Loves Choices. PENNY JORDAN
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she had once seen in a film the nuns had taken them to see in Seville.
The dressing room which she had to pass through to reach the bathroom was lined with wardrobes and cupboards, all of which were mirrored, and thinking that she could hardly expect Pierre to unpack for her, Hope returned to her cases and started to remove the clothes she would need for the morning. She didn’t plan to change for dinner—she would simply wash and re-do her make-up.
Just when would her father arrive? She quelled a feeling of disappointment that he hadn’t been there to meet them, but then she had guessed that this would be the case, for if he hadn’t been busy, surely he wouldn’t have sent the Comte to collect her. Rather like an unwanted parcel, she thought wryly as she stripped off her suit and returned to the bathroom to wash.
Half an hour later, her hair brushed and her make-up fresh, she opened the bedroom door and walked across the landing. Her shoes seemed to clatter loudly on the marble stairs. As she reached the hall a door underneath the stairs opened and a man walked through. Hope guessed immediately that he must be Pierre. His face bore several livid scars, his dark hair streaked with grey, but there was more curiosity than embarrassment in the look he gave her, and trying not to feel too self-conscious, Hope said warmly:
‘You must be Pierre. I am Hope Stanford and …’ Her voice faded away as she remembered that the Comte had told her that Pierre had been rendered both deaf and dumb by the bomb blast and, suddenly feeling awkward, she was relieved to see the Comte coming downstairs.
Unlike her, he had changed and her eyes widened a little as she took in the thick silk shirt and tightly-fitting dark trousers. Gold cuff-links glittered at his wrists, and she was suddenly and overpoweringly aware of him—not as her father’s friend, but as a man. Her heart started to thud with heavy, suffocating strokes, her body turned to marble, as stiff and unresponsive as the stairs, as she stared at him, barely noticing the signs he made to Pierre, or the comprehension burning to life in the servant’s dark eyes as he turned back to the door.
‘Dinner is almost ready. You need not look like that,’ he assured her, obviously misunderstanding the reason for her shocked expression. ‘Pierre is an excellent chef.’ He opened the door that Hope vaguely remembered belonged to the dining room, her eyes dazzled by the sea of polished wood and glittering glass and silver that swam before her, mentally contrasting the magnificence of the château to the refectory at the convent.
Two courses were served and eaten in silence, Hope merely sipping the wine the Comte had poured for her. She refused any sweet, watching instead while the Comte helped himself to some cheese—a local cheese called Chaource, he told her, offering her some. Again Hope shook her head. The long journey had tired her, her mind exhausted by so many new impressions.
A portrait on the wall behind the Comte caught her eye and she studied it. It looked relatively modern and depicted a dark-haired woman, proud and faintly arrogant so that Hope sensed a wildness beneath the conventionally elegant mask.
‘Is that … was that your mother?’ she asked hesitantly.
The Comte turned his head and studied the portrait for a while in silence, his voice harsh as he said, ‘No. My sister, Tanya. She is dead now, she committed suicide.’
For a moment Hope thought she must have misheard him, the words seemed to hover between them, and Hope looked again at the portrait. What could have driven a woman as beautiful and proud as she was to take her own life? She hadn’t realised she had spoken the words out loud until the Comte said bitterly, ‘A man, of course, mon petit; a man, and the shame of knowing herself discarded.’
Hope shivered, unable to tear her eyes from the portrait. ‘It happened six months ago,’ the Comte continued. ‘I was in Paris at the time, Tanya was in the Caribbean with her lover. I suspect she had hoped that in the end he would marry her, but I knew he never would. I had warned her, but she would not listen. In the end, she preferred to take her life rather than face his dismissal of her.’
‘Had he … had he fallen in love with someone else?’ Hope asked huskily, hardly knowing why she asked the question.
The Comte’s mouth tightened. ‘Hardly. No. Tanya was simply a diversion who no longer fitted into his plans, and so she had to go. She, poor girl, went on deluding herself up to the last that he genuinely cared for her. However, her death will be avenged. He shall not be allowed to shame our family unpunished.’ He said the words so quietly that Hope barely caught them.
‘Tanya,’ she pronounced wonderingly. ‘It is surely a Russian name?’
‘As is my own,’ the Comte confirmed. ‘My mother insisted upon it. She could not hand down to her children her own birthright—she was a Princess; Princess Tatiana Vassiliky—but she gave us her family names. Mine is Alexei, after her father.’
It was his Russian blood that demanded reparation for what had happened to his sister, Hope guessed intuitively, sensing as she had done before the savagery and pride that lay so close to the surface of his French sophistication—a sophistication which was barely more than a cloak.
‘Tanya’s lover?’ she pressed, scarcely knowing why she asked the question and yet somehow compelled to do so.
‘I think you can guess,’ the Comte said slowly, forcing her to meet his eyes and holding her gaze as he stood up and came to stand beside her. ‘Your father was Tanya’s lover, Hope,’ he told her softly, so softly that for a moment she didn’t sense the danger surrounding her.
‘My father?’ She stared up at him in bewilderment. ‘My father … but … You and he are friends … Why did you come for me when … ?’
‘How naïve you are, little one. Your father knows nothing of me apart from the fact that I am Tanya’s brother, but I know a great deal about him. I made it my business to know. I discovered, for one thing, that he had a daughter—a pious, innocent child, who was kept secluded from the world, brought up to be innocent in mind and body; a child who he intended to use as a pawn to secure for himself the power he has always wanted. You are that pawn, Hope,’ he told her softly. In the half-light his eyes glittered dangerously, hard and green as emeralds, and fear choked Hope of breath as she fought to take in what he was saying.
‘I swore when my sister killed herself that she would be avenged,’ he told her slowly. ‘The Russian blood in me demands that she is, even while the French mocks me for my passion, but on this occasion the Russian wins out, although I must admit that the French side of me has helped me to plan my campaign with care and thought. My first instinct was to deprive your father of life as he had deprived Tanya of hers.’
Hope, listening, shivered. She could well imagine this man killing her father, the lean fingers fastening round his throat, demanding that he suffer as Tanya had suffered.
‘But, on reflection, I decided that that was not enough. Besides, I have no wish to spend the rest of my own life languishing in prison. No, there had to be a better way. A way in which your father was vulnerable, and then, quite by chance, at a dinner in Paris, I found it. You will be surprised to know, mon petit, that you were the subject of the dinner-table conversation on that occasion.
‘My female companion, I shall not bore you with her name, was telling me of the marriage your father had planned between the Montrachet heir and his carefully reared daughter. It seems your father has been foolish enough to borrow money on his expectations of becoming the grandfather of the new heir-to-be. The Montrachet name is an old and powerful one, and Montrachet brides are always carefully chosen and vetted. Normally, they are also rich, but the numbers of rich young women who are also virginal in body and character are quickly dwindling.
‘However, your father has taken care to make sure that you fulfil both those latter two requirements. His name is also an old one—you have no fortune, of course, but Isabelle Montrachet, Alain’s mother, prefers a bride for her son who is easily moulded and taught. A healthy young bride, moreover, who will provide her son with children; a bride whose virtue is unimpeachable—and who better than her business partner’s daughter; a girl who can bring as her dowry, all these things. In return for your