"I get the idea, for crying out loud!" Tanya snapped impatiently. "I'll accept your word for now, though God knows why I should be that foolish. But I'm also going to leave a message with Maximilian Daneff — that if another attempt is made on my life, he won't have to look any further than you for the ultimate responsibility. Now get out, Alicia. And see that you do leave the country."
After the door closed behind Alicia, Tanya shook her head, wondering if that wasn't the most foolish thing she'd ever done, letting that woman go with no more than a thin scratch on her neck to pay for all the trouble, fear, and worry she'd caused. And what was she going to tell Maximilian's security people, who were even now out searching for her would-be assassin? Was she just going to let them go on wasting their—
"You are very good at dealing with your enemies, Janacek — except for the ones you don't know about. Perhaps I will let you write that little message for Daneff before I kill you. It will be amusing to see someone else pay for my deeds."
Tanya had whirled around at his first word, finding him standing in the doorway to her sitting room, where she had been having her lessons all week. And included in the lessons on her own ancestry had been miniature portraits of Janos Stamboloff and several members of his family. She knew she was looking at one of those people right now. Stefan had been so right. Swarthy-skinned, with blond hair and blue eyes, the man was a younger replica of
Janos himself. And he held a gun pointing right at her chest.
"Ivan Stamboloff?" she guessed.
"Very clever, Princess." He gave her a mockery of a formal bow.
"How did you survive that shipwreck?"
He smiled beautifully. He was actually a handsome man. There certainly wasn't anything sinister-looking about him to warn that he was a coldblooded killer. Perhaps that was why her heart hadn't jumped into her throat yet.
"I'm a good swimmer," was his cocky answer to her question.
"You swam across a whole sea?"
"I swam away from the wreck. Death awaited me there, not rescue. Leaving the area was my only chance."
"But that was suicide!"
He shrugged at her amazement. "It was my salvation, as it turned out. I was found the next day — a miracle, surely, that a Turkish ship should sail so close by to see me and take me aboard. A miracle, because it was God's will that I finish what my grandfather swore would be done."
Did he really believe that? And even with his having stated it clearly, that he was going to kill her, his expression didn't change. If he was harboring a deep, abiding hatred for her, it didn't show.
"If you shoot me," she pointed out reasonably, "my guards will be in here instantly. You wouldn't have a chance of escaping. You'll die, too."
"I would prefer not to, but I am prepared to die if I must. Now come away from that door, Princess. "
She moved slowly away from it, but only because he was walking slowly toward it. She realized too late that he was probably going to lock it, bettering his own chances for escape afterward.
She tried distracting him. "How did you get in here, anyway?"
"The window in there." He nodded toward the sitting room. "I thought dawn the perfect time, so imagine my dilemma when your damn women showed up that early. I barely had time to dash behind the drapes."
"You climbed up two stories?"
"I came down from the roof. It was much easier. "
And he was dressed in the lightest gray, the same color as the stones of the palace. It would have been very hard for anyone to notice him outside dangling from the roof.
"So you've been hiding in there all morning?"
"I am nothing if not patient, Princess. Haven't I waited twenty years for you to show yourself again?"
She wished this seemed more real to her, that she felt even half the fear she'd felt the last time she was in danger, to keep her from saying things like, "That doesn't sound like patience, it sounds like fanaticism."
Her remark didn't annoy him, however. He actually chuckled as he reached for the door.
"Touch that lock and I'll scream," she snapped.
He hesitated, even lowering his hand. "That wouldn't be wise of you, Princess."
She shrugged. "You're going to kill me anyway. Why shouldn't I take you with me?"
"Perhaps you would like to try talking me out of killing you first, as your little friend just did with you. I wouldn't mind hearing you plead a little."
"I don't think you'll hear that. But you have a knife," she said, looking at the dagger stuck beneath his belt, and knowing full well that that was what he meant to kill her with if he could, to keep the noise down to a minimum. "And I have a knife. Dare you try this fairly?"
He laughed. "You want to fight with me? You think just because you surprised me with your knife once, you're any good at wielding it?"
Her eyes flared the slightest bit as she heard what he was admitting. "So it was you that night in Danzig?"
"Of course it was. I had been waiting there for months for Barany to return with you."
"But how did you even know to expect me?"
"Because they thought I was dead, which I knew would bring you out of hiding at last. I couldn't have planned that shipwreck better if I had thought of it myself."
"Well, you haven't asked me to put down my knife, not that I would. So are you willing to break with tradition and do this fairly?"
She had finally managed to prick his calm exterior. "Are you implying my family conducted itself in an unfair manner, when your family began this vendetta?"
"Your uncle Yuri started it, by turning out to be a murderer. My father merely dispensed justice as it was deserved. But then your whole family turned out to be just like Yuri, didn't they?"
He didn't answer. With narrowed eyes he pulled out his dagger and stuck the gun in his belt. And Tanya finally felt her heart lodge in her throat as he started toward her. He was going to fight her fairly, she'd goaded him into that, but he was a man; and she might know how to wield a knife when it was in her hand, but she'd never had to use it on a man equally armed. Suddenly she knew how Alicia had felt just moments ago, and the feeling wasn't pleasant. To hell with being fair about this when her life was at stake.
She opened her mouth to scream, but never got it out. The door flew open first, and Stefan stood there, again entering without knocking, obviously, and already in a rage before he even noticed Ivan. But he couldn't help but notice him and, when Ivan whirled about, see plainly the knife in his fist.
What happened then was incredibly fast. Stefan hit Ivan in the face with what he was carrying, a pair of trousers, a trick he likely had learned from Tanya herself. The guards at his back came in next, but Stefan wasn't waiting for them to take care of the problem. He also had recognized Ivan, and while the man was reaching up to unblock his vision, Stefan lifted the gun from Ivan's belt and, without even hesitating, shot him.
Tanya merely watched as the guards toted Ivan out of there, but then she began to tremble, not because she had just witnessed the death of a man she had been having a conversation with — there had been at least seven deaths in The Seraglio that she had witnessed — but because the worry was over, and she had been much more frightened than she had realized.
"Are you all right? Did he hurt you?"
She looked up at Stefan, surprised to find him holding her. "I'm fine — really." But a shudder passed through her, making him tighten his arms around her.
"How the devil did he get in here?" he wanted to know.
"The window."
"Tanya, it's over. You have no more enemies, and if you did have, I would kill them for you. I'll never let anything hurt you."
"I know that." She started to relax the tiniest bit, but she badly needed a distraction. "Why did you come in here?"
She felt him stiffen. She was going to get a distraction in a big way, she was afraid. And in fact, he let go of her to fetch the trousers he had hit Ivan with. She couldn't help but notice that his eyes were glowing when he came back with them.