Chapter Twelve
It was still very early. The sky was overcast, a lowering grey that promised that particularly unpleasant drizzly soft rain that wasn’t quite rain, but soaked you anyway. Allison, having spent a torrid night tossing and turning, made her way quickly out to the fernery, her favourite of the succession houses, in search of solitude before resuming her governess duties.
Sitting down under the now familiar statue of Aphrodite, she unbuttoned her cloak and massaged her throbbing temples. To call yesterday a bit of a day, as Seanmhair would have, was a serious understatement. The first revelation had been born of the indignity of her being slapped down at the children’s ball. From the pain of her confession to Aleksei, had come catharsis and then a liberating hope, a bright new vision for her future that the herbalist in her couldn’t wait to embrace. It was as if all her life she had been preparing for this, lending meaning even to the role she had played in her own downfall, and the scandal she’d had to weather as a result.
So many ideas, so many plans would be fighting for room in her head, were it not for the second, even more momentous revelation emerging from yesterday. She was in love with Aleksei.
Not so much a revelation really, more like a secret that had been suppressed. Of course she was in love with him. Now she’d admitted it, it was impossible to imagine she could ever have been anything else. The attraction had been irresistible from the start. She’d never felt so drawn to a man, never desired any man the way she wanted him. But it wasn’t only that. He understood her. He knew what mattered to her and what didn’t, because he understood in a way she’d thought no man ever could, how much a part of her were her skills. Her need to heal. Her need to try to ease any sort of pain or suffering, whether it was the minor ailments of the Derevenko servants, or the heartache of his wards. He encouraged her. Even more importantly, she was certain he would never try to change her, never expect her to sacrifice her life for his. She’d always thought that there could be no room in her heart or her life for anything other than her vocation, but how wrong she had been. For the right man, for this man, there was a veritable palace in her heart.
The right man, but Aleksei was wrong in every other respect. If circumstances had been different—oh, so very different—then how blissfully happy they could be. He’d admitted he cared, last night, and that had been the most difficult thing for her to deal with. Her poor aching heart longed to declare itself, but she would not cause him the pain of having to reject her, as he must.
Think of it! She forced herself to do so, yet again, in the hope of extinguishing hope completely. She was as low-born as it was possible to be, with no idea who her father was, only the one certainty, that he had never been married to her mother. Aleksei was as high-born as it was possible to be, second in line to the most powerful and wealthiest dukedom in Russia. Even promiscuous St Petersburg society, which accepted without a blink of an eye, Count Derevenko taking a nonentity of a governess as his mistress, would not tolerate him taking her as his wife. She would be shunned, which she cared not for, save that it would hurt Aleksei, though not as much as the pain she would bear when society ostracised the pair of them. No, she was born on the wrong side of the blanket, and she would be on the wrong side of the fence for Aleksei for ever.
So it was just as well, really, that she had no inclination to switch sides. Just as well that her calling would keep her on the side of the poor and the needy. Just as well she would soon have the means to bring her precious, newborn plans to fruition. It would be a soothing balm as she tried very hard to forget all about her precious, newborn love.
With this melancholy thought she roused herself. What she must not do was permit Aleksei to guess the depth of her feelings for him. She was not gone from St Petersburg yet. There were still days and nights, like last night, to savour. Memories to squirrel away to sustain her in the solitary future which was her destiny. Fastening her cloak against the rain which was now battering hard against the glass of the succession house, she hurried along the soaking paths to the garden room.
‘Miss Galbraith! At last. Where have you been?’ Catiche’s face was tear-streaked. ‘We’ve been looking for you everywhere. Please hurry. It is Ortipo.’
* * *
The silly creature had eaten some poisoned bait put down by the gamekeeper to control vermin. Allison had managed to force him to take a small dose of ipecacuanha, dried golden root from her herb chest, with revoltingly spectacular though very effective results. The children’s much-loved pet lay snoring loudly in his fur-lined basket now, with Elena, Nikki and Catiche hovering over him, leaving Allison to seek out Aleksei in his study, clutching the present a grateful Catiche had presented her with.
‘Allison. You look very serious.’
He was in his shirt sleeves, his black coat draped over the chair behind the desk where he had been sitting, neat stacks of papers, letters and journals spread before him. He looked tired, the grooves around his mouth, the fan of lines at the corner of his eyes more accentuated. Had he lain awake all night too?
She walked into his outstretched arms, resting her cheek on his chest, drinking in the essence of him for a long, aching moment, before disengaging herself. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you but I have something very important to show you.’
He shrugged. ‘I was working on the plans for the modernisation of Nikki’s estates. We are thinking of trialling them on one of the smaller manors first. I have in mind appointing one of my ex-comrades to oversee matters. It is an important but rather dry task, so I am glad of the distraction. What is that you have there?’ She handed him the volume of Culpeper’s English Physician. ‘One of your herbal texts?’ Aleksei said, frowning over the ornate frontispiece.
‘No, Catiche just gave me it as a thank you for saving Ortipo.’
She went on to explain the morning’s events. ‘Where on earth would she come by such a thing?’ Aleksei asked when she had finished.
She braced herself. ‘I’m afraid that it was yet another keepsake that Catiche “liberated” from her mother’s bedchamber.’
It took a few seconds for her meaning to dawn on him, but when it did, Aleksei let slip the weighty tome, catching it just in time before it dropped to the floor before sinking on to the window seat, looking quite astounded. ‘This was in Elizaveta’s room?’ He stared at the book, holding it now as if it was about to explode in his face. ‘Is it in there, Wolf’s Bane?’
And when Allison opened the text at the relevant page, he paled. ‘Proof positive that my brother was murdered by his own wife, and with malice aforethought too. My wards’ mother was a cold-blooded murderess.’ Shock and anger turned his Baltic-blue eyes to ice. ‘The children, they must never, ever—dear God, they must never have so much as an inkling of this.’
‘Of course not!’
He stared down at the page for long minutes, dark thoughts flitting across his countenance. When finally he closed the pages, his face was set and extremely grim. ‘So, I have the definitive answer I sought after all. The timing is most serendipitous.’
He did not sound in the least happy. Allison’s heart sank. ‘What do you mean?’
His reply made it feel as if her heart was breaking. ‘I had word from the docks this morning. There is a ship sailing for England in four days, and there won’t be another for some time. With your permission I will reserve the best cabin possible for you.’
‘Four days?’
Aleksei covered her hands with his again. ‘We agreed last night...’
‘I am not—I know we did. It is just that it is so soon.’
‘Winter can set in very quickly here. It would be prudent to travel while you can.’
Winter, when the canals and rivers froze. Aleksei would take the children out on one of the sleighs. Though that sleigh was unlikely to be used. She must not think of that sleigh. ‘Then it makes sense,’ Allison said, unable to disguise the tears which clogged her throat. ‘Will I tell the children?’
‘I will tell them. I will write to Madame Orlova, asking her to resume her post forthwith.’
‘That is—that is very efficient.’
‘Allison.’
He sounded as wretched as she felt. No, not quite as wretched, for while he had put a rein on his feelings, hers had bolted away with her. She loved him so much. Too much to hurt him.
‘You’re right,’ she said, relieved to find that she had command of her voice again. ‘The sooner the better. Best not to prolong—you’re right, Aleksei, it’s what we agreed to last night.’ She managed to pin a smile to her face. ‘I have plans to make, many plans. A dispensary to open. Oh, and one to close. There is so little time, I don’t think...’
‘Leave that with me. You are irreplaceable but I’m sure I’ll find a competent substitute to carry on your fine work.’
‘You flatter me. No one is indispensable. I’m sure there are skilled herbalists out there.’
‘Perhaps, but they will not be you.’
She should be pleased he valued her so highly. She was pleased, she was, and it was very foolish indeed of her to feel hurt. Anna Orlova would take her place in the schoolroom. Some other herbalist would take her place in the dispensary. She could live with that. But would Aleksei also substitute someone else for her in his bed? She was much less sanguine about that prospect. Would he take another mistress, or would he start his search for a suitable wife, just as soon as her ship sailed? A woman of breeding suitable to bear the Derevenko name, an aunt for the Derevenko heirs, a mother to Aleksei’s own children.
A tear trickled down her cheek. She brushed it away angrily. ‘It seems you have everything well in hand.’
‘Allison, you must not be thinking...’
But she shook her head. The dam of her feelings was threatening to break and she was desperate to escape to the sanctuary of her bedchamber and burrow under the sheets. ‘I’m not thinking anything. Save that I meant it, I am pleased that you have contingency plans and I shall not be missed too much.’
‘You know that’s not true.’
But she brushed him aside. ‘I need to—the children—their lessons—my dispensary—I need to go and do—I need to go.’ From somewhere deep inside her, she summoned a brittle smile. ‘One last thing. Promise me you will not be too hard on Catiche, Aleksei. About the text, I mean. She is no thief. She is more like a magpie, stockpiling memories in the form of keepsakes. Like the miniatures.’
* * *
Aleksei stood unmoving in the centre of the room, staring at the door Allison had closed softly behind her, forcing himself to ignore the impulse to run after her, the urgent need to pull her into his arms, to kiss her, to soothe her, to dry her tears. What was the point? A fleeting comfort that was all it would achieve. And the danger of doing what he had promised he would not do, and beg her to stay till spring. Because she would love St Petersburg in the snow. Because then there would be time for her to properly train up someone to take over the dispensary. Because she could ensure that Madame Orlova continued with the children’s new, physically active regime, while resuming their lessons. Good, practical reasons. But trivial compared to the real reason. He desperately wanted her to stay for him. Selfish? Yes. Irrefutably true? Absolutely!
And yet he did resist, though it took almost all of his self-control. He forced himself to sit back behind the desk, staring at the astounding, incontrovertible evidence that Elizaveta had murdered Michael. That a Derevenko duchess had murdered a Derevenko duke. In any other St Petersburg family, it would not be so shocking. The history of the Imperial family was littered with heinous crimes. But his family name was beyond reproach. There had never been any scandal attached to the Derevenko name.
He still struggled to believe that Elizaveta had taken a lover. What kind of a man would dare to bed her? Who was he? Where might he find the answer to that question? Why in a magpie’s nest of course!
He jumped to his feet and was halfway across the room before pulled himself up short, recalling Allison’s warning. Catiche must not be made to feel she had done any wrong. He would tell her that he wanted to get to know her mother better through her keepsakes—yes, that was it, and dammit, it was the truth too! There was a chance, just the tiniest chance, that Catiche unwittingly held the answer to the final question.
* * *
It was late afternoon when Aleksei sent for Allison. He was in his study, in formal dress, motioning her to take the chair on the opposite side of the desk. ‘What is it? What has happened?’
He handed her a cup of sweetened tea and sat down. ‘You would not believe—I still cannot believe it myself.’ Drinking his own brew in one gulp, he set down the plain china cup. ‘After you left, I got to wondering what else Catiche had appropriated from her mother’s rooms. Do not worry,’ he added hastily, ‘I promise you, I did not accuse her of anything save missing her mama. Which she does, just as you told me, much more than I had realised.’
‘Your relationship with your own mother was so very different, Aleksei.’
‘As was yours, yet you understood. I have much to learn.’
‘So you have decided...’
‘I am beginning to think that I have no option. Hear me out. You will understand why soon enough. Amongst other trinkets, a handkerchief, a bottle of scent, a few buttons, Catiche had this in her little collection of memorabilia.’
He pushed a leather-bound scrapbook towards her. Inside there were sketches of the children, cuttings of their hair, ribbons, little childish notes, all pasted into the pages with annotations in French, in what Allison assumed must be Elizaveta’s handwriting. If ever any doubt had been cast on the extent of the Duchess’s love for her children, this touching testimony would put her feelings beyond question. ‘No wonder that Catiche took this,’ Allison said. ‘It is right that she should have it, to share with Elena and Nikki.’
‘I agree. But the book does not only contain keepsakes of her children,’ Aleksei said, looking very grim. ‘If you turn to the last page.’
She did as he bid her. Another lock of hair was pasted there, dark blond, and much coarser than the others, and beside it, what looked like a name, though unlike the rest of the book, the script looked to be Russian. ‘What does it mean?’
‘Vezuchiy,’ Aleksei said. ‘It means lucky.’
Allison frowned. ‘You mean this lock of hair was meant to bring luck? It did not come from one of the children. In fact it looks like yours, though why Elizaveta...’
‘Michael’s hair was the same colour. It is a trait in the male line of my family.’
‘I’m not sure where this is leading.’
‘I have a male relative with similar colouring.’
‘Your cousin Felix? But why—?’ She broke off, staring at Aleksei in horror. ‘Felix. It is from the Latin, isn’t it? It means...’
‘Lucky,’ Aleksei said with a pronounced sneer. ‘And well named! It is extremely lucky for Felix that I did not call him out when I confronted him earlier this afternoon.’
‘Aleksei, you did not hurt him?’ Allison said urgently.
‘There was no need. The pain was self-inflicted and he is a broken man. I doubt he will ever recover.’ He took the keepsake book from her, closing it over. ‘Felix is not a murderer, Allison, but he was, inadvertently, the cause of my brother’s death. I will explain, but for once, I feel the need to fortify myself with something stronger than tea.’ He took the stopper from the decanter which was set on the desk, with two glasses. ‘Will you join me in a cognac? You need not fear, it is the proper French vintage, not gut-rot from Michael’s cellar.’
‘Thank you. Since you seem to think I will require it, then I will.’ She took the heavy crystal glass, holding it in readiness, watching with a sense of dread as Aleksei, who seemed to be almost as abstemious as his brother had been reputed to be, swallowed a large measure, and immediately poured himself another. Her mind was wanting to race ahead, but she forced herself to stay calm, for it was clear that was what Aleksei needed most from her.
‘Where to start?’ he said, twisting his glass around and around on the desk.
She articulated the terrible, shockingly obvious conclusion, to save him the pain of saying it aloud. ‘Felix was Elizaveta’s lover?’
‘My first cousin! The man Michael would have entrusted with the care of his children. The change of the will is explained now. It proves that Michael must have known about their treachery, though my cousin...’ His jaw clenched. ‘The man whom I used to call my cousin, Felix Golytsin, believed Michael was oblivious. He ended it, he tells me, precisely because he was terrified that Michael might find out. The night before my brother died, Golytsin told Elizaveta that their affaire was madness, that it could not continue. The guilt was eating him up, he said. Though I suspect he was more concerned about saving his scrawny neck.’
‘So on the night she was absent from the palace, Elizaveta had been with her lover, just as Anna Orlova suspected and we concluded. He summarily ended the liaison, which would explain her highly distressed state of mind the next day.’
‘She did not recognise her mistress,’ Aleksei said. ‘you remember, that’s what the Orlova woman said, and Golytsin said the same. Elizaveta was like a madwoman, he said, talking wildly about them eloping and taking the children with them, and when he pointed out that the outcome would be to destroy all their lives, she simply wouldn’t listen. He went to Peterhof, he says, to give her time to come to her senses, to realise that there was no future for them, to accept it was over. I’ve never seen a man so broken or so consumed by guilt. There is no doubt I think, no matter how wrong it was, that he loved her. Her death added to the remorse he felt, for cuckolding my brother, his nearest relative.’ Aleksei thumped the desk with his fist, but with a supreme effort regained his self-control.
‘Do you think he suspects foul play?’ Allison enquired tentatively.
‘He concedes that Michael must have found out somehow, there is no other explanation for the change of will. As to whether he suspects Elizaveta took Michael’s life—no, I don’t think so. He confessed that he had considered the possibility that she had taken her own after Michael’s apoplexy, a case of severe guilt and repentance, but like me, he dismissed the notion. Whatever else Elizaveta was, she loved her children. They had already lost their father...they would need their mother more than ever.’
Allison set down her untouched drink, letting her hand lie on the keepsake book. ‘So when she murdered Michael, she was not thinking that she was taking their father from them.’
‘No. She was deluding herself into thinking that Golytsin would take Michael’s place.’
‘And her death—it seems it was an accident after all.’
‘It seems so, just as you surmised.’ Aleksei finished his cognac. ‘One thing we need not fear, is that Golytsin will talk. My discovery of the affaire was the final straw for him. He intends to resign all his positions at court and retire to the countryside. I can think of no better punishment for a man whose life centred around the Imperial court, than to be exiled from it because of his own actions. It’s ironic, isn’t it? I knew that such a murder must have had the strongest of motive. I knew that custody of my wards was the strongest of all motives. But I never guessed that love rather than money or power could be at the root of it. A warped kind of love it was, but there is no denying that is what it was all the same.’
‘Oh, Aleksei, I don’t know what to say.’
He leaned across the desk to clasp her hand. ‘You don’t have to, Allison, I know your thoughts without you having to speak them.’
That is one of the many things that I love about you. Dear heavens, she sincerely hoped he could not read her every thought.
He stood up, pulling her to her feet to wrap his arms around her. ‘It has been, as your grandmother would say, a bit of a day.’
She hugged him tightly. ‘You must be exhausted.’
‘I’m certainly tired of thinking.’
‘We have established a remedy for that. Why don’t we meet tonight and I can administer the cure?’
* * *
‘Light every candle,’ Allison said some hours later, turning the key in the lock of the State Bedchamber. ‘I want to see you in all your glory.’ To see him, to etch the memory in her mind, and to imprint herself on him. She wanted to demonstrate her love for him by truly making love to him. She wanted to show him what she could never allow herself to say.
Light flickered from every sconce, every candlestick in the huge chamber, reflecting the rich gold and blue hues of the furnishings in the gilded mirrors. As she stepped into Aleksei’s arms, Allison could see their entwined figures reflected too, his dark-blond head, her auburn, bending towards each other, and then their lips met, and she forgot about their reflection, and concentrated on the reality.
Their lips clung, their kisses not yet passionate but the kisses of two people seeking to banish the world, to forget themselves, to find succour in each other. Sweet kisses that went on and on and on, making her head spin, making her body pliant, bending and shaping itself into him. Her hands fluttered over the short, rough hair at the back of his head, down to the breadth of his shoulders, the length of his back, to rest on the firm slope of his buttocks. How she loved this man. How very much she loved him.
He tangled his fingers in her hair, scattering pins, combing through her curls as they cascaded free. His hands caressed her, flattening over her back, the dip of her waist, the curve of her bottom, back up to her breasts. And all the time their lips clung. Deep kisses. Licking kisses. Soft kisses. And then kisses that became darker. Their breath became shallow. Desire leapt inside her, a sudden flame, an aching tension, but when Aleksei began to unfasten her gown, she stopped him.
‘Wait. You first.’ She smiled up at him, a smile that was deliberately teasing, sinful, confident of her effect, rewarded with an answering, dark gleam in his eyes.
He cast off his coat, and at her behest, his breeches, boots and waistcoat too. Allison shivered in anticipation as she untied his stock, leaving only his shirt to cover his modesty. But only just. She slid her hands under the soft fabric to cup the taut muscles of his buttocks, pulling him against her, arching herself into the hard length of his erection, then kissing him again. A different kiss. A heated kiss, that he responded to with heat, but she slowed him, leading him through the strange little gate that guarded the bed, easing him on to it, standing between his legs. More kisses. The hardness of him against her belly, through her gown, was the sweetest ache.
‘Your shirt,’ she said, watching him, letting her desire show blatantly on her face as he lifted it, watching the ripple of his muscles, belly and chest, as he raised it over his head, then watching, simply staring for a long moment as he sat before her naked, while she was fully dressed. Even this was shockingly arousing.
He waited, sensing that that was what she wanted. No need to tell him. Another one of the things she loved about him. He waited while she removed her gown, slowly peeling it down her body, enjoying the way he watched her, registering the sharp intake of his breath as it slid to the ground. She turned around, and he unlaced her corsets, kissing her neck, his hands smoothing over the fullness of her breasts, circling her nipples through her chemise, making her moan, arch backwards against him.
And then she turned, pushing him back on the bed, discarding her chemise, now dressed only in her stockings and garters, to straddle him. More kisses. His mouth. His eyes. His mouth. She could never have enough of his mouth. Then his throat. His chest. His nipples. Did he like to have her do what he did to her? Sucking. Licking. Circling. Undoubtedly.
More kisses. Slowly easing herself down his body, licking and kissing her way from the dip of his rib cage to the rippling muscles of his belly, then back again, shuddering as her nipples grazed his skin, aware all the time of his bright blue gaze fixed on her, waiting, watching, taking his cue from her, stoking her confidence and her desire. She loved him so much. So very much.
She hesitated only briefly as she came to the soft line of dark-blond hair arrowing down from his navel. Kisses. She remembered the shocking delight of the kisses he had given her, and though her only clue was to echo that, her desire to make tonight unique, and to know all of him, gave her the confidence to continue. Sliding down from the bed between his legs, she felt the shock of his response in the way he said her name, and feared she had made a mistake. ‘Did I—don’t you want me to?’
‘I want only what you want. You don’t have to...’
‘Oh, but I want to,’ she said, sure now, very sure. ‘I want to.’
Kisses. The sleek muscles of his thighs. Then between. Kisses. And touch. Trailing fingers, making him contract, the lightest of kisses, making him shudder, and then her tongue, licking, eliciting a deep, feral groan. Kisses, along the satiny length of him, and then deeper kisses, daring to do what she had never dreamed of, aroused by his pulsing, throbbing arousal to more, until he cried out, begging her to stop because he didn’t want it to be over, not yet. And because she didn’t want it ever to end, she did stop, kissing her way back up his body to meet his mouth once more.
Their passion had never been like this. Not so feverish. Not so all-consuming. And not so desperate, as if there was a clock ticking down the hours. How she loved him. She loved him. She loved him. Hands and mouths clinging, skin to skin. When he slid his hands between her legs to stroke her, she ignited, tipping into a climax that shook her to her core, and still they kissed. But she wanted more now, urging him, crying out with surprised delight when he wrapped her leg over his, still lying side by side, and slid into her, pulling her tight around him.
Different frissons, as he began to rock against her, inside her, a gentle, slow, pulsing movement that set her pulsing too once more, her muscles clenching around him. She watched her own arousal reflected on his face, in the dilation of his pupils, in the slashes of colour on his cheeks, the way his eyes finally fluttered closed, and the thickening inside her, the deep, guttural moan of his that she had come to know presaged his own climax. She clung, lost to the consequences, digging her fingers into the muscles of his back, her heel on his buttock, she clung as he pulsed, rocked, and with a deep shudder and a cry his release took him, but not before he pulled himself free.
Honourable to the very last, she thought, kissing his chest, twining herself back around him. She kissed him again, burrowing her face in his chest, where it seemed to her she could smell the very essence of him.