Royal Renegade by Alicia Rasley Read Free Book Online Page A

dress.
    "It's unfortunate you couldn't have seen into the future, but then youth doesn't gift us with great foresight." Then he stopped, willing the anger to recede, for she was biting her lip, about to cry. He'd never, in all these years, taxed her with her refusal of him—and she hadn't actually refused him, after all, for he'd been in no position then to offer for her. It had all been for the best, he had long thought, but her palpable regret now that he had regained his wealth was particularly irritating. Still, they were friends, and he gained nothing from hurting her. He rose, tilted up her chin, and kissed her lightly. "I'm off for a couple of months on business. I shall see you, no doubt, when I return, and we'll talk more about your suggestion."
    Sarah raised her hand as if to stop him. But their affair had strictly defined limits, and they both knew he owed her no more explanation than that.
     

 
    Chapter Four
    September 1811 Smyrna, Turkey
     
     
    To Tatiana's delight, her escort Colonel Arbatov registered her under a false name when they arrived in Smyrna, the port city on the southwest Ottoman coast. They had traveled incognito from Russia, which she found laughable as well as thrilling. For years, she had been roundly ignored throughout the palace, almost as if she did not exist. Now she was truly anonymous, but only because she had suddenly become valuable. She was now a step in the political minuet choreographed by two nations. As such, she needs must be protected on her journey from roving bandits, revolutionaries, and French raiders. None of these villains would care much about simple Mademoiselle Oblenskaya and her companion, her burly coachman, and her anxious father.
    Tatiana even looked like another person entirely, with her fashionable short coiffure—the latest style in Paris, her hairdresser had assured her—and one of her exquisite new gowns. Regrettably, her undistinguished alter ego did not call for a surfeit of luggage, so most of her wardrobe had been sent ahead by a different route.
    That low profile she had to maintain also meant she saw little of the bustling coastal city. The colonel had hustled her from the carriage directly into the narrow, white-fronted hotel and up to her suite without allowing her even a walk along the harbor. After years of confinement in the palace square, Tatiana was restless, and she was restrained from climbing down from her second-story window only by Buntin's agonized pleas.
    So Tatiana remained in the shabby elegance of her spacious suite, pacing restlessly across ornately patterned red carpet, trying out each of the worn brocade chairs. She spent most of the second day sitting in the window of her boudoir, her knees hugged to her chest as she watched the life along the harbor. Smyrna was a major trading center, as the Ottoman Empire was one of the few independent powers in Europe. Here merchants from all over the world haggled peacefully in the courtyards and coffeehouses, entirely without regard to declarations of war, trade embargoes, and tariff regulations.
    Now Tatiana ran back to the wardrobe and puffed from her bag the little spyglass that her cousin Count Korsakov had given her during their short friendship. She twisted it in her hands for a moment, recalling Peter and his happy grin and the world she had hoped he would open for her. At least his little gift would expand her vista now.
    Shaking her head to clear away the cobwebs of regret, Tatiana returned to her window and peered through the spyglass at the polyglot parade of traders with their elaborate costumes and exotic wares. Everywhere were Arabs in their concealing burnooses, Chinese in their awkward hats, the flamboyant French Zouaves in their red balloon pantaloons. Even the currencies they exchanged so openly for silks and rugs and teas were colorful and multivaried. In a world at war, Smyrna provided a testimony to the conciliatory power of trade.
    But Tatiana's envy for the freedom of