“Ah, very well, mystery solved.”
“What mystery? Is there something else that accounts for my having been kept waiting?”
“If you don’t state the nature of your business, you don’t get very far,” he said simply.
“But I was told that King Frederick had an open policy of receiving his people.”
“You aren’t one of his people.”
“I am more than that.”
“Oh?”
As captain of palace security and a nobleman as well, he seemed the ideal person to help her. She wanted to trust him. She just hoped she wasn’t being influenced by her strong attraction to him. But he was an official, and that decided her.
She leaned slightly closer to him so he would hear her low-voiced entreaty. “Is there somewhere we can go so we may speak in private?”
His demeanor changed abruptly again. His golden brows rose as if she’d surprised him, and his blue eyes gazed at her warmly. When his hard mouth softened into a grin, she felt that fluttering in her stomach again, but more strongly this time. Good God, he was handsome. And as attracted to her as she was to him? Or was he just relaxing, letting down his guard? She wished she hadn’t been so sheltered in London and knew more about such matters.
“Come with me,” he said.
He grasped her hand immediately, surprising her. She didn’t like that at all. It wasn’t how an Englishman would behave upon first meeting a lady. But this wasn’t England, she reminded herself. Lubinians might think nothing of a man treating a woman this way. It might even be customary here for men to act like barbarians and drag women about. She groaned at that thought. Yet it did feel as if he were dragging her, though she allowed that it simply felt that way because his much longer stride was forcing her to quicken her step to keep up with him.
He led her out of the anteroom and deeper into the palace until they came to a side entrance that opened onto a wide courtyard. It wasn’t a private courtyard where they could talk, but the ward that lay between the palace and the old fortress walls that surrounded it. Soldiers and even a few opulently dressed courtiers were passing through. A merchant with a small cart was selling meat pies to the guards.
There was still daylight, though the sun had already dipped below the mountain ranges to the west. Alana tried to slow her step but couldn’t. Where exactly was the captain taking her?
When he stopped in front of the door to a building that resembled a fancy town house but was adjoined to the ancient fortress walls, Alana took the opportunity to pull her hand away from his, though she actually had to yank a little. He glanced at her and started to chuckle, but it was abruptly cut off when an angry woman swept through the doorway and attacked the captain, pounding on his chest with her fists.
Alana adeptly moved out of the way. The captain didn’t even try. The woman, who was young, blond, and finely dressed, pounded on him rather hard, but he gave no indication that he even felt her blows!
“How dare you have me thrown out!” she shouted.
He took her wrists, one in each hand, and thrust her away from him into the ward. Not very gentlemanly, Alana thought, but the woman had been attacking him and his annoyance was now obvious.
Yet his voice was absolutely calm when he asked the young woman curiously, “How is it you’re still here, Nadia?”
“I hid from your men,” she stated rather triumphantly.
“Who will now be disciplined because of it.” He waved at two passing guards.
Nadia glanced behind her to see the guards’ swift approach, then somewhat in a panic she yelled at Count Becker, “We haven’t finished our discussion!”
“Only a fool doesn’t know when to quit, so how much of a fool does that make you, eh?” That brought a gasp from the blond woman, but it didn’t keep him from adding, “Now, would you finally open your eyes to see that the past will no longer protect you from my contempt?” To the men who had reached him, he said, “Take Miss Braune to the gates. She is no longer to be allowed entry to the palace.”
“You can’t do that, Christoph!”
“I just did.”
Distinctly uneasy now—that had been quite a beautiful woman he’d just dismissed so cavalierly—Alana said, “Is she a former lady friend of yours?”
He took a moment to shake off his annoyance before he glanced at Alana. Once again, his long look took in more than just her face. But then he smiled at her and her breath caught in her throat, it so dazzled her.
“Not as you mean,” he answered.
Then he grasped Alana’s arm and ushered her inside the building, closing the door behind him. He was gentle with her now, not rough as he’d been with that harridan, not even as firm as he’d been when dragging her here.
She took a moment to glance around and get her bearings. This large room contained two plush, dark-colored sofas with low tables set before each, a chair, several bookcases, a fancy harpsichord, and a small dining table that would seat four. This one room seemed to serve many purposes, but she didn’t think it comprised the entire first floor of the building. And then she couldn’t think at all.
