Stefan was briefly at a loss since conversations about his collection of erotica were not usual in mixed company at tea.

He frowned at his aunt over his fiancée's blond head. Nadejda, momentarily distracted by the recalled beauty of her verse, was inwardly focused, her eyes half-closed in contemplation.

Stefan's aunt only smiled at him warmly as though she were beyond reproach.

"Darling," Nadejda said, her resentment forgotten with the memory of her cleverness in poetry, "would you like to hear my prize-winning poem?"

There was only one suitable answer, he knew, and he gave it.

They were instantly regaled with breathy drama and coy smiles to a rhyming description of a lake at sunset. Nadejda's metaphors were sugary, her similes strangely food focused. Long moments of heavy-handed rhyme later, Stefan worried he'd ever be able to enjoy a sunset again without visualizing caramel syrup dripping over the horizon.

Polite applause followed the poem's conclusion, however, a pleased preening smile graced Nadejda's flawless face, and an insidious sinking feeling settled in Stefan's stomach. He'd only squired his fiancée to receptions and balls the week he was on leave in Saint Petersburg, and their conversations had been interrupted and minimal in such circumstances. Was she truly so vacuous?

"Thank you, Nadejda," Militza said dismissively, although her tone was scrupulously cordial. "Stefan, why don't you take Nadejda for a stroll so that Lisaveta and I won't bother you with our discussion of Ovid."

Militza's suggestions were always delivered as well-mannered commands, but Stefan balked this time, his temper and patience on edge in his unaccustomed role of chivalrous fiancé to a woman who wrote such dreadful pedestrian poetry. "The Countess Lazaroff and I have some business to discuss, I'm afraid," he said. "She requires some bank drafts for her journey home. If you'll excuse us until dinner." He rose abruptly in no frame of mind to be further thwarted by his aunt or any female.

He needn't have concerned himself with his aunt's response. She was delighted to let her nephew go off with his new lover on whatever flimsy pretext he chose, and her smile was beatific when she gazed up at him towering above her. "By all means, Stefan, the Countess must be assured of her financial resources after having been left destitute on the steppes. Should we put dinner off until ten?"

Stefan's emphatic "Yes" and Lisaveta's "No" clashed starkly.

"My financial affairs won't be difficult to arrange," Lisaveta explained with a calm she was far from feeling. "I'm sure a banker in Tiflis will accommodate my needs. And if my name isn't recognized, either Papa's or cousin Nikki's will be sufficient." Lisaveta refused to fall into any of Stefan's plans. If he couldn't abide his fiancée's company, she wasn't going to be a convenient alternative, and if he thought he could snap his fingers and have her follow him, he had a lesson to learn. "Thank you, Stefan," she said with serene sweetness, "but your concern is unnecessary," and she reached for her teacup.

His arm shot out across his aunt's chair, his fingers closing around Lisaveta's wrist with her fingers just short of her teacup. "No reason, mademoiselle, to involve Nikki when my banker is amenable. And you forget," he said, his voice softly emphatic as he pulled her to her feet, took the lace napkin from her hand and placed it on the table, "your father's papers, which Haci saved from the Bazhis, need your attention."

She imagined he would prefer not involving Nikki, and as far as papers… He was thoroughly without scruple. There were no papers. For a moment Lisaveta considered exposing him before his rancorous fiancée. It would serve him right. She would simply deny the fictitious papers in embarrassing detail, but on second thought, he was offering her escape along with his own, and it didn't make much sense to suffer here over tea when freedom beckoned.

"I'm sure it won't take more than a few hours to sort them all and make certain nothing important is missing," he said, smiling, conscious she was acquiescing. "Should we say dinner at ten?" He waited, confident and assured, his intense dark eyes offering her… pleasure.

She waited perhaps five seconds before replying, because his assurance annoyed her. "Thank you," she finally said. "I'd like to see Papa's reports, but we needn't put off dinner." She turned to Aunt Militza. "Eight will be fine."

Aunt Militza conceded equal points to the two protagonists. How interesting the Countess would be for Stefan. He was familiar only with acquiescence and command. Countess Lazaroff apparently was, as well. "Eight it is," she said. "Now run along. I'm sure Nadejda and I would be bored to tears with reports."

As Stefan and Lisaveta left the terrace Nadejda was saying, "Stefan must show me his collection for it will be mine, too, very soon, and poetry is such a love."

"You are completely unscrupulous," Lisaveta said irritably, trying to shake his hand from her wrist. Stefan had guided her across the terrace and through the glass doors into the palace with what appeared a polite courtesy, but his grip was steel hard and he wouldn't be dislodged. "Let go of me!" Lisaveta snapped, struggling to wrench free. "You're unprincipled… selfish… you're-"

"-attracted as hell to you," he finished with that smile of his that she'd learned in the past week was capable of melting the polar ice cap. His fingers still firmly circled her wrist as his long stride took them rapidly through the drawing room adjoining the terrace.

"Don't try and dazzle me with that damn smile," she pettishly rebuffed, already feeling an answering heat through her senses.

"Temper, darling, the servants are watching." His smile was benign.

"I'm not your darling," she repudiated, "and knowing you, I'm sure the servants have seen considerably more than a woman arguing with you." Bristling with outrage at her body's eager, complacent response, vexed at his complacent response to a fiancée in the house, indignant he could so cavalierly ignore all but his own selfish interests, she continued huffily, "Knowing you, they could probably write their own manual on amorous technique simply from walking in on you, since you have no sense of propriety-Stefan, where are you taking me, tell me this second or I'll cause a scene, I swear, better yet, let me go and I'll forget any of this happened, I'll see you at dinner. Why don't you," she breathlessly went on as she was pulled down the hallway at a pace she had to run to accommodate, "spend the remainder of the afternoon showing Nadejda your Hafiz collection."

He laughed then. He didn't slow his progress, but clearly he was amused. "Do you think she'd like it?" His grin was wicked.

"I think you might have trouble getting her to the altar if you did."

"It's a thought," he softly said.

"You don't know her, do you?"

He was opening the door to his study, his favorite haven in his two-hundred-and-eighteen-room palace, a comfortable room filled with mementos precious to him. "I only saw her for a week, six months ago. She writes, and I answer occasionally."

Lisaveta wasn't a complete recluse from the aristocratic world she'd been born into. She understood most marriages were arranged for a variety of reasons having nothing to do with love, but Stefan had so much to offer a woman it seemed a shame he'd chosen such a bride. Even the manner of his choosing had been unusually prosaic. "When will you be married?"

"Sometime next year, I suppose." He could have been telling his valet which boots he preferred for all the feeling in his voice. "It's not a first priority, believe me. I may be dead by then if the Turks break through at Kars. Come sit down and talk to me," he said in a different tone, a quiet reflective nuance underlying his calm directive.

"I don't want to." She stood straight and tall, free now from his grasp.

He hesitated a moment before dropping into a down-cushioned chair upholstered in a tapestry incorporating his princely arms. Looking up at her he said very softly, "I wish you would."

Lisaveta sighed. His harsh features were tranquil, his powerful body relaxed against the burgundy silk, his dark eyes intent on her. Alone in his inner sanctum, surrounded by his personal mementos-photos of the Tsar; framed portraits of his parents, himself; precious jeweled icons and cabinets of medals; dress swords and weaponry-he was charismatic, the warrior in repose, the savior of Russia in private, the most sought-after man in Europe, and he was asking her to sit and talk.

Perhaps she had too many principles when he had none, perhaps she would later rue her choices, perhaps she should simply say yes to his invitation-and perhaps if his fiancée were not down the hall she might. But Lisaveta resisted being classed with all the other women to whom he'd extended similar casual invitations. She would make her own choices. Not he.

"I can never thank you enough for saving my life," she said, beginning to pace slowly before him as though her movement added authority to her resistance.

A promising start, he thought, and relaxed further.

"And certainly I'll remember forever the pleasure of the past week."

The feeling was mutual, he reflected. The days with Lisaveta had been not only passionate beyond his usual lust but different in character because they spoke to each other, their conversation an easy exchange of ideas and feelings. He'd never talked with a woman like the Countess Lazaroff. She seemed very like a friend, but much better, he decided a moment later, because she was a lush and sensual woman, as well.

"You are quite frankly-" Lisaveta stopped and gazed at Stefan levelly "-much better than any erotic fantasy I could have imagined." She was beautifully straightforward, and more than her compliment he admired her candor. "However-" and she began pacing again "-I'm not inclined to continue our pleasant relationship under your fiancée's nose. I know this isn't a concern for you but it is for me. Let's just say-it was nice." She stopped before him again. "But let's be sensible."