Golden Paradise

him fill her deep and hard and so intensely that she cried out in ecstasy.

'Am I dying?' she breathed a long moment later when the sound of her voice had faded into the night.

'No, darling, it's the very best of living, trust me,' he murmured into the curls near her ear, and the rhythm of his lower body, slow and smooth and carefully choreographed to suit her, to please her, brought the entire focus of the world to the flame-hot center of her body. It was living, she thought, breathless, her pulse beating in her ears, her skin so hot she felt as though they were back on the plain of Kars. It was bliss and an open door into paradise. Was this love, too, she wondered, this torrid, melting lust? Did you love a man like this, skilled and perfect and so beautiful?

She hoped not, she thought in the small pocket of logic that remained in her dissolving brain. She hoped not because she'd get lost in the crowd.

It wouldn't be much longer, Stefan decided, short moments later, watching her eyes and the flush on her face and throat, aware of her small hands fiercely pulling him close so she could feel him longer and deeper and more intensely. She was the most flagrantly sensual woman he knew, untouched by convention, more heated in her intemperate response than his Gypsy lover. Maybe it was the Kuzan blood. Sensuality ran unbridled through the family. She was a glowing, extravagant woman and she was about to climax.

He met and joined her passion with his in a driving, insistent wildness that kept her agonized, dying with pleasure for long practised moments until she trembled with small gasping sobs in his arms and he poured, shuddering, into her. Then they lay, sheened with sweat, their heartbeats shaking the bed.

In the course of the summer night they dallied like the lovers in Hafiz, and he taught her what pleasure was. She would say into the moonlit room, breathless with passion, 'You know that too?'

'And that!' She lay gilded with moonlight and pampered indulgence.

'And than'

Finally he laughed and said, 'I'll have to show you the Renaissance printmakers and the Japanese, sweet child. Hafiz is only one in a galaxy.'

Her smile was new when she looked up at him lying above her, and it was touched with a delightful sangfroid in addition to her habitual imperturbability.

'How nice,' she said.

Chapter Three

In the morning the Prince decided against an immediate return to Tiflis. Instead he sent his troopers ahead and pursued idyllic leisured activities with the Countess for several additional days. And when they finally chose to travel north, the Countess's wardrobe having been nastily restored by Aleksandropol's only French dressmaker still in residence, the two-day journey stretched into a number of more delightfully lazy days.

Prince Bariatinsky's household, of course, had been on the alert for his appearance since his men had arrived days before, so when the Prince and Countess drew up to the grand marble staircase of his palace overlooking Tiflis, his entire staff was at attention in the drive while two women-one elderly, the other young-stood on the first broad landing waiting their arrival.

His aunt lived with him, so her appearance was expected, but the younger woman Stefan recognized with a start. What was Nadejda doing two thousand miles from Saint Petersburg? He absorbed the shock with no visible change in his expression and bestowed casual greetings on the servants as he helped Lisaveta dismount. After introducing her to his majordomo, who greeted her with a proper bow and a friendly smile, Stefan escorted Lisaveta up the rank of white marble stairs to the broad balustraded landing where the two women waited.

Lisaveta assumed the small, trim, grey-haired woman was Stefan's aunt. He'd assured her Militza would be pleased to have her as a guest before she resumed her journey home to her estate near Rostov. But he hadn't mentioned anyone else. And while Stefan's aunt was smiling, the pretty blonde at her side was not. Was the scowling young lady a niece constrained from her own amusements to wait here and greet her uncle? Or simply some family friend, sulky by nature? She would soon find out since Stefan was about to introduce her.

With his hand lightly holding her elbow, Stefan moved with Lisaveta the short distance across the polished marble landing to where the two ladies stood. 'Countess Lazaroff,' he said, his voice touched with his usual nonchalance, 'I'd like you to meet my Aunt Militza and my-' He hesitated the smallest instant.

'Fiancee,' the fair-haired woman interjected firmly, her smile tight.

'Princess Nadejda Taneiev,' he said, as though he hadn't spent the last eight days in bed with Lisaveta, 'may I present the Countess Lisaveta Lazaroff.'

'You wouldn't be Felix's daughter?' Militza asked, ignoring Nadejda's anger and Lisaveta's embarrassment, her casual inquiry similar in tone to her nephew's when introducing his newest paramour to his fiancee.

'Yes,' Lisaveta and Stefan answered simultaneously, she in nervous response, he because he found himself strangely concerned his aunt like her.

'I knew your father years ago. He was a delightful dancer.'

Lisaveta couldn't help but smile, even though her temper was beginning to rise at Stefan's deceit or omission or whatever word best described his failure to mention he was engaged. Not that she was some naive adolescent who expected an offer of marriage after their intimacy-after all she had wanted him as much, if not more. But she expected a certain degree of honesty. She didn't realize that showed her naivete. Honesty was hardly an essential in matters of amour; play words were more useful, love words, pretty turns of phrase universally applied.

'I didn't know he danced well,' she replied, admiring Stefan's aunt's warm smile. So her father's accomplishments weren't confined to scholarly pursuits; this new image was pleasant. 'I never saw him dance,' she added.

'He was a favorite of all the ladies before your mama decided she wanted him. Did you meet Stefan at Maribelle?' Lisaveta's mother had once owned an estate by that name near Aleksandropol.

'Actually, no. Maman sold it before she died. I met Stefan on the plain between Kars and Aleksandropol.' Lisaveta paused, not knowing where or how to begin.

'She was abducted by the Bazhis,' Stefan interjected. 'We had given chase-'

'And you rescued her,' Nadejda said in a malevolent tone.

At Nadejda's vitriolic sarcasm, Stefan's gaze swung from his aunt to his fiancee.

Despite her own fury at Stefan's oversight in informing her of his fiancee, Lisaveta was still deeply grateful to him. Whatever her reservations concerning his character, he had rescued her. 'He saved my life,' she said calmly.

'And you naturally rewarded him.'

'Nadejda,' Stefan said. The single word was an order to silence.

'Why don't we go up to the house for tea?' Militza interjected, shamelessly pleased Stefan had reprimanded his fiancee. She'd been forced to endure the girl's uncharitable company for Nadejda had unexpectedly arrived in Tiflis with her parents on a visit to the Viceroy.

Felix Lazaroff's daughter was very beautiful, Militza thought, although not to Stefan's usual taste in women, which gravitated toward glamorous blondes. This girl was refined and delicate, her features touched with the ingenue, although her height was a shade above the average. Stefan usually preferred small women. How interesting, she speculated. As interesting as his cryptic note mentioning he might bring home a guest. Haci had defined the word guest for her, but more interesting yet was the fact Stefan invited the Countess to his home. A staggering first.

Months ago she'd watched with constrained silence as Stefan coldly selected a fiancee, appalled at his final choice. Nadejda was absolutely without endearing qualities. She was certainly striking, if one favored cool, fair- haired beauties from wealthy, powerfully connected families. But Stefan could have had anyone. When she'd said as much to him rather wrath-fully when he'd come back to Tiflis engaged, he'd only shrugged and said, not in explanation but in simple statement, 'I only had a week furlough.'

Lisaveta was desperately trying to formulate a suitable reply to Militza's suggestion of tea, for she wanted nothing less than to have to socialize with Stefan's malicious fiancee, when Stefan interposed. 'Perhaps we could