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  “No, thank you.”

  Dom paused with his hand on the stopper of the Bohemian crystal decanter he and Zia had brought the duchess as a gift for their first meeting. Thinking to soften the researcher’s stiff edges, he gave her a slow smile.

  “Are you sure? This apricot brandy is a specialty of my country.”

  “I’m sure.”

  Dom blinked. Mi a fene! Did her nose just quiver again? As though she’d picked up another bad odor? What the hell kind of tales had Zia and/or Gina fed the woman?

  Shrugging, he splashed brandy into two snifters and carried one to the duchess. But if anyone could use a shot of pálinka, he thought as he folded his long frame into the chair beside his great-aunt’s, the research assistant could. The double-distilled, explosively potent brandy would set more than her nostrils to quivering.

  “How long will you be in New York?” the duchess asked after downing a healthy swallow.

  “Only tonight. I have a meeting in Washington tomorrow.”

  “Hmm. I should wait until Zia and Gina return to discuss this with you, but they already know about it.”

  “About what?”

  “The Edict of 1867.” She set her brandy aside, excitement kindling in her faded blue eyes. “As you may remember from your history books, war with Prussia forced Emperor Franz Joseph to cede certain concessions to his often rambunctious Hungarian subjects. The Edict of 1867 gave Hungary full internal autonomy as long as it remained part of the empire for purposes of war and foreign affairs.”

  “Yes, I know this.”

  “Did you also know Karlenburgh added its own codicil to the agreement?”

  “No, I didn’t, but then I would have no reason to,” Dom said gently. “Karlenburgh is more your heritage than mine, Duchess. My grandfather—your husband’s cousin—left Karlenburgh Castle long before I was born.”

  And the duchy had ceased to exist soon after that. World War I had carved up the once-mighty Austro-Hungarian Empire. World War II, the brutal repression of the Cold War era, the abrupt dissolution of the Soviet Union and vicious attempts at “ethnic cleansing” had all added their share of upheavals to the violently changing political landscape of Eastern Europe.

  “Your grandfather took his name and his bloodline with him when he left Karlenburgh, Dominic.” Charlotte leaned closer and gripped his arm with fingers that dug in like talons. “You inherited that bloodline and that name. You’re a St. Sebastian. And the present Grand Duke of Karlenburgh.”

  “What?”

  “Natalie found it during her research. The codicil. Emperor Franz Joseph reconfirmed that the St. Sebastians would carry the titles of Grand Duke and Duchess forever and in perpetuity in exchange for holding the borders of the empire. The empire doesn’t exist anymore, but despite all the wars and upheavals, that small stretch of border between Austria and Hungary remains intact. So, therefore, does the title.”

  “On paper, perhaps. But the lands and outlying manors and hunting lodges and farmlands that once comprised the duchy have long since been dispersed and redeeded. It would take a fortune and decades in court to reclaim any of them.”

  “The lands and manor houses are gone, yes. Not the title. Sarah will become Grand Duchess when I die. Or Gina if, God forbid, something should happen to her sister. But they married commoners. According to the laws of primogeniture, their husbands can’t assume the title of Grand Duke. Until either Sarah or Gina has a son, or their daughters grow up and marry royalty, the only one who can claim it is you, Dom.”

  Right, he wanted to drawl. That and ten dollars would get him a half-decent espresso at one of New York’s overpriced coffee bars.

  He swallowed the sarcasm but lobbed a quick glare at the woman wearing an expression of polite interest, as if she hadn’t initiated this ridiculous conversation with her research. He’d have a thing or two to say to Ms. Clark later about getting the duchess all stirred up over an issue that was understandably close to her heart but held little relevance to the real world. Particularly the world of an undercover operative.

  He allowed none of those thoughts to show in his face as he folded Charlotte’s hand between his. “I appreciate the honor you want to bestow on me, Duchess. I do. But in my line of work, I can hardly hang a title around my neck.”

  “Yes, I want to speak to you about that, too. You’ve been living on the edge for too many years now. How long can you continue before someone nicks more than a rib?”

  “Exactly what I’ve been asking him,” Zia commented as she swept into the sitting room with her long-legged stride.

  She’d taken advantage of her few hours away from the hospital to pull on her favorite jeans and a summer tank top in blistering red. The rich color formed a striking contrast to her dark eyes and shoulder-length hair as black and glossy as her brother’s. When he stood and opened his arms, she walked into them and hugged him with the same fierce affection he did her.

  She was only four years younger than Dom, twenty-seven to his thirty-one, but he’d assumed full responsibility for his teenage sibling when their parents died. He’d been there, too, standing round-the-clock watch beside her hospital bed when she’d almost bled to death after a uterine cyst ruptured her first year at university. The complications that resulted from the rupture had changed her life in so many ways.

  What hadn’t changed was Dom’s bone-deep protectiveness. No matter where his job took him or what dangerous enterprise he was engaged in, Zia had only to send a coded text and he would contact her within hours, if not minutes. Although he always shrugged off the grimmer aspects of his work, she’d wormed enough detail out of him over the years to add her urging to that of the duchess.

  “You don’t have to stay undercover. Your boss at Interpol told me he has a section chief job waiting for you whenever you want it.”

  “You can see me behind a desk, Zia-mia?”

  “Yes!”

  “What a poor liar you are.” He made a fist and delivered a mock punch to her chin. “You wouldn’t last five minutes under interrogation.”

  Gina had returned during their brief exchange. Shoving back her careless tumble of curls, she entered the fray. “Jack says you would make an excellent liaison to the State Department. In fact, he wants to talk to you about that tomorrow, when you’re in Washington.”

  “With all due respect to your husband, Lady Eugenia, I’m not ready to join the ranks of bureaucrats.”

  His use of her honorific brought out one of Gina’s merry, irreverent grins. “Since we’re tossing around titles here, has Grandmother told you about the codicil?”

  “She has.”

  “Well then…” Fanning out the skirts of her leafy-green sundress, she sank to the floor in an elegant, if theatrical, curtsy.

  Dom muttered something distinctly unroyal under his breath. Fortunately, the Clark woman covered it when she pushed to her feet.

  “Excuse me. This is a family matter. I’ll leave you to discuss it and go back to my research. You’ll call me when it’s convenient for us to continue our interview, Duchess?”

  “I will. You’re in New York until Thursday, is that correct?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Then I fly to Paris to compare notes with Sarah.”

  “We’ll get together again before then.”

  “Thank you.” She bent to gather the bulging briefcase that had been resting against the leg of her chair. Straightening, she nudged up her glasses back into place. “It was good to meet you, Dr. St. Sebastian, and to see you again, Lady Eugenia.”

  Her tone didn’t change. Neither did her polite expression. But Dom didn’t miss what looked very much like a flicker of disdain in her brown eyes when she dipped her head in his direction.

  “Your Grace.”

  He didn’t alter his expression, either, but both his sister and his cousin recognized the sudden, silky note in his voice.

  “I’ll see you to the door.”

  “Thank you, but I’ll let myself… Oh. Uh, all right.”
<
br />   Natalie blinked owlishly behind her glasses. The smile didn’t leave Dominic St. Sebastian’s ridiculously handsome face and the hand banding her upper arm certainly wouldn’t leave any bruises. That didn’t make her feel any less like a suspect being escorted from the scene of a crime, however. Especially when he paused with a hand on the door latch and skewered her with a narrow glance from those dark eyes.

  “Where are you staying?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Where are you staying?”

  Good Lord! Was he hitting on her? No, he couldn’t be! She was most definitely not his type. According to Zia’s laughing reports, her bachelor brother went for leggy blondes or voluptuous brunettes. A long string of them, judging by the duchess’s somewhat more acerbic references to his sowing altogether too many wild oats.

  That more than anything had predisposed Natalie to dislike Dominic St. Sebastian sight unseen. She’d fallen for a too-handsome, too-smooth operator like him once and would pay for that stupidity for the rest of her life. Still, she tried, she really tried, to keep disdain from seeping into her voice as she tugged her arm free.

  “I don’t believe where I’m staying is any of your business.”

  “You’ve made it my business with this nonsense about a codicil.”

  Whoa! He could lock a hand around her arm. He could perp-walk her to the door. He could not disparage her research.

  Thoroughly indignant, Natalie returned fire. “It’s not nonsense, as you would know if you’d displayed any interest in your family’s history. I suggest you show a little more respect for your heritage, Your Grace, and for the duchess.”

  He muttered something in Hungarian she suspected was not particularly complimentary and bent an elbow against the doorjamb, leaning close. Too close! She could see herself in his pupils, catch the tang of apricot brandy on his breath.

  “My respect for Charlotte is why you and I are going to have a private chat, yes? I ask again, where are you staying?”

  His Magyar roots were showing, Natalie noted with a skitter of nerves. The slight thickening of his accent should have warned her. Should have sent her scurrying back into the protective shell she’d lived inside for so long it was now as much a part of her life as her drab hair and clothes. But some spark of her old self tilted her chin.

  “You’re supposed to be a big, bad secret agent,” she said coolly. “Dig out the information yourself.”

  He would, Dom vowed as the door closed behind her with a small thud. He most definitely would.

  Two

  All it took was one call to arm Dom with the essential information. Natalie Elizabeth Clark. Born Farmington, Illinois. Age twenty-nine, height five feet six inches, brown hair, brown eyes. Single. Graduated University of Michigan with a degree in library science, specializing in archives and presentation. Employed as an archivist with Centerville Community College for three years, the State of Illinois Civil Service Board for four. Currently residing in L.A. where she was employed by Sarah St. Sebastian as a personal assistant.

  An archivist. Christ!

  Dom shook his head as his cab picked its way downtown later that evening. He envisioned a small cubicle, her head bent toward a monitor screen, her eyes staring through those thick lenses at an endless stream of documents to be verified, coded and electronically filed. And she’d done it for seven years! Dom would have committed ritual hara-kiri after a week. No wonder she’d jumped when Sarah put out feelers for an assistant to help research her book.

  Ms. Clark was still running endless computer searches. Still digging through archives, some electronic, some paper. But at least now she was traveling the globe to get at the most elusive of those documents. And, Dom guessed as his cab pulled up at the W New York, doing that traveling on a very generous expense account.

  He didn’t bother to stop at the front desk. His phone call had confirmed that Ms. Clark had checked into room 1304 two days ago. And a tracking program developed for the military and now in use by a number of intelligence agencies confirmed her cell phone was currently emitting signals from this location.

  Two minutes later Dom rapped on her door. The darkening of the peephole told him she was as careful in her personal life as she no doubt was in her work. He smiled his approval, then waited for the door to open.

  When neither of those events happened, he rapped again. Still no response.

  “It’s Dominic St. Sebastian, Ms. Clark. I know you’re in there. You may as well open the door.”

  She complied but wasn’t happy about it. “It’s generally considered polite to call ahead for an appointment instead of just showing up at someone’s hotel room.”

  The August humidity had turned her shapeless linen dress into a roadmap of wrinkles, and her sensible pumps had been traded for hotel flip-flops. She’d freed her hair from the clip, though, and it framed her face in surprisingly thick, soft waves as she tipped Dom a cool look through her glasses.

  “May I ask why you felt compelled to come all the way downtown to speak with me?”

  Dom had been asking himself the same thing. He’d confirmed this woman was who she said she was and verified her credentials. The truth was he probably wouldn’t have given Natalie Clark a second thought if not for those little nose quivers.

  He’d told himself the disdain she’d wiped off her face so quickly had triggered his cop’s instinct. Most of the scum he’d dealt with over the years expressed varying degrees of contempt for the police, right up until they were cuffed and led away. His sister, however, would probably insist those small hints of derision had pricked his male ego. It was true that Dom could never resist a challenge. But despite Zia’s frequent assertions to the contrary, he didn’t try to finesse every female who snagged his attention into bed.

  Still, he was here and here he intended to remain until he satisfied his curiosity about this particular female. “I’d like more information on this codicil you’ve uncovered, Ms. Clark.”

  “I’m sure you would. I’ll be happy to email you the documentation I’ve…”

  “I prefer to see what you have now. May I come in, or do we continue our discussion in the hall?”

  Her mouth pursing, she stood aside. Her obvious reluctance intrigued Dom. And, all right, stirred his hunting instincts. Too bad he had that meeting at the National Central Bureau—the US branch of Interpol—in Washington tomorrow. It might have been interesting to see what it would take to get those prim, disapproving lips to unpurse and sigh his name.

  He skimmed a glance around the room. Two queen beds, one with her open briefcase and neat stacks of files on it. An easy chair angled to get the full benefit of the high-definition flat-screen. A desk with a black ergonomic chair, another stack of files and a seventeen-inch laptop open to a webpage displaying a close-up of an elaborately jeweled egg.

  “One of the Fabergé eggs?” he asked, moving closer to admire the sketch of a gem-encrusted egg nested in a two-wheeled gold cart.

  “Yes.”

  “The Cherub with a Chariot,” Dom read, “a gift from Tsar Alexander III to his wife, Maria Fyodorovna for Easter, 1888. One of eight Fabergé eggs currently lost.”

  He glanced at the researcher hovering protectively close to her work, as if to protect it from prying eyes.

  “And you’re on the hunt for it?”

  “I’m documenting its history.”

  Her hand crept toward the laptop’s lid, as if itching to slam it down.

  “What have you found so far?”

  The lips went tight again, but Dom was too skilled at interrogations to let her off the hook. He merely waited until she gave a grudging nod.

  “Documents show it was at Gatchina Palace in 1891, and was one of forty or so eggs sent to the armory at the Kremlin after the 1917 Revolution. Some experts believe it was purchased in the 1930s by Victor and Armand Hammer. But…”

  He could see when her fascination with her work overcame her reluctance to discuss it. Excitement snuck into her voice an
d added a spark to her brown eyes. Her very velvety, very enticing brown eyes, he thought as she tugged off her glasses and twirled them by one stem.

  “I found a reference to a similar egg sold at an antiques shop in Paris in 1930. A shop started by a Russian émigré. No one knows how the piece came into his possession, but I’ve found a source I want to check when I’m in Paris next week. It may…”

  She caught herself and brought the commentary to an abrupt halt. The twirling ceased. The glasses whipped up, and wariness replaced the excitement in the doe-brown eyes.

  “I’m not trying to pump you for information,” Dom assured her. “Interpol has a whole division devoted to lost, stolen or looted cultural treasures, you know.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Since you’re heading over to Paris, I can set up a meeting for you with the division chief, if you like.”

  The casual offer seemed to throw her off balance. “I… Uh… I have access to their database but…” Her glance went to the screen, then came back to Dom. “I would appreciate that,” she said stiffly. “Thank you.”

  A grin sketched across his face. “There now. That didn’t taste so bad going down, did it?”

  Instant alarms went off in Natalie’s head. She could almost hear their raucous clanging as she fought to keep her chin high and her expression politely remote. She would not let a lazy grin and a pair of glinting, bedroom eyes seduce her. Not again. Never again.

  “I’ll give you my business card,” she said stiffly. “Your associate can reach me anytime at my mobile number or by email.”

  “So cool, so polite.” He didn’t look at the embossed card she retrieved from her briefcase, merely slipped it into the pocket of his slacks. “What is it about me you don’t like?”

  How about everything!

  “I don’t know you well enough to dislike you.” She should have left it there. Would have, if he hadn’t been standing so close. “Nor,” she added with a shrug, “do I wish to.”

  She recognized her error at once. Men like Dominic St. Sebastian would take that as a challenge. Hiding a grimace, Natalie attempted some quick damage control.