"Happy? I am submerged in the depths of despair and still sinking, my lord, but to serve you, I will not complain. Oh, and my name is now Papin, my lord, for the duration of my incognito, um, incognito-ness. It means gray-haired lady."
"How very wonderful for you. But if we are to be players in this, Papin, I am no longer my lord, or even sir. For the nonce, you must address me as Justin."
Wigglesworth staggered where he stood. "But I couldn"t!"
"You"d rather find a new employer once I am caught out and hanged? You"ll not find another as lenient as me so easily."
Wigglesworth stood there, silent, before saying, "Just-Justin would not be good, my lord. Someone might still suspect. Better you take a Gypsy, er, Romany name. I will go ask the old lady who gave me my name, and-"
"Justin!"
All thoughts of his name, or Wigglesworth and his skirts-not to mention his chicken breast-fled as Justin turned to watch Alina running toward him across the field.
She was clad in a costume much like Wigglesworth"s: a blouse, a scarf tied about her waist, a full skirt to her ankles. But that was where all similarity ended.
Her unbound hair trailed out behind her as she ran, her bright red skirt held up and showing glimpses of several lace-edged white petticoats. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s strained against the ruffled neckline of her blouse, and the bright green scarf turned her waist into an incredibly small span, one he could easily encircle with his hands.
He took two steps toward her, ready to open his arms and catch her as she flung herself against him. He would lift her high off the ground, twirl her about and then draw her slowly down his body until he could kiss her smiling mouth.
Except that, still a good ten yards away, she suddenly stopped running, even as his imagination continued traveling down a path he knew he should not tread. He could see her composing herself before she began to walk toward him again.
Had she remembered that she should be angry with him? Even as he had brought himself back to the knowledge that he had no right to her affection?
"You"re safe," she said at last. "Not...not that I was worried."
"Good. The last thing I would care to do, Alina, would be to cause you worry. You look...well. There was no trouble making the exchange? Are the accommodations suitable?"
"The accommodations are marvelous," she told him, finally smiling again. "I have always wanted to ride in a vardo, but I wasn"t allowed, of course. To think I had to travel all the way to England to finally get my wish. Luka will want to know that you"re here. He"s asleep in the last vardo, back that way. It"s probably too soon for him to be attempting to take command. He"s feverish again. Tatiana and I were putting cool wet cloths on his head when someone told me you had arrived."
"Then perhaps it"s as well that I"m here, although you have to have realized that I am here because I failed. Your nemesis is still breathing."
"Yes, but so are you," Alina pointed out, as if that balanced the scales. "Does this mean we will not be traveling to your friends at Basingstoke?"
He chose his words carefully. "No, nothing has changed there. I want to keep heading north, until you"re safe at Malvern. I made more than one plan, and the second may work where the first failed. Alina-"
"Magdalena," she corrected, pulling out her skirt and slowly turning in a full circle in front of him, pausing with her back to him to look over her shoulder at him in a way that pierced his heart. "I am Magdalena, a simple Romany girl and no longer my lady. We"ve been practicing all afternoon, Tatiana and Danica and I, so that we are never caught in a mistake."
"Yes, Wigglesworth-that is, Papin-told me. He tells me the name means gray-haired lady. But by the look on that fellow"s face over there, the one eavesdropping on us even now, I"m not convinced that"s correct."
Alina lowered her head, her cheeks flushing. "Poor Wigglesworth. No, Papin does not mean grayhaired lady. I was told it means goose." She looked up at Justin again. "But Luka would not allow any of the other names they wanted to give the poor fellow. I think some of the suggestions were rather...naughty."
"I"ll remember that when Wigglesworth comes to me with my name for the duration."
"You can simply ask Luka. He speaks Romani." She then looked past him and waved to Brutus, apologizing for not greeting him at once.
Justin knew he could dredge his mind for days and not come up with the name of another woman who had even taken the time to say h.e.l.lo to Brutus. Or worry herself about Wigglesworth, for that matter. Add to that the fact that, rather than hiding in her caravan, terrified, she seemed to be enjoying herself mightily.
"This is an adventure for you, isn"t it, kitten?" he asked her as they walked between the rows of caravans on their way to see Luka.
"My father often told me that all of life should be an adventure. Yes, I am enjoying myself, except for the times I remember that Inhaber Novak wants to see me dead in order to steal lands from these wonderful people. You never saw him today?"
"I saw him," Justin answered shortly. "I will see him again. You"re not to worry about the man."
"I worried more that I wouldn"t see you again. I know what you said. That I should forget what happened ever happened. That you think I was only...curious. But how can that be, Justin? Something did happen. How can something have changed nothing?"
Justin stopped walking and turned her to him, his hands on her upper arms. "Nothing has changed, kitten. My plans have only been delayed."
Her eyes searched his as if looking for answers to questions she wasn"t sure she dared ask, but could not resist asking. "You left this morning without a word of goodbye. Was...was that easy for you? Because it wasn"t easy for me."
"Christ..." Justin took her hand in his, and they continued walking toward the last caravan. She held on tight, trusting him. Him! n.o.body should ever trust him, let alone an innocent young woman like Alina. "I knew last night was a mistake. I knew it, and yet I allowed myself to..." He squeezed her hand. "You"re young, vulnerable. And I"m a very bad man."
"The Bad Baron. Yes, Charlotte told me some call you that."
"I"ve been called worse by those who know me best. Listen closely, Alina. You don"t care about me. You don"t know me. What happened...what very nearly happened last night would have been the same with any man who knew only the half of what I know. You were curious, any fool could have seen that, and I was available. I didn"t rouse your heart, kitten. I awakened your body. That"s all it was. That"s all it could ever be for us, for reasons I"ve already explained. Someday, someday soon, you"ll travel to London with Tanner and Lydia, and you"ll meet a man worthy of you. In a year, you won"t even remember me."
"Don"t say that!" she commanded, cutting him off. "How dare you presume to tell me what I think, what I feel? How dare you!" And then she turned on her heel and ran from him, her glorious black hair lifting in the breeze the way it had a lifetime ago, when his heart had swelled as she"d run toward him.
ALINA REMAINED IN HER caravan for several hours, until dinner was over and the children had all been gathered up and tucked into their beds. Only then did she venture out into the center of the camp, on the hunt for Stefan, the young Romany who had driven their caravan that afternoon.
Stefan was very pretty. Even Danica, who never unbent enough to indulge in casual conversation, had remarked that Stefan could snap his fingers at any silly female and have her come running to him.
Stefan didn"t walk. He swaggered. His coal-dark hair was long, and he tossed it often, rather like a girl. His eyes were as blue as a summer sky, and ringed with long, curling lashes that rightfully belonged on a girl. His teeth were so white, they gleamed. He wore his full, blousy shirt open to the waist and tucked into tight-fitting leather breeches that ended just below his knees. Below his knees, his strong calves positively bulged with muscle.
He wore his face shaved smooth, but had a considerable amount of dark, curling hair on his remarkably muscled chest.
He sang like an angel, and had done so most of the afternoon, often turning about to peer inside the caravan to be sure his three female pa.s.sengers were listening appreciatively.
Alina thought he was probably the most beautiful man she"d ever seen. And the most immensely silly.
But he"d do.
Carefully avoiding Luka"s caravan, as she"d waited until Justin had entered it again a quarter hour earlier, she flung her black wool shawl up and over her head so that it settled low across her shoulders, and then began strolling along the clearing, past the eight campfires that illuminated the area.
She smiled to the women sitting on the steps of their caravans, knitting, mending, some turning cards over on small tables and nodding at what they saw. A young mother nursed her infant, a corner of her shawl covering her breast.
The men, those who had not disappeared into the trees to set up a perimeter guard, smoked long pipes as they rested their feet on the stones around the campfires, talking and laughing amongst themselves, one of them daring to whistle as Wigglesworth pranced by on his way back from the nearby stream carrying a shallow copper basin and some toweling, his expression a study of injured dignity.
Brutus appeared from between two of the caravans just as Alina approached, and the whistling and laughing abruptly stopped. The large man had that effect on people.
"They mean no harm to him, Brutus," Alina told him, and the man nodded his agreement, and then shrugged.
"And you"ll see to it that they do no harm," she said, smiling. "It must be very gratifying to be able to command so much respect merely by being you. That"s called consequence, Brutus. You were blessed with consequence. Why, I believe there have been princes and kings who have not commanded a room the way you do, simply by entering it."
Brutus seemed to chew on this thought for a few moments, and then nodded his thanks. Or she supposed so, anyway.
"Was there anyone else at the stream when you were there, Brutus?" she asked, having walked the entire camp and seen no sign of Stefan.
The big man nodded, and then pointed toward Alina"s a.s.signed caravan before seeming to mime a person holding reins, driving a team of oxen.
"Ah, Stefan. Stefan is at the stream. Thank you, Brutus, that"s just who I was looking for."
Brutus smiled, clearly happy to have pleased her, tugged at his forelock and lumbered on, following after the bewigged and beskirted goose.
Alina waited until anyone who had been watching the exchange between her and Brutus went back to what they had been doing, and then she slipped silently into the gap between two of the caravans and headed for the stream she had visited earlier, having volunteered to help bring water for the cooking pots.
She found Stefan easily, and watched him as he stood on the bank, his long legs spread as if he"d just laid claim to the ground around him, one hand on his hip, the other just then very precisely and almost ceremoniously bringing a thin black cheroot to his lips. He inhaled deeply, and then blew out a stream of smoke that seemed blue-white in the fading light as it wreathed his head before blowing away in the breeze. Everything he did, every move he made, seemed to Alina to be planned, practiced, deliberate, even when he thought himself alone.
Except for the cheroot, and the hair on his chest, he reminded her very much of her Aunt Mimi.
"Stefan," she said before she could change her mind. "What are you doing here?"
He swiveled about slowly, moving first his head, so that she had no choice but to look into his eyes, his slow smile, before he turned to fully face her, holding out his hand to her, palm up. "Come, Magdalena, see the moon as it rises in all its glory. The smoke from the fires obscure, but here, at the water"s edge, there is nothing to hamper our view of the wise man who smiles down on all of us."
"Some of us more than others, do you think?" she asked as she joined him, noticing that once again his shirt was opened to his waist, baring his chest to the moonlight even as he raised his face to it, as well.
"Moon baths are salubrious to the complexion. I wait here until it is fully risen, and then I shall bathe in it."
Alina covered an involuntary giggle with a cough. "Really? I...I"d never heard of that, Stefan. You...you do have a lovely complexion."
He nodded, accepting her compliment as his due as he fingered the single gold hoop earring in his right ear. "The sun? The sun is not good for the complexion. Look at those who seek it and see the leather they call skin. But the moon? The moon washes all clean."
"I had thought that the job of soap and water. That"s...fascinating. Really."
He denied the moon the pleasure of his face as he lowered his chin and turned to her, his smile confident. "You should bare your complexion to the moonlight, Magdalena. I have with me a blanket. We could bathe...together."
Only the elders knew that Alina was their key to the land they coveted, as Luka believed that the fewer who knew, the fewer who could make a mistake and give her away. Stefan had not been told who she was, that she was anything more than what she appeared to be, as she"d changed her clothing in the caravan before they"d joined with the other wagons. To him, she must be simply another Romany girl to seduce with his vaunted beauty and ridiculous prattle about moon bathing.
"I don"t think so, no," she told him, careful to maintain her smile. "But perhaps a kiss? A single kiss in the moonlight? It...it would seem a shame to waste it."
He looked crestfallen for a moment, but then shrugged his wide shoulders before tossing his cheroot into the stream. "A kiss tonight, a hope for tomorrow," he said, taking her hand and pressing her palm against his bare chest. "You will dream of me, and I of you, and tomorrow night, beside another stream, we will visit the moon again...and perhaps the stars, as well."
"But for now," she reminded him, "only a kiss. You have to promise, Stefan."
"Agreed, it is a promise. But you will ask for more."
Alina closed her eyes as he lowered his head toward her. She knew now not to purse her lips, nor to tighten them against him. Instead, she opened her mouth slightly and prepared herself for the first small explosions inside her to begin, the first stirrings of what she knew now as desire.
And there was nothing. Nothing happened...except that her palm began to tickle against the hair on his chest.
She ground her mouth against his, and he responded by clasping her close against him, insinuating his tongue between her lips.
And nothing happened.
He wasn"t clumsy. He didn"t attempt to overpower her. He was very gentle as he cupped her left breast, actually, and probably very practiced. He rubbed lightly at her nipple through the thin material, moaned low in his throat as if pleased by the feel of her.
But nothing happened.
"I...I"m sorry," she said as he dropped his hands from her and stepped back, looked down into her face. "That was...very nice."
"For me, Magdalena, a moment in heaven. But not for you. Stefan knows this. There is another. But for another, you would be mine. The fault lies with him, not me."
She did not wish to discuss Justin. "The fault? Stefan, this... What happened just now is nothing to do with you. And there is no one else."
He brightened. "No? Then the fault is with you. This happens with females. But I can fix that. I will merely redouble my efforts, and you will soon swoon and sigh. Oh, Stefan, Stefan, you will cry. Yes, Stefan, yes."
He reached for her, but Alina only laughed and deftly danced out of his reach...and straight into Justin"s arms.
"Dear me, I feel decidedly de trop," he said, steadying her. "Shall I go away, and leave you two your privacy?"
"No!" Alina exclaimed, and then quickly lowered her voice. "That is, Stefan and I were just talking. Weren"t we, Stefan?"
Stefan pointed at Justin with his chin and sneered. "Who is this? Your father?"
Alina looked up at Justin, wide-eyed. He looked so...so at a loss for words. She couldn"t help herself. She began to laugh. She laughed so hard, in fact, that she found herself clinging to him as he continued to stare at Stefan until it seemed that his mistake had finally penetrated the young Romany"s brain, and he took to his heels, returning to the camp.
"Stop it," Justin said quietly once the young man was gone.
But she couldn"t. She"d attempted her small experiment, she had proved Justin wrong...and now Stefan had mistaken her almost lover for her father?
"But...but it"s so funny!"
"I fail to see the humor."
"Oh, pooh, Justin, of course you do," Alina said, using her sleeve to wipe at her streaming eyes. "Stefan is such a child. Not a man at all, even if he is older than me. He sees you as ancient. Do you feel ancient, Justin?"
"I feel like turning you over my knee. What the devil maggot did you take in your head? Bathing in moonlight? Allowing a lummox like that to kiss you? Paw you? What did you think you were doing? Were you trying to make me jealous?"
Alina sobered as suddenly as she had burst into laughter. "And now you think this is about you. Do all men think they are the most important creatures in nature?"
Finally, Justin smiled. "Yes, kitten, we do. It"s an illusion women have allowed us from the beginning. Our mistake is in ofttimes believing what you all tell us."
"Oh," she said quietly. "Well, then, I suppose that"s all right. And I wasn"t in any danger, you know. I told Stefan one kiss, and he agreed."
The smile disappeared. "He sounded as if he"d agreed. Did he act as if he"d agreed?"
"Well...no. But if you hadn"t stood in front of me like some great wall for me to run into, I would have been safely back in the camp, and we wouldn"t be having this conversation, would we?"
"Ah, so now it"s not Stefan"s fault, or your fault...but once again my fault. A thousand apologies, I"m sure."
"I accept your apologies, all thousand of them. And one more, for saying that it didn"t matter who kissed me last night because I was simply being...awakened. Even you would have to agree that Stefan is exceedingly handsome-"
"Even if he is thick as a plank," Justin inserted neatly.
"Well, yes, there is that. But it was not his mind that I was kissing, was it? Are you hairy?"
"I beg your pardon?" Justin said in a faintly strangled voice.
"Stefan is very hairy. On his chest. I don"t think I like that. Not that I considered the thing until now, but there is such a thing as too much of anything, don"t you agree?"