A Bride For The Taking

A Bride for the Taking

Sandra Marton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

DORIAN had barely settled into the back of the taxi, silently thanking whatever gods were responsible for finding her an empty cab during a rainy evening rush-hour in mid-Manhattan, when traffic came to a sudden halt.

She sat forward, looked out at the press of buses, cars, and trucks, then rapped sharply on the smeared glass partition that separated her from the driver.

‘I’ve got a plane to make,’ she said in the cool, don’t-fool-with-me voice she’d learned worked best during the five years she’d lived in New York City.

The cabbie looked into his rear-view mirror and lifted his shoulders in an eloquent shrug.

‘Is a mess, lady,’ he said agreeably. ‘I do best I can.’

Dorian sank back into the cracked vinyl seat. His best, she thought glumly, would not be good enough if they didn’t get to Kennedy Airport within the next hour. The chartered flight to Barovnia would take off, leaving her behind.

The thought made her shudder. She was on the first decent assignment WorldWeek magazine had given her and, after almost two years of doing research for other reporters and little filler pieces without the coveted ‘byline’ every journalist dreamed of, she wasn’t about to lose her chance of becoming a correspondent.

A horn blared behind them, the single sound immediately taken up by what seemed to be every other vehicle caught in the tangled snarl that filled Fifty-Seventh Street. Even Dorian’s driver began to pound his fist on the horn, all the while muttering to himself in a tongue that bore no resemblance whatsoever to English.

Dorian muttered something too, short and succinct and not at all ladylike. The cabbie glanced into the mirror as if he’d heard her. We’re in this together, the look on his face said, but that wasn’t true at all. The meter was running, adding dollars to her growing frustration. He could sit here all night if he had to; at least he was earning his pay. Dorian wouldn’t really begin to earn hers until she’d boarded that damned charter flight.

It would be on the apron by now, hatches open as the personal luggage of the entire Barovnian entourage was loaded aboard. The reporters themselves would travel light, but Dorian was sure the delegation would not—especially the man at the centre of it.

Jack Alexander, the wealthy and powerful head of the giant corporation that controlled Barovnian exports, would expect to travel in style—even though his destination was an isolated kingdom with one foot still planted in the ignorance and poverty of the Middle Ages. And now—now, if the newly crowned abdhan of Barovnia died...

Dorian slid backwards as the taxi shot into a sudden opening in the traffic. Good! They were moving again—but only as far as the next corner. She groaned and rapped once more on the partition.

‘I absolutely, positively must get to Kennedy by seven,’ she said. ‘Please. Can’t you do something?’

The driver threw up his hands. ‘Is no my fault, miss.’

That was the motto of the day, Dorian thought glumly as she sank back in her seat. Her boss had used the same words when he’d dumped her into the middle of this situation.

She had been intent on the story she was writing, her fingers doing their usual hunt-and-peck across her computer keyboard while she tried to stretch a forty-word filler piece about the Florida citrus crop into one hundred words of journalistic brilliance, when a bulky shadow loomed across her desk. She looked up and saw Walt Hemple standing beside her.

‘Got to see you, babe,’ he said around the cigar that was, as always, clamped between his teeth.

Dorian nodded and got to her feet, biting back the desire to tell him for what would probably be the thousandth time that her name wasn’t ‘babe’. There was no point to it—’babe’ was Hemple’s standard form of address for all the women staffers, a not-so-subtle reminder that, even if the law and a changed society required that WorldWeek employ female reporters, Walt Hemple didn’t have to like it.

She followed him through the crowded newsroom to his office—a narrow cubicle perfumed with the noxious fumes of his cigar. Hemple elbowed past her, grunting as he settled into the old-fashioned swivel-chair behind his desk.

‘Sit,’ he said, but, as usual, there was no place to sit. Files, papers and old copies of WorldWeek were piled on the only other chair in the room.

Hemple folded his hands across his ample belly and looked at her.

‘So,’ he said after a moment, ‘how’s it going?’

She blinked. What kind of question was that? Hemple was not a man given to making small talk, especially not with staffers as far down the ladder as she.

‘All right,’ Dorian said cautiously. ‘I’m just about done with—’

‘What do you know about Barovnia?’

She blinked again. Barovnia. Barovnia. She knew the name, of course. It had been in the papers weeks before. WorldWeek had even done a piece on it.

‘Not much,’ she said, still cautiously. ‘It’s a country near the Black Sea—’

‘A kingdom. A mountain kingdom in the Carpathians.’

She nodded. ‘Right. I remember now. The Barovnian king died a couple of months ago, and—’

‘They don’t have a king. They have an abdhan.’ Hemple grinned around his cigar. ‘He’s like a cross between God and Emperor of the World—an absolute monarch with the power of life and death over his people.’

Dorian nodded again. ‘This is all very interesting,’ she said carefully, ‘but what—?’

‘Read,’ he said, shoving a sheet of paper across the desk.

She started to do as instructed, but Hemple clucked his tongue impatiently and snatched back the paper.

‘It’s an announcement from the Barovnian embassy,’ he said. ‘It just came over the wire. The abdhan may die. If he does, they’ll be crowning a new one.’

‘But it’s a mistake. You just said the king died last month—’

‘Jeez, babe, get it straight, will you? He’s called an abdhan. How many times I got to tell you that?’

Dorian’s eyes narrowed beneath their veil of dark lashes. Count to ten, she told herself, and don’t say anything you’ll regret.

‘What I’m saying, Walt, is that this is old news. The abdhan had an accident a couple of months ago—’

‘Having a massive coronary in your sleep after eighty-five years of being one of the world’s last absolute rulers can hardly be classified as an accident, babe.’

‘The bottom line is that the old man died and they replaced him, which means the wire-service story is wrong. Do you want me to phone them and—?’

‘The story is one hundred per cent on the money. The old guy died, they crowned his successor—’

‘Seref Baldov. Wasn’t that his name?’

‘Right. And yesterday there was some kind of tribal ceremony, something to do with horses. A mock battle, who the hell knows—?’

‘A tribal ceremony?’ Dorian couldn’t quite keep the scorn from her voice. ‘Hasn’t anyone told these people we’re on the threshold of the twenty-first century?’

Hemple’s teeth showed in a smile. ‘Exactly. Americans are planning a mission to Mars and the Barovnians still play at being Cossacks. Interesting point, isn’t it?’

Dorian sighed. Now she knew where this was going. A heading danced before her eyes. COSSACKS AND COSMONAUTS. Well, something like that. It didn’t matter because the piece she’d write wouldn’t rate a title. Walt would want a filler, some human interest thing that could be tucked in to fill space on the bottom of a page.

‘How many words? Fifty?’ she asked. ‘A hundred?’

‘So this Baldov guy,’ Hemple said, ignoring her, ‘the new abdhan, fell from his horse. He hit his head and now it looks like he may not pull through.’

Dorian nodded. ‘I get the picture—although frankly I don’t know why WorldWeek’s readers should much care. Just because this little king of barbarians wants to play Mongol warrior—’

Hemple’s brows drew together. ‘You need to do your homework, babe. Barovnia may be backward, but it’s got oil reserves that make the Arabs look like paupers, and minerals they can mine for the next thousand years—and if Baldov kicks the bucket it’s also going to have a new abdhan.’

He didn’t want a filler, she thought, he wanted an article. Not from her, of course—she’d only do the research. Someone with a name would be tapped to really write the piece.

‘Interesting,’ she said, trying to look as if it really were. ‘OK. I’ll put together what I can. How much time do I have?’

‘Send me your first fifteen hundred words as soon as you can after touchdown.’

Dorian’s heart gave a thump of excitement. Hemple had never sent her further than Newark on a story. Surely, he couldn’t mean...

‘Am I going somewhere?’ she asked carefully.

‘The Barovnian embassy’s arranged to fly a planeload of reporters from the major media out tonight.’

Dorian swept the stack of magazines and papers into her arms and sank down in the chair.

‘Are you sending me to Barovnia to cover this coronation?’

Hemple shoved a slim manila folder across his scarred desk-top. ‘That’s all the background the library could put together on such short notice. You can read it in the taxi on your way to the airport.’

A thousand questions were racing through Dorian’s head, but there was one in particular that demanded an answer, even though only a fool would ask it.

‘Walt?’ She took a breath. ‘It’s not that I’m not—’ She hesitated. Pick a word, she told herself, one that won’t give away the fact that you want to leap into the air and whoop with joy. She cleared her throat. ‘It’s not that I’m not pleased with this assignment, but it occurs to me, we didn’t send anybody to cover the last guy’s coronation.’

Her boss nodded. ‘Right.’

Dorian nodded, too. ‘Well, then, why...?’ She hesitated again, but it had to be said. ‘Why now? And why has the Barovnian embassy offered to fly reporters in? I mean, why would they think we’d be interested?’

Hemple leaned forward. ‘Does the name Jack Alexander mean anything to you?’

It took a few seconds to change gears. ‘Yes,’ she said after a moment. ‘Sure. He’s the head of Alexander International.’

‘Uh-huh. The guy inherited millions, and he’s racked up millions more on his own.’ Hemple switched his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other. ‘What else do you know?’

She frowned. WorldWeek had done a piece on the man once, when she’d first started at the magazine....

A look of disdain narrowed her mouth. ‘Our article said he collects women almost as easily as he collects money—except he holds on to the money.’

Walt Hemple laughed. ‘I don’t think we put it quite like that but yeah, that was the general idea. Anything else?’

‘No, I don’t—’ She nodded. ‘He hates personal publicity. His women lined up to be interviewed, but we couldn’t get a reporter past Alexander’s door.’

‘Not with questions about himself, no. Ask him about Alexander International, he talks. Ask him about Jack Alexander, he turns to stone.’

‘Walt, I really don’t understand. All this is interesting, but what’s the point? If you’re sending me to Barovnia, what’s all this side-bar stuff about Alexander have to do with it?’

Hemple’s chair groaned its displeasure as he tilted it forward and leaned across his desk.

‘Alexander International should really be called Barovnian Exports. Sixty, sixty-five per cent of what it controls comes from there.’

‘So?’

‘So,’ Hemple said, smiling slyly, ‘it turns out that our pal, Mr Alexander, has been sitting on a secret, babe.’ He paused dramatically. ‘Mama was a Southern belle. But Daddy—Daddy was a Barovnian. A Barovnian of royal lineage, no less.’

It was Dorian’s turn to lean forward. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean,’ Hemple said with relish, ‘that Jack Alexander was born Jaacov Alexandrei.’ The sly smile came again. ‘I mean that the guy’s a product of the Virginia Military Academy, Harvard, and the Wharton School of Business—and now it turns out that under that hand-tailored, three-piece suit beats the heart of the guy who may become the next abdhan.’

Dorian’s green eyes opened wide with shock. ‘What?’

‘Alexander’s gonna be on that plane, along with a handful of his business buddies—American advisers, the Press release calls them. How’s that grab you, babe?’

It grabbed her. How could it not? It was the best kind of story, a reporter’s dream, all the most basic human interest stuff combined with something as serious as oil and gold and international dollars.

‘Are you sure?’ Hemple nodded, and Dorian frowned. ‘Wait a minute. If this is the same Jack Alexander, the one who’s gun-shy of publicity, why’s he taking a planeload of reporters along with him to Barovnia?’

‘The embassy made the arrangements, not him.’ Hemple’s eyelid dropped in a conspiratorial wink. ‘And from what I’ve heard—on the QT, of course—Alexander made them wait until the last minute before he agreed to their plan. The guy’s no dummy. There’d be no way to keep something like this off the front pages—he must figure the best way to handle things is to control the story inside Barovnia, where he’s got the power, instead of having rumours leak out from the foreign embassies.’

Dorian nodded. It made sense. The only thing that didn’t make sense was that this plum should be falling into her lap.

‘Just think,’ Hemple said, chuckling. ‘All these years, companies have lived or died on this guy’s say-so—and now it turns out that he may get that kind of power over people’s lives. God, is that a story just waiting to be written, or isn’t it?’

It was. Oh, it definitely was. But why was he giving it to her? Why?

‘Here.’ Hemple tossed an envelope across his desk. ‘Everything you need is in there, including chits to sign for Accounting so you can take some cash with you—which reminds me, I want you to hop downstairs and buy whatever you think you’ll need. Clothes, make-up—you know what I mean. The plane leaves in two hours, so there’s no time to go home and get your stuff.’

Dorian nodded. ‘That’s OK. All I’ll need is a toothbrush and a change of...’ She fell silent. Whatever you’ll need. Clothes, make-up. Make-up...

And suddenly it all fell into place.

‘Walt.’ Her voice trembled a little with anger; she had to clear her throat before she could continue. ‘Walt,’ she said, choosing her words with the greatest care, ‘I’m grateful for this chance. You know I am.’

Her boss’s expression gave nothing away. ‘But?’

‘But I’m not—I mean, I assume you haven’t chosen me because I’m...I certainly wouldn’t want to think that—that...’

‘Because you’re a woman. A good-looking woman. Is that what you’re choking over saying?’

Dorian swallowed hard. ‘Yes. No. I mean—dammit, Walt, is that the reason you picked me? Because you think Alexander will—will notice me?’

Hemple’s beady eyes moved over her, assessing without personal interest her shiny cap of silvery blonde hair, her wide-set green eyes fringed by heavy, dark lashes, the small straight nose and full mouth.

‘He’d have to be dead not to notice you, babe,’ he said flatly.

Dorian flushed. She had no illusions about her looks. She was pretty, perhaps more than pretty, but it was nothing to do with her. She had inherited her beauty, she hadn’t worked at it as she had at honing her reporting skills, and if she’d wanted to use her looks she’d have done so long ago. More than one city-room editor had made it clear that she could get ahead by going to bed—his bed, more specifically. She could even more easily have carved a career in TV news, where a pretty face went a lot further than ability.

But she hadn’t done any of that. And she wasn’t about to start now.

‘Walt.’ She straightened in her chair. ‘I want this assignment very badly. But I’m not going to take it if you think—if you’re assuming I’ll trade on my—on my looks to get anything out of Alexander. I don’t work that way.’ Her head lifted until her eyes were boring into his. ‘And you’ve absolutely no right to ask me to do something like that, either.’

Hemple’s smile was bland. ‘I sent you out to interview that librarian who hit the jackpot a few months ago. Why did I choose you, do you think?’

‘That’s not the same thing.’

‘Because your résumé says you worked a year as a library assistant, babe. It was a good fit, the same as it made sense to send Joe Banks to interview that sky-diver once I knew Banks jumped out of airplanes, too.’

‘Walt, it’s different. You’re asking me to—’

‘I’m asking you to be what you are—a reporter and a looker, too.’ He gave her a quick, hard smile. ‘Unless you’d rather I handed this over to somebody else.’

Dorian had stared at her boss, hating him for putting her in this spot, hating herself for not being able to tell him what he could do with his assignment, almost hating herself for being a woman.

It had been as if Hemple had been able to read her mind. His smile had broadened until it threatened to dislodge the cigar, and that had been when he’d uttered the words that almost mirrored the ones the taxi driver had used.

‘Why fight reality, babe? After all, it’s not my fault you’re a good-looking broad, is it?’

Dorian sighed as she remembered the smirk on his face as he’d spoken. Hemple was a pig, she thought as the taxi exited the Queens Midtown Tunnel and started along the highway, but he was the man in charge.

She took the file folder from her bag and opened it. The bottom line was that he’d given her an assignment, and she would fulfil it to the best of her ability.

She would certainly not use sex to accomplish it; she’d made that clear enough to him before she’d left his office. Hemple had only smiled. Dorian had known what he was thinking: that if Alexander had a choice between talking to her and to a male reporter he’d talk to her.

She sighed again as she began leafing through the papers inside the folder. Even if he did, it wouldn’t be because she’d gone out of her way to set things up. Certainly, she’d done nothing to glamourise herself.

She’d taken money from Accounting and dashed to a little shop on the corner where she’d bought a large carrying bag and only the basics: comb, toothbrush, underwear, a pair of jeans and a couple of T-shirts in addition to the khaki trouser suit she was wearing. Nothing feminine, nothing—

There was a sudden bang and the taxi lurched sharply to the right. Dorian cried out as the papers in her lap went flying. The driver cursed, this time loudly and fluently in Anglo-Saxon English, and pulled the vehicle off the road and on to the grassy verge.

Dorian leaned forward and hammered on the partition. ‘What happened?’ she demanded. ‘Why are we stopping?’

The man turned and slid the glass aside. ‘We have flat tyre, miss. I must change.’

She stared at him. ‘How long will that take?’

He shrugged. ‘Ten minute. Maybe fifteen. It is raining. Not so easy to do.’

‘Well, then—can you call for another taxi to come and pick me up?’

He shrugged again. ‘Sure. Can do. But other car may not come any faster than I change tyre.’

Dorian glanced at her watch. ‘Do it anyway, please,’ she said. ‘I’m really desperate.’

He did as she’d asked, then set to work. It had gone from afternoon to night now, and the rain had turned into a steady downpour. Time passed, but no new taxi appeared.

Dorian flung open the door and stepped out into the darkness. Wind buffeted her; she felt the rain drive straight through her thin cotton jacket and trousers, felt it plaster her hair to her skull. Spray from a passing car slapped against her face.

‘Miss.’ She turned. The driver had risen to his feet and was standing beside her, looking at her as if she were crazy. ‘I cannot fix. The jack no work. Please, we sit in taxi and wait.’

Dorian shook her head. ‘I can’t wait,’ she said. ‘My plane will be leaving.’ She peered ahead into the night. ‘We’re almost at the airport, aren’t we?’

‘Yes, but—’

‘That’s what I thought.’ She reached inside the taxi and grabbed her holdall. The contents of the file she’d yet to look at—clippings, photos—all of it lay scattered on the floor. But it was too late now. ‘I’ll start walking,’ Dorian said. ‘If another taxi shows up, send the driver looking for me, will you?’

‘Miss, please, you cannot.’

‘Here.’ She dug into her bag for some bills and tucked them into the bewildered driver’s hand. ‘Maybe I’ll be lucky and someone will stop and give me a lift.’

‘In New York?’ The driver’s voice carried after her as she began marching towards the distant airport. ‘It will not happen, miss, and even if it should you cannot trust. Not in this city. Please. You must wait.’

But she couldn’t, not if she was going to make that plane. Dorian’s footsteps quickened. The driver was right, of course. No car would stop for her. This was New York, where only the fittest survived. You could fall to the pavement in the middle of Fifth Avenue and no one would acknowledge it. And he was right about the rest, too. In this city, you couldn’t trust anyone, especially someone crazy enough to stop to pick up a stranger.

Not that that would stop her. You couldn’t be a good reporter if you were afraid of—

A horn blared shrilly, making her jump. Dorian’s head lifted sharply. Go on, she thought, have fun at my expense. A truck whizzed by, closer than it had a right to be to the verge; water splashed over her, cold as ice.

She shuddered and kept walking. How long would it take to walk a mile or two under these conditions? Twenty minutes? Half an hour? Would she make it on time, or—?

A car swept past her, swung sharply to the right, and came to a stop on the verge of the road just ahead. It was a sports car, something long and lean with a throbbing engine. Dorian blinked her eyes against the rain. Could it be...? Yes. Yes! The passenger door was swinging open.

She began running, her pace awkward in the muddy grass. When she reached the car, she paused and leaned down towards it.

The interior was dimly lit and leather-scented. Warmth drifted towards her, along with the faint strains of Tchaikovsky. There was a man at the wheel, but she couldn’t see him very clearly. His face alternated between light and shadow from the headlights of oncoming cars. All she could tell was that he was tall and that his hands lay lightly—and powerfully—on the steering-wheel.

‘Thank you so much for stopping,’ she said, her voice a little breathless. ‘You just saved my life.’

He turned slowly towards her, and for some reason her heart seemed to tighten in her breast. His face still alternated between light and shadow, but she could see that he had dark hair and eyes, a straight, handsome nose above what seemed to be a full mouth, and an arrogant tilt to his chin.

‘Where are you going?’ he asked. His voice was deep and soft, almost smoky. Dorian had the sudden crazy feeling that he never had to raise that voice at all, that people would do whatever they had to do to hear his words.

‘You cannot trust,’ the taxi driver had said. ‘You cannot trust...’