Читать книгу Wicked: - Noelle Mack - Страница 5

Light hems swirled over dancing slippers and polished boots stepped in measured time over the ballroom floor. Semyon Taruskin saw nothing else—he had to look down as he made his way through the crush to avoid the yearning gaze of a certain young lady who had pleaded with him just last night to ravish her, so in love was she.

He had refused her—gallantly, of course, telling her that she was too innocent and too sweet for him. But the truth of that statement had only aroused her more. He’d had to untwine her soft arms and unclasp the lovely hands that caressed whatever she could reach of him, before bidding her a soft adieu and beating a hasty retreat past the dozing aunt in the corner.

He straightened as he came in to the next room, a smaller chamber where male guests swilled punch from crystal cups and joshed each other in loud voices.

Semyon gave an inaudible sigh, hoping to find more interesting company.

Female, of course. Witty and pretty. There had to be one or two in attendance. Without thinking overmuch about where he was going, he went down a narrow hall, staying behind a footman in livery. The fellow walked slowly, his arms laden with winter cloaks trimmed in voluptuous folds of fur, plainer mantuas, and fine shawls woven in designs of infinite complexity. The things he held shifted with each stride, trying to escape his grip, seeming oddly alive.

But then it had not been long, perhaps only seconds, since each cloak and shawl had warmed the woman who wore it. The thought was pleasant. Semyon caught a whiff of the delicate scent of perfume and powder that the feminine garments exuded. Following idly to see where they would go, he imagined the bare, silky shoulders that had been caressed by the luxurious heap of stuff in the footman’s arms and smiled to himself.

At the end of the hall, the footman stopped outside a wall of shimmering fabric, its golden folds and swells illuminated from within and showing the silhouette of a woman.

No, it was not a wall, Semyon saw, but a double set of floor-to-ceiling curtains looped on a rod that were pinned closed by a most ingenious device—no, it was not a device but hands.

Semyon looked closer. Slender fingers with oval nails held the curtains together, fingers that undoubtedly belonged to the silhouette. When the footman announced his presence on the other side and his wish to be relieved of his burden, the hand let go of the brocade and pushed one of the curtains back.

The light from the candle sconces in the hall fell upon a woman of such surpassing beauty that Semyon almost gasped. A maidservant? Somehow that seemed unlikely. He drew back into the shadows. She did not seem to see him.

Her hair was pinned up in a delectable tangle of curls, glowing a flickery dark red in the candlelight. The shape of her body was clearly visible. With the inner light of the improvised chamber behind her, he could see her sensually small waist and the long, smoothly rounded thighs that brushed each other as she took a step forward to take the things from the footman.

Ah. He almost moaned aloud at that sight.

Were he by some fortunate trick of fate to become her lover, he would feel privileged indeed to lift her skirts and touch the inside of those fine thighs…he knew exactly how they would feel. The shoulders and bosom revealed by her diaphanous gown shone in the soft light. The lovely, immodest rest of her, no longer concealed, would be just as tempting, and the skin on the inside of her thighs like hot satin. It was far too easy to imagine his hand caressing her there.

Semyon pressed back against the wall, still watching as she exchanged a few words with the footman, who bent forward at the waist to tip the bundle of garments into her outstretched arm. One of the heavier cloaks escaped both of them in the transfer and slid to the floor, causing the footman to swear.

“Never mind, Jack. You must go back without delay. I am sure there are many more ladies waiting in the foyer.”

“Then let them wait, Angelica.”

So that was her name, Semyon thought. And how it suited her. In her plain gown of white with no adornment upon her neck or ears but the curling tendrils of her hair, she might well have passed for an angel in some low church.

Jack was about to disobey her request and pick up the cloak when a stern male voice called from the other end of the hall.

“That is Kittredge,” she said in a quiet, cultured voice, “and it sounds as if he is in a swivet. You must go, Jack.”

The footman scurried off, consigning all butlers to the flames of Gehenna under his breath. The swiftness of his departure caused all the candles but one in the hall to sputter and go out.

Excellent. He might observe her a little longer in peace, Semyon thought, without disturbing or frightening her.

Angelica left the fallen cloak upon the floor and moved back into the curtained chamber, putting each of the others in some place where it might easily be found. She chose the back of a chair for the light shawls, hanging the mantuas on a rack brought there for that purpose, and tossing the most splendid of the fur-trimmed cloaks over a dressmaker’s figure.

Then she went back for the fallen cloak, bending down to pick it up, her breasts nearly escaping the confines of her bodice. He longed to cup them. Just that would be enough, feeling the tender nipples in the very center of his palms and—

She was shaking out the cloak, sending a gust of air his way. It smelled sweetly of her or perhaps of the things she’d handled. He didn’t know, but he didn’t stop breathing it in avidly.

Her every motion made her soft flesh quiver slightly and Semyon felt his groin tighten. Absently, she brushed a few bits of lint from the cloak with her slender fingers and flicked them away. He grew impossibly stiff—ah, to be stroked there so softly and then flicked a bit by such feminine nails. He gritted his teeth.

She held up the cloak with both hands for a final inspection and turned to go back in to the curtained room.

He could not help himself. Semyon stepped forward, slipping his coat off and holding it in his arms and giving a discreet cough to warn her of his presence.

“Back so soon, Jack?” she murmured, putting the cloak she’d picked up over the one already on the dressmaker’s figure.

“No,” said Semyon.

She gave a start at the sound of his unfamiliar voice and regarded him with wide, wary eyes that he thought were green.

“Where did you come from?”

He nodded in the direction of the ballroom, nonplussed by the directness of her question. “I was dancing—it is quite warm—”

She seemed uninterested in his stammered explanation. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Not very long. I am sorry if I startled you, Miss—?” he paused, hoping she would tell him her last name. Her face seemed faintly familiar, but then he had been staring at her hungrily from the first second she’d opened the curtain.

“Miss Harrow.” She seemed to take his respectful address for granted at first, then gave her head an infinitesimal shake as if she’d had second thoughts about that. It occurred to him that even if she was now a servant, she had not been born into that class. “Or if you like, just Angelica. That will do,” she said in a composed voice.

“As you wish.” Knowing her first name, another man might have attempted further liberties with her, but Semyon remained respectful—and suddenly very curious. Only a well-trusted maidservant would be given the task of seeing to expensive cloaks and furs at a grand ball, but there was nothing servile about her.

Her pride and breeding showed in the way she held herself. Not haughty but confident. And so beautiful that she would outshine all other women present tonight. She belonged on the dance floor in the arms of one adoring partner after another, not behind a curtain at the end of a hall. Semyon wondered how on earth he might speak to her where there was no chance of interruption by a returning footman or anyone else.

Not now, evidently…she was looking at him in a way that did not invite him to talk to her. He felt unnerved by the steadiness of her regard.

“Ah yes—my coat. Here you are.” He held out his coat. “As I said, it is rather warm in the ballroom.”

She came closer and inclined her head in a gracious nod that effectively dismissed him as she took it from his hands, quite careful that there was no inadvertent contact. No doubt she was accustomed to wandering men propositioning her at parties just like this one or angling to touch her in some way and she probably hated it. He glanced in to the room as she went back in, noticing with chagrin that there were no other men’s garments in sober black to be seen.

Everything else was embroidered, sequinned, furred, and patterned—all women’s things. She must think him a fool for having come here at all.

He managed a smile and made the briefest of bows, turning around to go back until he heard her soft voice.

“Sir—”

“Yes?”

“I do not know your name.” Her lips pressed tightly together as if she was trying not to laugh. “And if other men take it into their heads to do what you have done, then I might mix up your coat with someone else’s.” She reached for a small pencil and a piece of paper, placing it on a book for a hard surface to write upon and looking at him expectantly.

Semyon nodded, as if the matter was of grave importance. “I understand. If you like, I’ll take it to wherever it is supposed to be—”

She shook her head and gave him a small smile. “No, that is not necessary. But I would like to know your name.”

“Semyon Taruskin,” he said. “At your service.”

She wrote it down as if she knew how to spell it—or, indeed, knew him. Again that faint feeling of familiarity nagged at him, but he just could not place her.

With a swift gesture, she tucked the piece of paper in the pocket of his coat. “Enjoy the ball, sir,” she said matter-of-factly, essentially dismissing him.

“I shall. And I expect my coat will not mind keeping company with so much feminine frippery.”

She nodded, acknowledging his jest with only a nod.

He found himself envying the damned coat for the way she was holding it. Not too tightly. Absently stroking it with just a fingertip while she looked steadily into his face.

Her eyes were green, a springtime shade, but they held shadows. Of fear? Sadness? He could not begin to tell. A feeling of unreality stole over him, as if he had been spirited into this out-of-the-way chamber and not walked there on his own two feet, simply because he was following a footman going about an ordinary duty.

Of course, it was not by his own will that he had come here tonight at all, but his older brother Marko had dropped too many hints to ignore. Kyril, the oldest of the three Taruskins, would have insisted: the wolf-blooded Pack of St. James had to keep up public appearances while they handled other, private matters for the king—matters that required an equal measure of discretion and viciousness.

Semyon, the not very dutiful youngest of the three Taruskins, had given in, not knowing he would have to dodge the unwanted attentions of a romantic girl, or that his effort to do so would cause him to wander down a hall at random and find a veritable goddess behind a golden curtain.

A goddess who seemed to be losing patience with him at the moment.

“Thank you, Miss Harrow.”

She lifted a very elegantly arched brow.

“Angelica, I mean.” He turned away from her with an effort and strode back through the hallway, toward the distant music of a quadrille.

It was an hour later when he returned, as soon as he thought it was not too obvious an attempt to talk to her again.

He had glanced about for Jack, hoping the footman would not interrupt him with Angelica, and spotted him under the stairs, sipping from a flat brown bottle with Kittredge. No doubt it was or had been filled with whiskey. They were red in the face and laughing together.

The ball was in full swing, nearly a riot by any estimation. Puffed-up bucks were down to their waistcoats and shirts, essaying leaps and other embarrassing steps to ever-louder music, while the women looked on from behind fluttering fans. The crush of guests on the side was close to unbearable and the stench of too many people in too small a place revolted him.

No one would notice his departure and he wasn’t leaving, really. If anyone saw him leave the floor where he’d taken an obligatory turn or two with the better dancers, they would assume he was swilling punch somewhere or vomiting off a convenient balcony.

The one person in attendance who’d looked much at him, meaning the amorous young lady with the longing gaze, had disappeared, along with her mama. As to what the girl saw in him, Semyon could guess. It was not thoughts of marriage that addled her brain, but rather his reputation as a lover. He could hardly be considered all that eligible, not with his Russian name and the mystery surrounding his clan, ensconced though they were in a house so near to St. James’s Square.

Their mysterious comings and goings caused no end of whispers. As for the murders that Marko had solved a year ago—it had not helped that one of their number was among the guilty. And the bizarre affair of the tsar’s missing objet d’art, the Serpent’s Egg, had Kyril departing for the far north of Russia—well, even without those two things it was hard enough for a wolfman to hold his head up in London, let alone howl.

No, Semyon, the most English in manner of the three, had much preferred to blend in. Let sleeping wolves lie. No one had come around the Pack looking for trouble in some time and they liked it that way.

He headed down the hall again, where the sole candle was down to a nub in the sconce, flickering as if a wind were blowing through. Yet the air was more still than before. The fragrance of woman was stronger too, assaulting his sensitive nose and making him think of Angelica.

The gold curtain up ahead was still illuminated by the lantern within the space, glowing, drawing him near. There was no silhouette against it now—perhaps she was sitting down. Or perhaps she had left.

He walked the remaining distance to it, letting his boot heels strike firmly on the bare wood floor so that she would hear him coming. No one inside the curtain rose; no one spoke.

Semyon slid a hand between the panels and looked in. Angelica was there.

She was asleep on a pile of coats. There had been too many in the end, he supposed, as more and more guests arrived, and there was no place to put them all.

In her hand was a red rose and she clutched the stem, her fingers moving nervously. It was newly budded, tight and fresh, still with just a trace of sparkling dew on its furled petals.

It seemed to him that she held it to her lips. As if a lover had given it to her.

He felt a furious jealousy that surprised him, and then disgust. Had she let herself be taken against the wall by some man, standing up like a common strumpet, and then collapsed in sleepy lust? There was no divan or chaise in the chamber, let alone a bed. What maidservant would risk being sacked by lying with a man upon the clothes of her betters?

He reminded himself that she was most likely not a servant. Semyon studied her in silence for several moments, sniffing the air and thinking. He caught no smell of sexual congress, he could be sure of that much, but nothing else. Perhaps the rose had been given to her by a male guest as a gallant gesture and nothing more.

Gradually, as his jealousy eased, something else took its place.

Arousal.

Her pose reminded him of the paintings some gentlemen hung in their private rooms. The sort that usually featured a beautiful woman, perhaps a shepherdess with skin like porcelain, her glorious hair a-tumble and her gown half falling off, barefoot, asleep in the hay as a sturdy farm lad happened upon her, agog with surprised desire.

The sort of painting that a new wife consigned to a distant room or sent off to be sold in a London bric-a-brac shop. In the flesh, living and breathing, Angelica was in every particular the sort of woman that would worry an inexperienced young wife. An older one might be grateful in her way for the sort of respite she could provide.

Perhaps she had been a lady’s maid, hired for her good breeding and taste, until some unfortunate event had consigned her to the lower depths of this household.

She had seemed too intelligent to have fallen for the wiles of a master bent on seduction. Certainly the owner of this grand pile of stone in Mayfair, who had danced with someone else’s wife all evening, had a reputation for chasing his female servants, but what of it? So many gentlemen in London did. Had she been forced, then, by a thoughtless and selfish master, and demoted in rank by her long-suffering mistress?

Angelica gave an almost inaudible moan through her parted lips. On the lower one he saw—or thought he saw—a faint trace of the dew upon the rose.

He kneeled beside her. His hand hovered over the sweet curve of one thigh, longing to stroke it, but he drew it back.

Her breaths made her bosom rise and fall in her uneasy slumber and he could not help but look. Such tender flesh. The idea that she had ever been manhandled made him angry.

Invited to touch her in an instant fantasy, Semyon imagined her arching drowsily with pleasure as he caressed both breasts, releasing them from her bodice, then mounding and squeezing the malleable flesh to erotic heights so that the nipples—pink, erect nipples—jutted out.

He would feast upon them, suckling avidly, one hand caressing the low curve of her belly until he felt the tremors of deep feminine arousal begin.

And then—ah, my sleeping angel, he thought fondly, you have no idea what I am thinking or that I watch you. Dream, dream as you lie there on all that fur and finery and I will put it in your mind too.

He would take her hands and place them upon her bared breasts, telling her to continue his caresses while he watched and undid his breeches. Were she wanton enough, and he suspected she would be, her slender fingers would clasp her nipples and tug, then move to cup her breasts and squeeze them in a rhythm that both satisfied her and made her want more.

The thought made his cock spring powerfully upward, constrained by the soft, thin leather of his breeches, which remained buttoned. He did not dare touch the manifestation of his manhood or her, but let his fantasy take over until the sleeping woman before him shimmered in his mind, awakened and wanting him.

He would tell her to lift her skirts, slowly. As the white material was drawn up, and she showed her legs and her thighs, a dainty triangle of curls and a flash of her most intimate, succulent flesh.

He would waste no time in assisting her to fully spread her thighs and reveal the nether lips, neat and plump, to his hot gaze. She, of course, could not see herself in that way, but that did not matter. She would sigh with pleasure when his probing finger slid into her and lift her hips instinctively.

He would bring her a taste of herself, touching his slick finger to her mouth and asking that she lick it.

Then—he leaned upon one hand, looking ardently at the vision of unviolated beauty sleeping before him—his tongue would go where his finger had been. Lapping with just the tip, then thrusting as deeply as she would let him. Teasing the tiny bud that held the most intense pleasure for a lady. Overwhelmed by the sensation, craving more, she would bend her spread legs and clasp them behind the knees to give herself more freely.

An excellent reason for him to raise his head, then, and push her clasped legs gently back against her shoulders, telling her to hold them so that her bottom was lifted off the bed.

Then he would see all, from glistening curls to swollen bud to the flushed lips of her sex, and finally to the tiny puckered hole where a fingertip might stray and stimulate, if she wanted that. Her wanton display would call for further delights. Her plump buttocks he would fondle, perhaps a little roughly, as his tongue lavished her snug cunny with silky-wet strokes and soft penetration.

Completely his at that moment, her body lifted and held in his hands, her first orgasm for him would be an intense one, an experience to savor while he controlled his own bursting desire.

Ahhh. He bent his head and closed his eyes, still not actually touching her, wondering if the sleeping, fully clothed woman before him had experienced the compelling fantasy in slumber as he’d hoped. He let his lust ebb away.

Semyon could not bear to wake her. If he was caught with her, the gossip would be all over London in an instant. If she had come down in the world and he suspected as much, she might fall still lower, though he had done nothing but look at her.

His sensual reverie had taken no more than a few moments, but he was stiff all over as he got to his feet.

Angelica slept on.

His coat—where was it? He hoped she was not lying on it, but then he spotted it easily enough. It was still the only masculine article of clothing in the room and had been hung up with care by itself. He shrugged into it, thrusting his arms through the sleeves, glancing into the mirror to adjust the lapels and make sure his erection had gone down. Given the size of his member, something still showed, but that was de rigueur at a ball that went on into the wee hours. He had no doubt that the buttoned-back bulge in the front of his breeches would be grabbed at by more than one tipsy female as he left.

Angelica’s warm breath had made the rose unfurl its petals somewhat and he could see its innermost center, drenched with the same dew that had moistened her lip. Semyon smiled sadly. He hated to leave her. But if fatigue and the tedium of seeing to the needs of so many others had claimed her so utterly, he had no right to wake her.

There was always tomorrow.

He would make inquiries and find out more about her—and her master and mistress and well. How she had come to this house, whether she had ever been “upon the town,” in the polite phrase, ever married, been widowed, run off with a soldier—in short, everything.

From down the hall he heard the coarse but not unfriendly voice of Jack. The footman was alternately singing in snatches and muttering to himself.

Semyon stepped outside of the curtain. “Miss Harrow has fallen asleep,” he said to Jack.

“Miss Harrow? Do you call her that? Very kind you are, to treat her so respectful, when she is no more than an upstairs maid.” The footman peered at him “Downstairs, now, of course.” Then he looked at Angelica. “Now that will never do,” he said, remembering who he was and where he was. “But the ladies as what wants their things might like them warmed, though.” He winked at Semyon.

“I could not bring myself to wake her,” Semyon said softly.

“Then I must.” Jack tottered into the room and leaned over the sleeping woman, speaking to her in a loud whisper. “Cor—Angelica, wake up. What if the mistress sees you sprawled like this, hey? Wake up.”

She stirred and pushed the footman away almost violently.

“Will she be all right?” Semyon asked.

“I am sure she will, sir,” Jack said, returning his attention to the chore, though Semyon would not call it that, of awakening the slumbering beauty on the heap of cloaks. The footman looked up when he heard the clink of a masculine fingernail on a heavy coin, just in time to catch the guinea that Semyon tossed to him.

“Take good care of her,” was all he said.

“That I will do. Good night, sir. And thankee.” The footman looked down at Angelica like a fond but somewhat exasperated brother, and leaned over her again, shaking her by the shoulder. “Now do as I say, and wake up!”

Semyon left the way he had come, instinctively sure that Angelica was safe with Jack.

Not too long after that, he had reached the Pack’s lair in St. James by a circuitous route that involved a stop at his club, where he was plied with strong spirits. He was feeling rather the worse for his indulgence and headed straight for the massive staircase leading up from the door, wanting nothing but the security and peace of his own chambers to sleep it off.

A soft hand on his arm forestalled him, and a gentle voice murmured an inquiry in Russian.

“Natalya,” he sighed. “I am going to bed.”

The young wife of their housemaster spoke in English, since he had. “I wanted only to give you a message, Semyon.”

He looked down at the shining crown of braids interlaced with ribbons upon her head—inside this house, Natalya favored traditional Russian dress in all its colorful glory. Outside of it, her braids and bright embroidered tunics were hidden under hats and coachman’s coats in winter.

“Yes?”

“A man came to the door inquiring after you in the middle of the evening. You were at the Congreves’ ball—”

“You did not tell anyone where I had gone, I hope,” he said severely. The Pack lived under rules of strict secrecy as to their whereabouts.

“Of course not, Semyon,” she said with some heat. “Do you take me for stupid?”

Semyon shook his head, reminding himself of her rare courage and cleverness in defending the Pack. “No. Forgive me, Natalya. I am tired and have had too much to drink—” He broke off, realizing he had given her a reason to brew her bitter-tasting herbal remedy for such self-induced ailments.

He hated the stuff, and usually spat it out when she wasn’t looking. Tonight, though, it seemed to him that she was done with her household tasks and perhaps eager to talk to someone. That he would do but he did hate being cosseted.

“Very well, Natalya,” he said, not wanting to be rude to her. Her face broke into a wide, glowing smile and she dashed in to the kitchen to put the kettle on the hob.

He followed into her realm. The room was a mix of Russian coziness—it boasted an enormous tile stove upon the top of which a boy slept at night, though he was not there now—and up-to-date English conveniences, marvels of kitchen engineering. The hearth was carefully banked with ashes, but she stirred up the high pile of embers and tossed a few pieces of cut wood upon them. Flames blazed up quickly under the kettle’s dented bottom.

She had just finished baking, evidently, and several dark loaves were cooling on a rack. Natalya peered in to the kettle, added a little more water to it, and took pinches of dried herbs from jars in a rack and put them in a teapot. She ground peppercorns in a little mill into its open top and last of all added little twisty dried things from an earthenware jug stoppered with a cork.

Semyon had no idea what the dried things were. Natalya’s potions were best drunk with eyes closed and nose held. But they did work.

When the kettle sang, she poured the boiling water into the teapot and sniffed appreciatively. Semyon hid a grimace. “Let that steep,” she said.

They chatted agreeably enough about who had been at the ball, finally coming around again to the forgotten subject of the man who had called when he was out.

“Did he leave a card, Natalya?” Semyon asked.

She shook her head, preoccupied with pouring out the medicinal brew into a large mug.

“Then what did he say?”

“Not much. Only that he hoped you would be in tomorrow. So that was the message.”

“Nothing in writing, eh?”

“No. I gathered that he wanted to talk to you privately.”

Semyon shrugged, unconcerned. “If he comes back, then I will, I suppose. I hope he is harmless.” He yawned hugely, suddenly revealing the hidden fangs that were the mark of the Pack men as his curling tongue touched the top of his mouth.

Natalya pretended to be shocked. “Don’t scare me like that, Semyon.”

He smiled lazily. The effects of the liquor were beginning to wear off. “Sorry. Your dear husband Ivan is here to protect you, is he not?”

“Ivan is sound asleep. Can you not hear him snore?” She gestured vaguely in the direction of the bedroom allocated to the housemaster and his wife.

“No, and that is a good thing.”

She laughed and pushed the disgusting-smelling mug to him. “Must I?” he groaned.

“Yes.” She put her hands on her very womanly hips and looked at him squarely. “While I watch.”

His lips quirked, thinking of how much he had enjoyed watching someone else under very different circumstances. Should he tell Natalya of the sleeping maidservant? He could embellish the story to amuse her—of course, he would leave out the salacious fantasy he’d indulged in. But he would make the most of his impression that Angelica Harrow was too well bred to be a housemaid and also that her eyes held a hidden sadness. A beautiful heroine with both those qualities sounded like the beginning of a fairy tale, and his recounting of their brief meeting would appeal to Natalya, who was sentimental when she was not fierce.

He began the story of Angelica, hoping to distract her, then took a sip, scowling. He wanted to gag. Miraculously, the brew stayed down.

“All of it,” Natalya said.

“The potion or the story?”

“First drink that,” she scolded him.

Semyon sighed and lifted the mug, holding his nose as he tossed the steaming contents into his mouth, swallowing it all in one go like a trencherman at an inn. He gasped when he set the mug on the table, wiping away the tears streaming from his eyes.

“Very good,” she said, evidently pleased with him. “That’s over with.”

“I think you have poisoned me,” he said weakly. “Send roses to my funeral, if you please.”

“What color would you like?”

“Ah—red.”

“Indeed not. Red roses are for lovers. No, a ghostly white spray of lilies would do for you, I should think.”

“It is the middle of winter.” He coughed against the sour tide rising in his throat. “Hothouse blooms are too costly. No, bury me plain, if you please.” His idle jests did not quite take his mind off the red rose Angelica had been holding in her sleep. Natalya’s innocent remark made him wonder again who had given it to her and why.

Natalya went to the loaves she’d baked and tore off a chunk. “Eat this,” she said. “It will take the bad taste away.”

He sank his teeth into it, relishing its warmth and dark, earthy flavor, an echo of the faraway homeland he barely knew. Ivan’s wife was truly a treasure. He dusted the few crumbs from his hands, smiling at her again.

“Now,” she said, settling herself on a stool. “You did not tell me enough about the ball.”

“It seems to me that I have run through the entire guest list and made unkind comments about nearly all of them. What else would you like to know?”

“What the women wore, from first to last.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Natalya glared at him. “The night is cold, so begin with their cloaks and furs and hats, and then go on to”—she dropped her voice to a sensual whisper—“what lay beneath.”

“Oh, I see,” he laughed. “Well, a gaggle of lady’s maids divested the female guests of everything they wore on top before they went into the ballroom, and then a footman took it all away. The gowns were certainly very pretty, although I cannot remember specific details, Natalya.”

“Then who was the prettiest woman there?” she asked eagerly. “I am sure you remember that.”

He nodded, making her wait for it. “Her name was Angelica Harrow and she was not exactly at the ball.”

“No? Then where was she?” She looked at him narrowly. “You are a master of seduction from what I know and not to be trusted.”

“The footman brought her the cloaks and wraps to put away and guard until their owners would want them again.”

“She was a maid?”

“I think she wanted to give that impression,” Semyon said carefully. “But to my ear and eye, she was not bred to the task.”

Natalya looked sad and sympathetic. “Alas. A ruined beauty, forced to slave for a pittance.”

Her melodramatic turn of phrase made him smile a little. “I have no idea.”

She tore off a chunk of bread for herself and chewed it absently. “And did you engage her in conversation?”

“I merely handed her my coat. But yes, we exchanged a few words.”

Natalya nodded, thinking it over. “I thought you seemed different somehow when you came home.”

“I was drunk.”

She waved a hand. “Not that. Something else—you seemed to be elsewhere, as if you were thinking of something or someone lovely. Not the sots at your club, certainly.”

He acknowledged her remarkable intuition with a nod. “Well done, Natalya. Angelica was on my mind from that moment on tonight. I hope to find out more about her.”

“And when you do, will you tell me everything?” she asked eagerly.

“If I think it is fit for your pretty ears, yes, most likely I will.”

“I am a married woman now,” she said indignantly. “You can tell me anything. You and I are the youngest among everyone in this gloomy house, so you must. Who else am I to talk to? Not old Levshin—his nose is always buried in his ledgers. And Antosha is forever scribbling. I believe he is writing a history of the Pack.”

“For many reasons, it will never be published,” Semyon said.

“In any case, only those two are around much, so you have to talk to me when I need to be amused.”

“I will do my best,” he laughed.

Natalya nodded, pulling off another chunk of fresh bread and adding jam to this one, as if she needed to be fortified for the next installment of gossip. “If this Angelica took your coat from you, she also gave it back,” she said slyly. “So you spoke to her twice.”

“Ah—not at our second meeting.”

“Why not?”

“She had fallen asleep on the pile of furry things. Holding a rose.”

Natalya sighed. “Poor thing. But someone admires her besides you, it seems.”

Her sly remark hit home and Semyon knew she was aware of it. “Yes, well, that is neither here nor there,” he said briskly. “I found my coat myself and left our sleeping beauty to the footman.”

“Will you see her again?” Natalya asked innocently.

Semyon wanted to make some equally sly response but found to his surprise that he did not have the heart to do so. He looked straight into Natalya’s wide questioning eyes and said only one word.

“Yes.”