To Wed a Wicked Prince Read Free Page B

ago.”
    “At least,” Livia said, deciding that objecting to his presence was going to be futile at best and undignified at worst. Besides, she wasn’t certain she did object to it. “It belonged to a distant relative of mine. I think she insisted on a degree of state when she went out and about.”
    He looked at her closely, his eyes suddenly a bright glow in the dim interior. “Did she? How interesting.”
    “Why should you find that interesting, Prince? I’m sure she was a woman of her time. She died at the end of last year,” she added.
    “Ah, I’m sorry to hear it,” he murmured.
    “I never knew her,” Livia said. “As I said, she was a distant relative…I’m not even sure how we were connected, but we shared a surname and for some reason that was important to her, so she made me her heir.” Even as she gave this explanation, Livia wondered why she was being so expansive; it was none of this gentleman’s business. Yet somehow he seemed to provoke confidences.
    “So, tell me about yourself, Lady Livia.”
    “There’s nothing to tell,” Livia said shortly, deciding that there’d been enough confidences for one evening. “But you could tell me why a Russian prince is in London at a time like this. Don’t you expect to find yourself looked upon with suspicion? Russians are hardly persona grata since your czar signed a treaty with Napoleon.”
    “Oh, politics, politics,” he said, waving a hand in dismissal. “Dreary stuff. I want nothing to do with it. Besides, I am only half Russian.”
    “Oh? And what’s the other half?”
    “Why, English, of course,” he declared in a tone of such delightfully smug satisfaction that Livia couldn’t help another chuckle. The man made her laugh too much and too often.
    “I would never have guessed,” she said. “Apart from your fluency in English, of course.”
    “Oh, we Russians are fluent in many languages except our own,” he said airily. “Russian is spoken only by the peasants.”
    Livia was about to question this when the carriage came to a halt and the groom opened the door. “Thank you, Jemmy,” she said, accepting the lad’s hand to assist her down to the pavement.
    “Well, Prince Prokov, here is where we part company. Thank you again for the dance, although I by no means condone your methods of achieving it.” She gave him her hand with what she hoped was a purely friendly, if firmly dismissive, smile.
    He raised her hand to his lips, however, turning it over to press an unambiguous kiss into her palm. “You will permit me to call upon you, my lady.” It was a statement rather than a request.
    Livia could see no reason to object to the declaration except that she preferred to feel that her wishes were in some way to be taken into account in such matters. She contented herself with a vague smile, another murmured good night, and turned from him to hurry up the steps to her own house. Tonight of all nights it would have been nice if Morecombe, the ancient butler, had been on the watch for her return. Of course, as she’d expected, she had to bang the knocker three times before she heard the shuffle of his carpet slippers across the parquet within, and the slow, painful drawing back of the bolt, before the door opened a crack and the old retainer peered suspiciously around.
    “Oh, ’tis you,” he declared, as if it could have been anyone else.
    “Yes, Morecombe, it’s me,” Livia said impatiently. “Open the door, for heaven’s sake.”
    “Oh, patience, patience,” he muttered, opening the door wider. “Come you in, ’tis time respectable folk were in their beds.”
    Livia whisked herself inside and resisted the urge to look back to see if the Russian prince had been watching this little sideshow from the pavement.
     
    Alexander waited until the door had closed and then he stepped back into the street to look up at the house. It was a handsome building, in keeping with its fellows around the gracious London square. There