‘uncles’ deserved true love in the new lives they’d fashioned for themselves. But in all fairness, she didn’t feel that charitable towards Stepan. She’d never thought about losing him that way, that one day he’d find someone.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want Stepan to marry and have a family of his own, it was simply that she’d never thought of him doing it, of leaving her. Perhaps he already had. Who did he see in London when he wasn’t here with them? How did he spend his days? His nights? Did a pretty Englishwoman already hold his heart and his attentions? Anna wished she had not spoken those hasty words out loud on the stairs. They’d conjured up a host of new, unsettling thoughts and she couldn’t stop thinking about their implication: one day Stepan would leave her.
He should leave. It was the one thought Stepan returned to time and again over the excellent roast beef supper that night. He could rent a house of his own—perhaps he could even contact Preston Worth about renting his house with the caves beneath it in Shoreham. Wouldn’t that be convenient, to smuggle vodka from a prevention officer’s own home? The risk-taker in him rather liked the idea. But then, he’d be dining alone and these suppers at Dimitri’s would disappear.
Stepan took another swallow of the wine, an exquisite, full-bodied burgundy, and surveyed the table. These were occasions he loved to hate or was it hated to love? Each night Dimitri and his wife, Evie, served a piece of paradise; warmth and security presented in a delicious, hot meal and comfortable conversation with local guests. Every aspect of the meal was a reminder of what his life would lack without Dimitri. This was not a scene he could replicate on his own. He had no family other than the one Dimitri had adopted him into two decades and one year ago. Ever since he was ten, he’d basked in the borrowed light of Dimitri’s familial glow. To walk away from that was no small thing, but neither was his sanity.
Tonight, dining with the Squire’s family was no exception. Perhaps he even felt that glow more keenly given the direction of his thoughts. While there was a price for leaving, there was also a price for staying: watching Anna-Maria dazzle the table every night, constantly bracing himself for her sudden appearances like the one in the entrance hall today, a feminine ambush of smiles and silk coming down the stairs or popping into a room at any time, conjuring up reasons to spend hours a day away from the house, knowing that Anna-Maria was oblivious to all of it.
Stepan filled his glass again. Why shouldn’t she be oblivious? He was twelve years her senior. He’d known her since she was born. He’d seen her skin her knees. He’d seen her cry when her ‘pet’ frog of one day escaped from his jar. He’d even seen her as a stubborn six-year-old stamp her foot in a temper when Dimitri had refused to spoil her with a porcelain doll. He was privy to the best and the worst of her. He was like a brother to her, or perhaps an uncle just as Nikolay and the others were. Why should she even be aware of how he looked at her now?
Across the table, Anna-Maria was teasing the Squire’s son. Tonight, she shone in a gown of cerulean blue, a simple crystal heart about her neck and her dark hair piled up high—something Evie was letting her practise this winter before going to London. The poor boy smiled and blushed, unable to take his eyes from the radiant creature talking to him and yet not knowing what to do with her.
Oh, mal’chik, Stepan thought, you are in over your head. I have been with the most sophisticated women of the Kubanian court and I am barely afloat. She is captivating, vivacious, passionate in her tempers... She is dangerous and she doesn’t even know it.
As she had been today on the steps, her hands twisted into the lapels of his jacket, her body so close to his that he could feel the heat of her, the light brush of her breasts against him.
Anna-Maria might look upon him as an uncle or brother, but no uncle or brother would ever entertain such thoughts. Stepan took a long swallow of wine, which was getting better with each glass. His awareness of her shamed him. It made a hypocrite of him. He’d always thought of himself as forward-thinking. He’d been one of the first to protest the repressive and archaic laws in Kuban that compelled girls into arranged marriages at young ages without providing them a voice or a choice in the matter. He’d seen girls as young as fifteen wed to men in their fifties. He did reason with himself that this was hardly the same. At thirty-one, he was in his prime like many well-born Englishmen who waited until their thirties to marry and took brides ten to twelve years their junior. But that didn’t make the situation more palatable to Stepan. He knew the general reasoning behind it: the younger the better when it came to producing the next heir and moulding an unformed mind. He refused to assess a woman’s value in the same way he would a brood mare.
Even with these arguments, he hated himself for the attraction. He could not say when his feelings had changed, when he’d become aware of her in the way a man is aware of a woman he desires. He was doubly careful with her now, with Evie and Dimitri, too. What would they think if they knew? Dimitri wanted more for Anna-Maria than an exiled prince.
The Squire reached for the carafe at Dimitri’s informal table—no hovering footmen here. Everyone served themselves. ‘The wine is excellent, Petrovich. Wherever do you get it?’
Dimitri smiled and nodded towards Stepan. ‘Stepan has a connection, a French vintner by the name of Archambeault who ships to him.’
Monsieur Archambeault was otherwise known as Ruslan Pisarev, former Kubanian revolutionary, now a happily married, soon-to-be owner of a small but profitable winery in Burgundy. Dimitri’s eyes met his at the mention of their friend. Ruslan did not want to be found by the world, at least not by his real name. It was one of their secrets, one of the many things that had bound them together over the years. Stepan loved Dimitri as a brother. Dimitri had given him a family when he’d had none, sharing his own father with him, and hope when he’d had even less. Dimitri had given him a reason to seek out the freedom he claimed to want. Without Dimitri, all those things might have remained dreams only.
In return, he’d given Dimitri unquestioning loyalty, ushering the Petrovich family to safety in England and leaving behind the only life he knew—a life full of privilege but lacking in affection. Dimitri had given him so much. He could not repay his friend by coveting his sister, especially when he knew how much Dimitri had given up in the raising of her.
In theory, Stepan wanted all the best for her, too. At a distance, he could embrace the knowledge she was in London having a Season without having to experience it in person. He wouldn’t have to witness her flirting with London’s young beaux the way he had to watch her charm the Squire’s son tonight. He wouldn’t have to watch her dance in the arms of gentlemen with titles more legitimate than the honorific he bore. Yes, it would be best to leave. He wondered if he’d find the discipline to do it. After all, he’d simply be exchanging one type of hell for another, the only difference being that one hell held Anna-Maria in it and the other did not. It was hard to say which one was worse. Perhaps hell didn’t have varying degrees, only varying interpretations.
* * *
There was brandy after the meal and the requisite half hour of polite conversation with the ladies after that while Anna-Maria played the pianoforte. All in all, it was a very satisfactory country evening, the sort that usually filled him with a soft contentment, a domestic denouement of sorts to the adventure of his days. But tonight, Stepan had little to contribute and he was glad to see the Squire’s family go. Anna-Maria shut the door behind them shortly after ten, with a laughing farewell to the Squire’s son and a promise to go riding as soon as the mud cleared. She turned, a beaming smile on her face, her dark eyes dancing with mirth.
‘Be careful with him,’ Stepan said sternly, too sternly. Part of him, the jealous part, wanted
