The Runaway Princess

  “I didn’t think you were courting me . . . her. I thought you were telling.” She squirmed. “I can’t breathe.”

  He didn’t reply. He just moved against her, securing her with his weight and his hands. And she really couldn’t breathe.

  It was like before. Like at the orphanage, when she had stood up to the headmistress and her cohorts. Charitable women, they called themselves, who ran a “school.” Hags, Evangeline had said; bullies who slapped the younger girls if they wet the bed or cried out with a nightmare.

  That was where she had learned that courage would be punished, and dreams never came true. How had she forgotten that lesson?

  It was dark beneath him, and the feather mattress extended around the sides of her. She was suffocating, and she gasped and strained, shaking with fear. “Danior. Please.”

  Abruptly she was released. She lay gasping, sucking in the air that had seemed too thin, and staring at Danior’s scowl. He hovered as if waiting for a trick, and when she didn’t move, he said, “Interesting. Did they lock you in the closet in that school you attended?”

  “Sometimes.” Realizing he wasn’t going to attack again, she sighed and relaxed.

  His fingers slid along the jut of her jaw, lifting it to its former defiant position. “We didn’t pay them to do that.”

  “You didn’t pay them at all.”

  Pulling his hand back, he stretched out on his side, and watched her in an attitude of vigilance. “I can scarcely believe you dare to look at me through those eyes and insist you are English.”

  The mattress dipped in his direction, and she struggled not to roll into him. “I am English.”

  “You speak English very well, it is true. And you behave too much like an independent woman for your own good. But”—he brushed a feather of hair off her cheek—“you have Serephinian eyes.”

  Jolted, she tried to sit up, fighting the well-aired mattress, which wished to envelop her. Bracing herself on her elbows, she watched him vigilantly as she replied, “They’re odd, yes. But what do you mean, Serephinian eyes?”

  “Slanted eyes, the color of mahogany. Eyes inherited from the first queen of Serephina. The queen who was conquered by a Moor, and who in turn conquered him.”

  “Indeed?”

  A whisper of memory tugged at her mind. The sight of an old woman with flame-blue eyes looking down at her eleven-year-old face. Taking her chin and lifting it. Turning it from side to side in austere analysis. Saying to one of the hags in charge, “I’ll take her.”

  Danior did much the same, stroking her chin with his thumb, scrutinizing her features. “The queen and the Moor left a combined legacy of legendary beauty and ruthlessness in my country—and in yours.”

  Defensively, she drew her knees up to her chest. “Who am I supposed to be? The legendary beauty, or the ruthless conqueror?”

  His heavy, dark brows snapped together. “I do not think, Ethelinda, this is the time for levity.”

  She hadn’t been trying to be funny. She had been trying to protect herself from mockery. And from that testy, proprietary manner with which he handled her. “I suppose it’s not out of the realm of possibility that my parents were from Serephina.”

  Picking up her carelessly thrown stole, he ran it through his fingers.

  The sight of the fragile lace in his broad hand gave her an odd sensation, almost as if he were threatening her. “I don’t remember my parents.”

  His fingers paused. “I know.”

  “It’s not so bad being an orphan, once one gets used to it.” Fighting the drag his weight created, she moved back toward the headboard. “It taught me to be self-sufficient.” They were in her bedchamber, this self-proclaimed prince and a counterfeit princess, and they were alone. He had wrestled her onto the mattress. When she had demanded release, he had done so, true, but he had also first made a rather oblique comment. What was it? This isn’t my chosen method of courtship.

  “You don’t know me well,” she said, “and certainly you have no reason to be concerned about a mere stranger.” She glanced at him from beneath her lashes. He wrapped her stole around his neck and flung the end over one shoulder in an extravagant gesture.

  He should have appeared effeminate. Instead, the lace contrasted with his black jacket. The fringe trickled down his broad back. Incongruous decoration on a stolid statue of a man. “But you needn’t worry that I’ll be unable to care for myself.”

  She scooted toward the edge of the bed and lowered one foot toward the floor. “I am quite practical. This adventure was only a temporary aberration in the even tenor of my life.”

  Her toes had just touched hardwood when his hand grasped her other ankle. “Much as I admire your attempt to divert me from my purpose by reminding me of the tragedies which have ruled your life and your rather touching attempt at bravado, I find myself unmoved—Princess.”

  He emphasized the title with what Evangeline considered unnecessary vigor. “You also seem to be skeptical about our need for you in Serephina and in Baminia.”

  “But you see, you’ve made a mistake.” She tugged at her ankle.

  “I am the crown prince of Baminia, and I do not make mistakes.” His fingers pressed deeper, compressing the bones. Sitting up, he continued speaking relentlessly, confident as only a man who had never made a mistake could be. “As prince, I frequently mingle with my people, and I would never mistake a commoner for nobility. So luckily for you, I am well aware of not only my own duty, but of yours, and I possess the means to enforce your obedience.”

  His eyes burned like the flame in the hottest part of the fire, and she could almost see the air between them waver in the heat. Compelled by the kind of appalled curiosity that made onlookers crane to view a carriage wreck, she asked, “What means are those?”

  “I have the strength. I have the determination.” Taking her hand, he pressed it between his legs. “And I have this.”

  Ignorant as she was of anything but instruction from a book, it took her a moment to realize what the shape beneath his trousers indicated.

  When she did, she made a noise not unlike that of a chicken producing its first egg. She could have incapacitated him; she knew how in some rational part of her mind. But reason fled before the proof that, yes, Evangeline Scoffield could make a man lustful.

  And also, that Evangeline Scoffield did not have the slightest idea what to do with that man once she had done so.

  Placing his hand on her shoulder, he tipped her back toward the pillows and stated his goal. “Once I have compromised you, Your Highness, you will have no choice but to do your duty, and that is to return with me to the city of Plaisance in time for the Revealing—and our wedding—and unite our countries as the prophecy foretold. There, in the Palace of the Two Kingdoms, you will bear the royal child which I have placed in your womb, and we will live with the contentment of knowing we have done our duty.”

  A pang of pity for the true princess rippled through her. Then as he bent over her, a pang of panic for her own plight made her shudder. “You’d do this in cold blood?”

  Something shifted in his blue eyes. “Cold?” he said. “I promise you’ll not complain of a chill.”

  A sudden, sharp conviction that he was laughing at her made her tug away. He caught at her and they rolled, wrestling briefly. Finding herself pinned against the headboard, her wrists pressed against the carving, she glared balefully as his head lowered to hers.

  “Relax,” he murmured as his lips touched hers. “This is the best part of our duty. You’ll see.”

  Silken whispers of enticement, his lips drifted over her face. They stroked the eyes he claimed to recognize, paid reverence to the high cheekbones that had so set her apart, and, as gently as a butterfly descending on a flower, they settled on her mouth.

  Seduction, she reminded herself. Cold-blooded seduction for a very practical purpose.

  But Danior had spoken the truth. There was nothing cold about this. She could almost smell the singe of their con
necting flesh.

  Then the sound of shattering glass jerked his head up. Evangeline caught a glimpse of a round, black, shiny missile flying through the air. It bounced off the bed. With a metallic thud, it landed on the floor.

  “What? . . .” she tried to say, but Danior hurtled off the bed and dragged her behind him in one motion.

  She stumbled off the dais and fell to one knee.

  He tugged her to her feet. “Run,” he said. “A bomb. It’s a bomb!”

  Five

  “A bomb?” Evangeline said stupidly. Then, “A bomb!”

  Dropping to her knees, she twisted her arm.

  Danior lost his grip on her.

  But as she scrambled back toward the bed, he roared, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “My money.” She lunged under the mattress. “I have to get my money!”

  Her fingertips had just touched the precious bag when he seized her from behind by her sash.

  “Damn you, woman.”

  She screamed and fought, but he hoisted her over his shoulder.

  “You’re not dying on me, too.”

  He sprinted from the room. His shoulder bones battered her ribs, while she cried out and stretched toward the open doorway where her money, her precious money, remained.

  They had almost reached the main hall when the flash of the explosion blinded her. The blast made her ears ring. The concussion of air sent Danior stumbling forward.

  When Evangeline opened her eyes, she saw flames shooting from the doorway of her luxurious bedchamber.

  Danior swung around and faced the conflagration. A shudder swept him. “Just like before,” he muttered.

  Pandemonium sounded from the dining room. Gentlemen and ladies, some holding napkins, some dabbing their mouths, crowded the doorway. They gaped at Danior and Evangeline, then at the inferno down the corridor.

  Evangeline pressed her hand to her chest. “It really was a bomb.” A bomb. In her bedchamber. And she’d lost everything. “My money. My future.”

  “Be quiet,” Danior snapped.

  He didn’t understand. He’d never been hungry. She grabbed the waist of his trousers and jerked as hard as she could, and she hoped those manly parts he was so proud of trekked clear up his spine.

  “Damn!” Danior slammed her down on her feet—feet that tried to run, but got nowhere. “Try that again and I’ll . . .” He took a long breath and let it out slowly. “We’ll be lucky if we escape to have a future, you and I. Don’t you understand? They’ve found us.”

  She didn’t understand. Why should she? The cosmic threat that he saw so clearly meant nothing to her. She only understood that when this matter of the princess was cleared up, Evangeline Scoffield would go back to England and face the poverty she had feared her whole life. Scrubbing at her wet cheeks with her fists, she whimpered, “My bookstore. It’s gone.”

  Danior bared his teeth, but before he could shake her, a ripple surged through the guests. Ladies squealed as two darkly clad men charged through, knocking all aside with no deference to gender or age.

  Danior waved to them, and like wraiths they closed around Evangeline. With a glance, each summed her up. Despite her tear-stained cheeks and wild eyes, they apparently found her of noble aspect, for they bowed their heads in one short, jerky nod. Then they turned to Danior, and the remote homage they had paid her became a very personal devotion. These men were Rafaello and Victor, she supposed, the ubiquitous bodyguards, and they clearly adored their master.

  “The bastards’ll be waiting outside,” one said. He wore subdued, elegant clothing, but he tugged at his cravat and hunched his shoulders. Although he spoke fluent French, his lips barely moved, as if the act of articulation was arduous.

  “They’re waiting for us to run out.” The other man was refined from the graceful sweep of his short cloak to the even trim of his fingertips, and he spoke easily, with the polished delivery of an aristocrat.

  Yet whatever their differences, the three men communicated with the ease of those who had been together for years.

  Their master spoke. “Take care of it, Rafaello.”

  The aristocrat turned to the throng spilling out of the dining room. With a perfect, upper-class English accent, he called, “I say, I think that was a bomb. Do you suppose more will come flying through the dining room windows?”

  As a diversion, it worked well. Well-clad people shrieked as they streamed into the large sitting chamber.

  The maître d’hôtel bounded out on their heels, and Evangeline screamed, “Henri! Help me!”

  Danior’s big hand covered her mouth, cutting her off, but Henri barely glanced her way. Instead he stared at the flames that ate at the château, and shrieked at the servants, “Get buckets! Pans! Anything! Start a line from the kitchen well, or we’ll be out in the snow this winter!”

  “Don’t look for help from him,” Danior murmured to Evangeline. “His livelihood is going up in smoke. And Your Highness—it’s your fault.”

  He took his hand away, and when she kept quiet, he let go of her. But it didn’t matter. She was incoherent. Her fault? How was this her fault?

  Futilely Evangeline hunted for a handkerchief. The madness around her was sweeping her up. The shouting and increasing hysteria made her wonder if she would make it back to England at all. Or if others might agree with Danior and somehow deduce that this catastrophe was her fault. After all, the world had run mad.

  She sniffed and dabbed at her nose with the back of her hand.

  “Women.” Danior stuck a clean square of linen in her hand.

  As if she weren’t going to cry after all this! She wiped her eyes, then hiccuped and pressed the material to her mouth, wishing desperately she could blow.

  “It’ll be safer outside,” Rafaello shouted, his voice aimed above the hubbub. He made shooing gestures, and although a few rational voices raised objections, the hysterical herd advanced toward the exterior door.

  Victor tossed a cloak over Danior’s shoulders. When Danior turned up the collar, he covered the white of his shirt and cravat, and his somber figure became positively grim. Then the men joined the flow of refugees, carrying Evangeline in their midst. When she tried to wiggle away, Danior simply grasped her arm and hustled her along.

  These men with their conservative clothing and their obvious tension stifled her. Worse, the two bodyguards looked remarkably like Danior in their height and coloring, and she had no doubt they were of like temperament.

  She was surrounded by bullies.

  Even in a crowd, their stature should have made them stand out, but as they cleared the threshold to the outside, they bent their knees to make themselves shorter and to blend in with the crowd.

  The throng scattered along the verandah and out into the garden, encouraged by comments from Rafaello, their harrying guard dog. “It’ll be safer away from the building,” he called. And, “This is all Napoleon’s fault. I imagine his Frenchies are trying to liberate him.”

  “Why would anyone toss a bomb here to free Napoleon?” Evangeline asked logically.

  Her unwanted companions ignored both her comments and her dramatic sniffling, staying with the crowd until they reached the deepest shadows. Then they broke away, hastening toward the stables. At some prearranged signal, Rafaello and Victor picked up speed, leaving Evangeline with Danior.

  Danior tugged her into the shadows of a tree and held her there, unseen by the stable boys who ran past them, lugging washtubs full of water.

  “Help!” she yelled. “I need—”

  “Be quiet!” Rudely, he pulled her close and shoved her face into his chest, holding her by the back of her neck as a tomcat did with a field mouse, then he moved them farther from the path, farther from human activity.

  It didn’t matter. She could shout all she liked. She could struggle. No one paid attention. No one cared about one woman’s kidnapping. Not when the château was burning.

  The shouts of the toiling servants almost drowned out Evangeline?
??s subdued lament. “Who did this thing?”

  She wasn’t still crying, not really, but the slow leak of moisture from her eyes must have wet his shirt, for he answered, “It was the revolutionaries.”

  Her mind blanked. Revolutionaries? What did he mean, revolutionaries?

  Yet Danior seemed to think she knew what he was talking about. “That’s why we’ve got to go, and quietly, too.”

  “The revolutionaries.” She tasted the word, not liking its flavor.

  “Damn their souls.” He vibrated with outrage.

  “But I thought Serephina and Baminia were safe.”

  “They are safe. We have to get there.”

  For some reason, she had not even considered visiting the two countries, although she knew they weren’t far.

  For good reason, it seemed.

  “Look.” He turned her so she faced the rocky heights. “Serephina is just over that line of cliffs.”

  A chill ran up her spine. “So close.”

  “Yes, but the cliffs run for miles from east to west, and we have to go around. The horses are good, trained in the mountains, and with luck we can cross the border in two days.”

  “Only two days.” To escape him and go back where the world was sane.

  His hand rotated slowly, soothing the muscles on her rigid neck. “Despite my best efforts, Dominic’s band has grown active again.”

  “Again.”

  “Yes. And you remember what happened last time.”

  “I do?” She searched her mind. Leona had never mentioned any problems.

  “It was a time of great sorrow for all of us.”

  She wasn’t sure, but she thought he dropped a kiss on the top of her head.

  “Dominic’s gang wants the end of the monarchy, and they’ll get it any way they can—by our deaths, if necessary.” He turned her back into his arms. “That’s why we must convey you back to Plaisance and fulfill the prophecy.”

  She detected something in his voice; chagrin, perhaps, that he hadn’t been able to control the situation by himself.

  Speaking into the soft linen, she asked, “Is that why you said this bomb was my fault?”