wouldn’t be fatal, not from this distance, but Danyal was counting upon neither of the two knowing that. The fact that he was firing a gun at them would make them duck and give him a few precious seconds of time to act.
Slaten slapped his hand to the side of his neck, making a damp, thick choking sound.
Bright red blood pumped from between his fingers.
“Get behind me,” Danyal told Elise, swinging the Deringer toward the woman and firing again, as Elise slipped around him.
The woman threw herself to one side, her gun bellowing loudly i
n the small room. The bullet flickered through a fold of Danyal’s cape and Elise uttered a soft cry and pulled herself against his back and clung to him.
Slaten’s gun hung from his hand, useless, as he gripped his neck. His knees bent, and he folded slowly toward the already stained rug.
The woman lost her footing and threw up her hands, her feet skidding. Danyal noticed for the first time that the floor between the rugs gleamed wetly.
He leapt forward, instinctively taking advantage of the moment. As the woman sprawled, the hand she had thrust out to support her also slid in the water. Danyal gripped her hair, turned her head and put the little Deringer against her temple. “From this close, the bullet is quite fatal.”
She grew still, breathing hard.
Slaten was on his hands and knees, now. The blood fountained, staining the rug, splattering against the dressing table and washstand and the flocked wallpaper.
“My dear sweet lord…!” Elise whispered.
“The bullet sliced the big artery open,” Danyal murmured, watching Slaten die.
“Is there nothing we can do for him?”
“He brought this upon himself,” Danyal said coldly. “He made too many mistakes. The largest error was underestimating you.”
Elise wrapped her arms around her middle as if she was cold.
“How did you know?” Danyal asked.
“Know what?”
“That I would know what to do with the gun?”
Elise’s mouth twitched. A smile tried to form. She pointed at his chest.
Danyal looked down at the uniform and the medals.
“I hoped that they were not honorary medals,” she said, “and that at least one of them was for marksmanship.”
Danyal could feel his own smile forming. Then he remembered what lay ahead and his amusement vanished.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Danyal kept the gun resting against Maria’s temple until Slaten was quite dead. Elise tried to feel pity for the Anarchist, but could not, not after what he had tried to do to Danyal.
She stayed well out of the way of the spreading pool of blood, then pushed the rugs around it so they could soak it up. She didn’t look at the red substance as she worked and tried to pretend it was merely a spring flood she was damming back, as they had done at Northallerton in particularly rainy years.
While she worked, Danyal tore a bed sheet into strips and bound Maria to the chair. He forced one of the strips into her mouth and tied it behind her head, to stop her speaking.
“It won’t hold her for long,” Danyal told Elise, studying the knots. “But it will give us time.”
“Time to do what?” Elise asked.
“Not here,” he said simply, glancing at Maria. “Are those your coat and things?” He turned his chin toward the pile upon the bed.
“Yes.”
“Put them on. You will need them. It is growing cold outside.”
When she had put everything back on, including hanging the muff around her neck and picked up her valise, Danyal held out his hand.
Elise took it. The simple touch sent a thrill through her.
His fingers shifted against her hand, as if he had felt the same sensation.
Then he pulled the hood over his head and down low and led her from the room. He locked the door and pushed the big iron key underneath it, into the room behind.
Then he led her down to the main floor of the hotel and through back corridors, into the service section, then through a bewildering range of rooms and corridors and kitchens, all with staff chattering at each other, who turned to watch the pair of them walk through.
“How do you know the way?” Elise hissed.
“We came this way. Thank Slaten for the convenience,” Danyal told her. “This is the most popular dining establishment in the city. If we had been forced to go through the public rooms I would have been seen, and that is a complication I hope to avoid for now.”
They moved out into crisp air and a failing light. It would be completely dark soon.
The service courtyard behind the hotel was large and empty. Danyal hurried across it, tugging Elise along by the hold he had on her hand.
They moved through alleys and streets and lanes, until they reached a main street with a great deal of traffic moving along it. Danyal held the hood together over the lower half of his face, while looking up and down the road. “Can you whistle?” he asked Elise.
“I?”
“I cannot,” he confessed. “It was…discouraged when I was a boy and there is a cab coming this way right now.” He pointed.
Elise laughed. “I am a northern Miss,” she reminded him. She stripped her glove quickly, put her finger and thumb between her teeth and let out a piercing whistle, the one she had used to direct the shepherds’ dogs on more than one occasion.
The cab driver’s head jerked in their direction.
Danyal waved imperiously.
“You remembered how,” Elise said.
“It is all coming back to me,” Danyal said, as he picked up her hand and hurried toward the cab, which was pulling into the curb. “Every single moment of it,” he added softly, and helped her up into the cab.
He held the hood over his face again as he gave directions to the driver in his native tongue. Then he settled in the hansom beside her. “I have another confession,” he added.
“Yes?” Her heart thrummed.
“I have no money to pay the cab driver with. I don’t usually carry any with me, here, and I left the palace in a great rush.”
Elise rested her head against his arm for a moment, not sure if she wanted to laugh or sigh. “We will manage,” she told him.
The address they arrived at was a modest house, with warm lantern light streaming through the windows, and the scent of something hot and succulent wafting from the door.
The cab driver accepted Elise’s coins suspiciously, while Danyal murmured something that made him nod and pocket them, then pick up the reins and drive away.
“What did you say to him?” Elise asked, as she turned to study the little house.
“I told him that if he presents the coins at any bank, they will exchange the coins for Pandevanian currency, at a very good rate…only he must do it first thing tomorrow.”
“Why first thing tomorrow?” Elise asked.
“As to that…” Danyal took her hand once more. She rather liked him constantly taking her hand, she decided. He strode up to the door and knocked sharply.
It took a moment for the door to open. The man who opened it was in shirtsleeves, and he held up a lantern to spill light upon them, while he glanced up and down the street.
Danyal pulled the hood back enough for the light to fall on his face.
The man started and stared. Then he gabbled in Bulgarian and took another swift look up and down the narrow street. He reached for Danyal’s arm, as if to pull him in to the house, then stepped back, remembering who he was. He held open the door instead, and beckoned, his hand moving swiftly.
Elise stepped up behind Danyal and moved into the little house. Warm air bathed her face and the scent of savory meat in the air made her mouth water. The room they were in was the only room on this level. A narrow, steep stair led up to the next floor. On the opposite side of the room was an enormous iron stove, with red coals glowing through the grate at the front. On the stove top was a kettle.
A woman in an apron, her hair covered in a kerchief, stood stirring the contents of the kettle. She said something sharp to the man.
Then Danyal dropped the hood.
The woman drew in a sharp breath, her hand flying to her mouth. She put the spoon she had been using to stir the meal onto the stove top, but missed the mark, for she was not watching where she put it. The metal spoon clattered wetly upon the stone floor as the woman dropped into a deep curtsey.
The man bowed, too.
Danyal spoke and gestured. The man straightened, his eyes widening.
The woman rose slowly, looking co
nfused.
Then Danyal said, “How good is your English, Georgiev? I would have Miss Thomsett hear what we say.”
“My English…” Georgiev put out his hand and wiggled it from side to side. “I follow good enough. My Tanya, though…” He shook his head.
“That will have to do. You may tell your wife everything afterwards. Something has happened, Georgiev. I need your help.”
Georgiev straightened and grew taller, although he still was not as tall as Elise. “I help. But first, eat, yes? The miss is looking at the pot all the time.”
Elise blushed.
“We can eat while we talk. There is very little time,” Danyal replied. He drew Elise to the big, solid table sitting before the stove.
Georgiev hurried around the room, pulling over two stools from another corner. He insisted that Danyal take the head chair and brought his wife’s chair around for Elise to sit beside him. When she thanked him, he winked.
Tanya, his wife, placed a thick bowl in front of Elise. The bowl looked hand formed. It contained a stew with many vegetables and pieces of meat. Tanya gave Elise a large spoon to eat it with, and an even larger hunk of bread. The bread inside the crust was dark and flecked with grains.
Elise did not wait for everyone else to settle themselves, even though it was the height of rudeness. She was simply too hungry. She took a spoonful of the savory concoction, then tore at the bread with her teeth and chewed.
A tin cup with a dark wine was put in front of her, too. Elise barely looked up to murmur her thanks.
It was a simple meal, yet she could not remember enjoying a meal more than that one, not even the grand Christmas feasts at Innesford and Northallerton.
It took a few mouthfuls for Elise’s ravening hunger to subside enough for her to focus upon what Danyal was telling the man, Georgiev. She remembered the man’s name from the exchanges between Slaten and Danyal. He was the leader of the Balkan Resistance group in Pandev. A man whom Danyal clearly admired.
Her Rebellious Prince (Scandalous Family--The Victorians Book 2) Page 15
