TATIANA.’
Jasper eyes me knowingly. For the first time, he almost smiles.
“I do suggest you go, Ms. Turner,” he says in that dulcet tone of his. “You might find it quite interesting.”
Chapter Eight
I tell Alex I’m going out shopping, which isn’t a big deal because I have been making it a daily routine to go shopping – Moldavian-style, of course. Alex has to go to work anyway. I was surprised to find that princes actually do work.
“I’m on the board of directors for several companies,” Alex explains, “and yes, I do have to work. As does my mother. It isn’t just lip service.”
I’m sure his job is more glamorous than a hotel maid’s.
Anyhow, my nerves are jangling as I make my way down to the East Wing entrance at 2.30 p.m. sharp. I’m dressed in one of my non-Moldavian dresses, with a Moldavian jacket slung around my shoulders. Nothing like mixing modern styles from different ethnicities. I’m sure that Tatiana will not be choosing a public place for our tete-a-tete.
Then again, I can’t be sure.
After all, what do I know about her? I have never even spoken to the woman in my entire life. Everything I know about her has been painted for me in a portrait larger than life. Tatiana has been in turns glamorized, lionized, put on a pedestal and made to look like yesterday’s news – all in one sitting. How much of it is true?
A sleek magenta Rolls Royce with darkened windows is waiting for me at the entrance, as promised. So she is punctual. A good thing.
I get into the backseat.
Butterflies invade every part of my anatomy.
Lady Tatiana Natasha Guernberg is seated there, and she gives me an encouraging smile. OK, Fallacy One disposed of. She doesn’t have fangs and two horns sticking out of her head. Her hair is as red and vivid as I remember it, and it is augmented by carefully constructed curls that must have taken hours of perming in a salon not unlike the one I went to.
Her clothes are in the color of what designers consider ‘nude’. (You see? I’m getting really good at fashion.) The bodice of her dress is embellished with a pearl and mother-of-pearl motif. I’m willing to bet those are real too.
“How are you today?” she asks.
“Good.”
I’m extremely conscious of how ordinary I look compared to her. She possesses an old world beauty that harkens back to glamorous movie stars from the last century – like Marlene Dietrich and Grace Kelly. If there’s anyone who resembles a real life princess, even though she isn’t technically one, it’s Tatiana. Her lips are painted scarlet and she doesn’t have a hair or thread out of place.
Up close, her skin is flawless. She’s breathtaking in every way.
My guts shrivel.
How can I possibly compete with this?
But you have, a joyous inner voice sings. You have and you’ve won.
This isn’t a game, I tell myself sternly. Where matters of the heart are concerned, it is never a game.
But I can’t help feeling elated. I mean – I’m nothing special. Just look at me. All I can manage to be is to look fairly attractive in designer clothes. To think that Alex prefers me (momentarily) over this exquisitely beautiful goddess is nothing short of a marvel in itself. And Alex clearly desires me. I can feel it in the c**k pressing against my thigh every morning at dawn when we both wake up together.
“Drive on, Manfred,” Tatiana instructs the chauffeur. “And put up the glass, please.”
The Rolls Royce revs off smoothly. A glass window slides into place between the front seats and the back, effectively soundproofing us from the driver.
I grip both my fists. My fingernails have been nicely manicured and done up in mauve. Tatiana’s fingernails are as scarlet as her lips.
“You must be wondering what I called you out here for,” she says pleasantly.
“Yes.”
“I wanted to meet you … in private.” Her cool brown eyes are appraising. “You are very attractive.”
The underlying tenor suggests ‘but not even close to me’.
Maybe I’m reading too much subtext into everything.
“Thank you,” I say.
“I can see why he likes you. We are like chalk and cheese, you and I. He must relish the contrast.”
“I wouldn’t know. He doesn’t share his preferences with me when it comes to women.”
That is true. Alex doesn’t. He doesn’t talk much about his women in general.
“Are you pregnant?”
Her blunt question takes me unawares. I don’t like what she’s implying either – that Alex is with me just because I’m pregnant.
“No!” I protest. I want to add, “How can you even think of asking me something like that?’ but it would only take the already charged atmosphere in the car up another notch.
“It’s a fair question,” she says.
“But not something you’d ask a total stranger,” I reply pointedly.
“I do have a stake here.”
“But still – ”
It is not the best of starts. Tatiana seems to realize this because her next sentence is conciliatory.
She says, “Anyway, I didn’t call you out here to have an argument over a man.”
I’m a little bolder now. The adrenaline boost was what I needed. “What did you call me out here for, Tatiana?”
“To get to know you. And to let you get to know me. After all, we could be friends in a different life. We are not so dissimilar – you and me. We both love him.”
Funny, but before this, I never thought Tatiana would be capable of loving anyone. But I realize that it is my subconscious that was making her a monster. Of course she’s capable of loving someone. And who more than Alex, who commands attention in every way?
I study her eyes. Her pupils are wells of deep sincerity.
She nods, and her curls bob. “Oh yes, I do love him. I don’t know what you have been led to believe, but I do love him. Just as he has once loved me. You see, I have heard many things about you, Elizabeth. Vile, nasty things. Possibly nastier things than you’ve heard about me.”
A stab of pain shoots through my chest. No one likes to be told bad things about themselves, least of all me. And what she says wears the harsh truth. The press has been nothing short of vindictive in their portrait of me as the penniless gold-digger who is trying to entrap their beloved prince.
It just never occurred to me that someone else would have a less flattering portrait of me than I have of her. I’ve always seen myself as the poor, oppressed underdog in this – never the villainess.