Prince of Hearts (24 page)

But as his gaze dropped to her face, his wicked, ridiculous thoughts sputtered out, and his anger faded. She was staring at him with tears streaming down her bloodless face through eyes the size of saucers.

"I keep forgetting ... how could I forget?" she murmured. "You're not
human
!"

Chagrined, he turned away from her and wiped the remaining blood from his temple with the edge of his shirtsleeve. He had forgotten what a shock it must be to see his wounds miraculously disappear in the blink of an eye.

When he turned back to her, she was still sniffling, and Ilya was pressed against her side as if to comfort her. This only seemed to make her cry harder. She raised her tear-filled eyes once more to him. "Ikaterina?"

He shook his head once, sharply, unable to form the words. It was still too raw.

"Oh, dear," she sobbed even harder. "And it was all my fault! How could I have been so stupid?"

He couldn't answer her. It wasn't that he blamed her, precisely. After the way Vasily had overpowered Fyodor, Sasha didn't think Aline would have been safe even had she stayed at the townhouse. Vasily had been determined to have her, whatever the cost. But he couldn't help but feel an irrational surge of resentment towards Finch. She was, after all, the reason he felt as if he were sinking to the bottom of a very deep ocean.

He’d killed without remorse for her, and he was afraid he'd do so again and again until his father's blood boiled like lava through his veins, and he'd drown in the darkness. Until he was no better than that ...
thing
Vasily had become. She’d made him lose all control.

She’d made him love her, and he hated her for it.

And he hated her stubbornness, her desire to leave him and marry a man he knew she didn't love, though this was what was best for her.

Above all, he hated the tenderness she engendered in a heart he had long though pulverized by his ancient grief. It was overwhelming.

"Why have you come here?" he bit out, all of his anger and self-loathing swiftly returning now that the shock of her unexpected arrival had worn off. He stepped over the ruins of his vase and swiped his vodka from his desk, unable to look at her. "You shouldn't be here."

He stumbled away from her and threw himself in a chair by the hearth. She followed with Ilya, wiping the tears away, though they kept falling. He tried not to care.

"You're drunk!" she breathed with some of her usual spark.

"What gave it away?" he muttered.

"You're a wreck!"

He gave her a significant glance, from the top of her tumbledown hair, to the soles of her muddy boots. Her expression began to grow angry again as she caught his meaning.

She wiped her eyes one more time and stalked to the divan opposite him and the chess board he and Fyodor used. She sat down and glared at him, though her puffy eyes and red nose undermined the effect. She looked terrible. She looked delectable. He had a very real urge to leap across the distance between them and lick her tears away.

Which was why he needed her to leave.

Or stay forever.

A dangerous thought, which he immediately quashed. Yet he found himself waving the bottle in her direction, as if he were no longer in control of his actions.

She looked at him as if he'd grown horns.

He shoved the bottle into her hands. "Drink. Trust me. You'll feel better."

He groaned inwardly at his behavior. What was he doing?

She gave him a scathing look, but then, to his surprise, she raised the bottle to her dainty lips and took a long swig. She coughed violently and clutched at her throat.

"It's like ... fire," she protested, but then she raised the bottle again. She took another long drink. And another.

He snatched the bottle away from her when she threatened to take yet another.

"Better?" he asked wryly.

She nodded. "I shouldn't have. I'm a poor drunk. One glass of wine sends me reeling."

She'd be on the floor, then, with the amount of liquor she'd just ingested. Wonderful.

"I on the other hand have been drinking for days. To little effect." That was a lie, of course. He was near to full-on intoxication, and he did not feel one inch better for the effort. He tried to focus. "I know I deserved it, but what exactly compelled you to break my vase on my head?"

Her expression fell in renewed horror at her actions. "Oh dear, it was quite valuable, wasn't it?"

He shrugged. "17th century Ming Dynasty. The artist was a friend."

She paled. "Of course he was," she murmured. "A friend."

He scowled at the bottle. "The vase was small recompense to the damage I've caused you. But I swear I've done nothing to the bone-hunter," he said, taking another giant gulp.

She glowered at him. "Why are you lying? Still? Just tell me the truth."

"I know you don't believe a word I say, but it's the truth."

"But he told me..." She broke off, a look of confusion washing over her features. "He's certain you had him fired from the University. He was quite upset about it." Her face collapsed as a new wave of tears gushed from her eyes. "He told me he was leaving! And he made it clear that ... that we're finished!" She broke off with a moan and buried her face in her hands, her shoulders heaving with broken little sobs.

At this unexpected announcement, his heart soared. He crushed his rising hope. She was not for him. She would never be for him. But when he saw how miserable she was, he felt guilty for his momentary elation – guilt and something that felt a lot like jealousy. Jealousy that he was not the one capable of stealing Finch's affection as the unworthy bone-hunter had done. And uncommon anger at the absent Charlie Neverfeel for reducing his secretary to this leaky bundle.

"I swear to God, Finch, if you don't stop leaking, I'm going to have to reupholster," he muttered, tossing a handkerchief into her lap.

"I'm normally not a watering pot," she retorted, dabbing at her eyes. "But the past few days have been rather difficult for me."

"I shall overlook it this time, Finch. You really wanted to marry him, didn't you?"

She met his eyes imploringly. "Do you not see how I might want what Charlie was offering? A chance to have a family of my own? A family I never had?"

A feeling of understanding so raw and visceral it hurt passed into his heart. He understood exactly how she felt, for it was the same thing he felt deep down inside his ruined soul. A desire for family, for normalcy, for ... peace. But he'd never have that.

"I see, " he said. It was a whisper, ragged and heartfelt.

"You do see, don't you? You lost your family too."

The sympathy in her soft voice was unbearable. He raised the bottle to his lips once more and drank long and hard, the liquid burning down his throat, warming the hollowness of his chest.

"That was long ago. We were speaking of you and the bone-hunter," he said gruffly. "You are well rid of him,
milaya
. Surely you can do better than that. He was such a prude."

"How would you know that?" she demanded, her anger returning.

"Two seconds in his company was enough to determine that. Did he even kiss you, Finch, or does his English propriety warn against such intimacy before the wedding?"

She blushed crimson. "We have kissed."

"So I was not your first," he said teasingly, though inwardly he was not so sanguine. "Well, I would doubt his manhood if he hadn't at least kissed you. He tried, perhaps, to go a bit further?"

If she blushed any more, she'd be the color of a cherry. God. He loved watching her blush.

"Charlie is a perfect gentleman," she said primly.

"He sifted around you like he was looking for old bones, didn't he?"

"He did no ... Oh,
how
are we talking about this?" she cried.

"You wanted to know my opinion of the bone-hunter. I'd wager you planned on keeping the fact you were the author of a torrid penny-dreadful from him forever."

Her eyes went wide. "How could you know...”

He smirked. "I am three hundred forty two years old,
milaya
. I study human nature for a living. And I'm sure he had no idea you have a gambling problem either."

"I didn't need to tell him that, because it's not true, and I don't gamble any more anyway!" she cried, outraged.

"Care to wager on that?"

She glared at him. At least she wasn't weeping any more. "The point is moot. Charlie and I are through. Now I am stuck here. Just as you wish," she cried. "I know you have the power to have him dismissed. I know you think you can do what you want to me, and you've made it clear you didn't want me marrying him, or going to Egypt. How can I not believe you had something to do with this?"

"It's true I never thought this Egyptian nonsense was a good idea for you. You'd desiccate in the Sahara. If you can even survive the journey."

She huffed and stuck out her jaw defiantly. "That is not for you to decide."

Hearing the truth spoken aloud was more painful than he'd thought it would be. But he just shrugged, as if it were of no consequence. "You are right. Now that the madman has been caught, my interference in your affairs is at an end. Owing to your unique condition, however, and the fact that London seems to be crawling with vampires, I doubt you'd be any safer here than in the Sahara."

"How comforting you are!" she cried. She took off her spectacles and polished the tears from them. He noticed she looked a bit unsteady. The vodka was kicking in.

"The point is, I didn’t do anything to Neverfeel. I'd not do that to you, despite what you might think,
milaya
. I want you to be happy. And I'll soon be gone from your life completely."

Her brow furrowed in confusion. She stuck her spectacles back on her nose and peered at him. "What? You're leaving?"

He gave her a wry smile and finished off the rest of his bottle. He tried to set it on the chess board between them, but he miscalculated in his stupor, and it toppled to the floor. He ignored it, as he didn't think he could retrieve it without falling out of his seat. "It is time, I believe, for me to move on."

Far from looking relieved, she looked a bit deflated, which gave him some twisted sense of comfort. At least she wasn't reveling in his pending departure. "But where will you go?"

"As far away from here as I can get," he said honestly.

"Oh," she said, faintly. She was silent for a long moment. Then, "I suppose you have to do this often. Leave. Start over. I saw those letters you keep in your secret drawer. They were from all of your different lives." She paused. "I read the one from your wife."

He'd guessed as much when he saw someone had tampered with his drawer. He clenched his jaw and refused to look at her. "Do you really want to discuss my wife, Finch?"

"I don't know what I want, Sasha," she said softly.

He froze. He'd never before heard her call him by the diminutive his mother had used. The way she said it, so softly, reminded him of the two moments he'd allowed himself to touch her, kiss her. Dangerous, erotic chills swept down his spine at the memory of the softness of her lips, her breast. He tried to shove these dangerous thoughts aside, focusing on his anger over the direction of their conversation.

"I'll tell you about Yelena," he said. "She was beautiful, sheltered, and devout. And I loved her. Then my father killed her, and she took my son with her." He sat back in his seat, still unable to look at her. But she was very still across from him, so he knew she was listening. He continued, unable to stop himself.

He'd make her understand once and for all what he was, and why he had to leave.

"It took me a year to recover from what my father did to me, and to get by memories back. When I did, I sat down with my father for our usual chess match." He gestured to the table between them. "I put arsenic in his wine, and I watched him die. Then I left Russia, and I vowed never to love like that again. Its cost was too great."

He finally looked at her. She was staring at his chest with an unfathomable expression, and he realized he was unconsciously rubbing the scar over his heart. He dropped his hand away.

"You think what you did to your father makes you just like him," she stated quietly. "You think you are a monster."

He was stunned by her perception, the bald truth spoken out loud. He gave her a wry twist of his lips. "Am I not? You saw with your own eyes what I'm capable of. I ripped Vasily's head off."

"Well, he
was
a vampire who was going to rape and murder me," she said, as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world to talk about.

His heart sank anew at the memory of her at Vasily's mercy. He gripped the arms of his chair until his knuckles were white. "I think the vodka has gone straight to your head,
milaya
. You sound as if you're defending me. You came here to throttle me, remember?"

"I do feel a bit wobbly. I should go, I suppose." But she made no move to rise. She just stared at him with that same, unreadable expression she'd been wearing for the past several minutes. It unsettled him, that look. Where was her righteous anger? Her despair over her broken engagement? "The hall was empty when I came inside tonight,” she said thoughtfully.

He shrugged. "The servants are packing up the house."

"Oh." She paused. "Already? You're leaving that quickly?"

"Yes,
milaya
."

She clasped her hands in front of her and bowed her head, hiding her expression. "I'm never going to see you again, am I?" she said in a small voice.

She sounded ... sad.
Longing
. And it nearly undid him. He was as terrified of leaving her as he was of keeping her close. He'd never felt this way before, even about Yelena. He did not know how he was going to bear it. He hardened his heart, and gave her the unvarnished truth, however. "No, I think that's for the best."

At last she raised her head, and he was shocked to see tears coursing down her face again. "But why? Why must you leave? Is it really so necessary?" she cried, with such unexpected anguish Sasha's pulse began to race.