tales. Just look at these marvelous illustrations!”
Anya crossed to the desk. A lump of emotion balled in her chest at the bittersweet pleasure of seeing her native language. Cyrillic was such a beautiful alphabet. She stroked her finger over a gilt-enhanced picture of a golden prince in a garden with a flame-colored bird perched in an apple tree. It was as richly decorated as a medieval manuscript.
“Thank you,” she stammered. “I don’t know what to say. It’s wonderful.”
“The whole thing’s in Russian,” the dowager said, with a glint of challenge in her eye. “I got it from a rare book dealer on Publisher’s Row. I thought you could translate it into English, and I’ll have it printed and bound. I like the idea of being a literary patron. We’ll make a special edition and I’ll give copies to all my friends.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea.”
The dowager nodded. “I thought of it last week, at the Russian ambassador’s reception.” She gave a dismissive sniff. “Much as I hate to disparage your fellow countrymen, the food was rather inferior. And Dorothea Lieven is the most dreadful gossip alive. She wants to know everything about everyone. You should have seen the way she was clinging to Lord Castlereagh. Like a vine over a trellis.”
Anya hid a smile. The newspapers and caricaturists often lampooned the ambassador for having a wife far more skilled at maintaining diplomatic relations than himself.
“A whole bunch of your countrymen were there, in fact,” the duchess said. “Tsar Alexander’s sent some kind of trade delegation. I’d be surprised if you didn’t know some of them.”
She sent Anya a quizzical look that was supposed to be innocent, but fooled Anya not a bit. The dowager was fishing for any hint of scandal.
“One chap was particularly popular with the ladies,” the duchess said with studied casualness. “A war hero, so they say. Count Petrov, his name was.”
Anya felt the blood drain from her face. “What?”
The duchess was watching her closely, a shrewd gleam in her eye. “He’s been telling a fantastical story. Says he’s searching for his missing fiancée who disappeared just after he proposed. No ransom note was ever received, but he firmly believes she was kidnapped and brought here, to England. He’s been looking for her for months. He’s never given up hope that she’ll be found alive. Isn’t that romantic?”
“No!” Anya practically shouted.
The dowager gave a self-satisfied nod, as if her suspicions had been confirmed, and Anya cursed inwardly. She might have known she wouldn’t be able to keep the story from the duchess indefinitely.
“He says he doesn’t care if she’s been ruined by her captors,” the duchess said mildly. “His love for her will forgive any slight. He’ll marry her even if she’s ruined.”
Anya couldn’t keep silent. Blood was pounding in her temples. She grasped the surge of anger, since it was preferable to the icy shards of fear that had pieced her on hearing Vasili was here, in London.
“He will forgive any slight? It’s not his honor that’s in question! It’s the woman’s right to forgive—or not to forgive—as she sees fit.” She thumped her palm on the leather tabletop. “This is what I hate about ‘polite society.’ If a woman is taken against her will, she’s ruined. If she gives herself to a man willingly, before marriage, she’s ruined. Yet no one expects a man to go to his marriage bed untouched. It’s such a double standard!”
“Bravo!” The dowager chuckled. “And I quite agree. Society’s full of such inequalities and ridiculous expectations. If Count Petrov’s fiancée disappeared, I’m sure there’s a far more reasonable explanation than kidnapping. Perhaps she didn’t really want to marry him?” She studied Anya’s burning cheeks. “In fact, I think that’s exactly what happened.”
Anya met her gaze and felt resistance bleeding out of her.
“We’ve become friends over the past months, have we not?” the duchess said softly.
“Yes, ma’am. And I have been extremely grateful for your kindness toward me.”
The dowager snorted. “Oh, pish. It’s hardly kindness to enjoy the company of an intelligent young woman. Most girls in the ton are vapid, well-bred twits. I get far more from you than you get from me. And you can trust me to keep your secrets, child. You are Petrov’s missing fiancée, are you not? The Princess Denisova?”
Anya sighed. “I am the princess, or, at least, I was, but I am not Petrov’s fiancée. He wanted to marry me, and I refused. On several occasions. He did not take the rejection well.”
“Men rarely