Page 35 of Innocent in the Prince's Bed

It was not the sort of spontaneity he could enjoy with Lady Dove. To take her to bed would require an understanding of the matrimonial sort. He did not deal in those, but he couldn’t deny the physical pull of her. He’d been attracted to her looks since the first night in Lady Burton’s ballroom. That attraction had only deepened as their association lengthened. Last night in the garden had been proof of that. She’d been exquisite, her face tilted to the stars, her eyes the colour of moonlight, her body warm and aroused yet innocent. Just thinking of awakening that innocence, the possibility of bedding her was tempting. He realised with a rather visceral intensity that he wanted to be her first lover, the lover who showed her passion’s promise, that he could not bear the idea of someone else having that opportunity, of having her.

When they’d danced, he’d held a moonbeam. There was poetry in that image. It was laying in fragments on sheets of paper in his room. How long would his moonbeam last? Already, she understood her fate too well, as did he. Percivale and society would not let her play the moonbeam for long. Marriage to Percivale would crush her, slowly, accidentally even, over the years, wearing down her joy, her dreams, until she was a shadow of her former self, her ebullience lost. Illarion swallowed down the last of his vodka. What would it take to save her from that fate?

Around him the men started to applaud, bringing his thoughts back to the present. The vodka tasting was going well. Nikolay had his sword out, balancing a full glass on the flat of the blade while Stepan and Ruslan each held an end steady. It was an old Cossack ritual of manhood to drink a glass from a blade without spilling or cutting oneself. Nikolay was just about to drink when the door to White’s opened, a group of gentlemen entered laughing, walking sticks swinging, expressions freezing, good humour evaporating when they laid eyes on the group. Viscount Heatherly and Percivale were at the centre. ‘Well, what do we have here?’ The derision in Heatherly’s tone was thinly disguised.

‘Vodka tasting.’ Ruslan came forward with a tray of glasses, sweeping aside any acknowledgement of hostility. ‘Join us. Prince Baklanov is about to demonstrate an old Cossack tradition.’

The group ignored the offer, letting the immaculate Heatherly speak for them. ‘I understand vodka is nothing more than fermented potatoes, the food of serfs and Irishmen.’ This got a cold round of laughter from the group. Illarion’s gaze drifted over Percivale. Heatherly might be the one engaging, but Percivale made no move to intervene and put a stop to it. Perhaps Percivale had orchestrated this, put Heatherly up to it as he might have put Lady Hampton up the seating arrangement last night. That was the way of the ton—indirectness. It prevented Illarion from outright accusing Percivale of any wrongdoing.

Well, he simply wasn’t going play that game. Illarion rose and stepped towards the newcomers. This wasn’t about vodka, not really. It was about him. ‘You’re mistaken, Lord Heatherly. Vodka is the drink of all Russians.’ He held his arms out wide and proceeded to quote, ‘Prince Vladimir in the tenth century remarked, “Drinking is the joy of all Rusi. We cannot do without it.”’

‘Here, here!’ Nikolay seconded, clinking glasses with anyone near him, rousing the quieted group surrounding Stepan, many of whom were looking uneasy, perhaps reconsidering their association. ‘I dare say we’re not alone in that.’ Illarion felt Nikolay’s presence at his shoulder—Nikolay the warrior, Nikolay who would rather fight than think if given the choice. Illarion wondered where the Cossack sword had ended up. ‘Englishmen are so desperate for their brandy they’ve been known to bring it in illegally.’ Nikolay didn’t even pretend to be polite. No one was allowed to insult the motherland in his presence. Nikolay remained fiercely patriotic in spite of exile, believing fully that one could hate one’s Tsar, but not one’s country.

Something dangerous glinted in Heatherly’s eyes as they shifted to Nikolay. ‘It could be liquid ambrosia and I still wouldn’t drink it with the likes of you. I don’t drink with men who claim to be one thing, but are quite another. How interesting that Amesbury died with you and the others here in hot pursuit. Is that what passes as princely behaviour in your country? Running a duke to death?’

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