"Possibly, but"-Tatiana shook her head in as firm a manner as possible-"I do not wish to involve anyone else at this point. In my brother's last letter he wrote that he is confident the viscount had never heard of the Heavens until Alexei told him." She sat down on the edge of the sofa and met the dowager's gaze. "I cannot help but think that the fewer people who are aware of my search, the better the chances for success. Just revealing the loss of the Heavens would give Valentina an advantage in Avalonia I fear to consider. It is a weapon already in her hands, but I am confident she will not use it, nor will she give up looking for the Heavens, until I do. Or until the jewels are found."

"Then you have little time to lose. You should leave for Weston Manor at once." The dowager rose to her feet. Tatiana followed suit. "Given your brother's presence at your side tonight, my lord, I gather you have gotten over your reluctance to return home?"

"Indeed I have, ma'am." Matthew grinned. "And I am most appreciative of your assistance in that regard."

Her Grace snorted. "Come, now, my boy. Call it what it is. Meddling, plain and simple." She cast him a smug smile. "And most successful. Now, if you will excuse me, I shall return to my guests."

Matthew quickly stepped to the door and opened it for the elderly lady.

"I shall leave the two of you alone." Her Grace paused in the doorway and leveled a firm gaze at Tatiana. "I suspect you have much to discuss."

"As for you..." She leaned toward Matthew and lowered her voice. "Sometimes, my boy, love is indeed enough." The dowager turned and swept from the room.

"What did she mean?" Tatiana said.

Matthew closed the door slowly and deliberately, as if he needed time to pull his thoughts together. It did not bode well.

"Why didn't you tell me?" His voice was level and cool. She hadn't the slightest idea what he was thinking.

She stifled the immediate urge to pretend she had no idea what he was referring to as well. "I did."

He scoffed. "When?"

"Well..." She bit her bottom lip and thought for a moment. "Any number of times, I just can't recollect exactly, at the moment."

He raised a brow. "Odd, how they seem to have slipped your mind."

"Now I remember." She nodded firmly. "When I discovered your deception regarding your

grandmother-"

"My deception?"

"I distinctly remember saying then that I was your wife and would always be your wife."

"I thought you were being sentimental."

"Sentimental?" She planted her hands on her hips and stared. "If I remember the circumstances of that

conversation correctly, the pervasive sentiment was not undying love and affection."

"Yes, well..." He waved away her comment and stepped toward her. "You should have told me long before then."

"I've called you my lord husband. Several times, I believe."

"I considered it nothing more than sarcasm."

"Well, it certainly is now." She blew a frustrated breath. "I tried to tell you, Matthew. The day you

brought up the annulment, I attempted to say something then, but you did not want to discuss it."

His eyes narrowed. "I did not want to discuss the annulment of our marriage, not the fact that you did

not have it annulled at all."

"That makes no sense whatsoever."

"It makes perfect sense." He paused. "Or perhaps it doesn't, but you know what I mean nonetheless."

"I knew this was how you would react," she huffed. "You are angry, are you not?"

"Angry?" His brows pulled together. "Of course, I-"

"I knew it. For fifteen months and so forth and so on, I knew this would be your response." She pointed a finger at him. "This is exactly why I did not tell you, although, in truth, I did tell you." "You did not," he snapped. "And what is thrown about wildly in the course of an argument does not count as a legitimate announcement of something as serious as the state of a marriage."

She tossed back her head. "In your country, perhaps."

"In any country where men and women are forced to live together!"

"You are not being forced to do anything! Nor have you ever been forced to do anything including marrying me!" "No, indeed. I did that of my own free will. I married you because I wanted to make you my wife." He moved closer. She stood her ground. "You are my wife. Apparently you have always been my wife, and with luck you shall be my wife until my dying day."

"Which could well be any moment if you do not tell me right now you are not unhappy about this!"

"I am not unhappy about this. I am bloody blissful!"

"But you are angry with me?"

"Not, I'm not angry. I am beside myself with joy. Ecstatic! I can hardly control myself. Look, Tatiana."

His mouth stretched into a bizarre showing of teeth. "I am so happy I can scarce contain my smile!" "That hardly counts as a smile," she scoffed. "I have seen better smiles on the faces of condemned prisoners."

"Oh, were they married too?"

"Only if they were very, very lucky!"

"Well, I consider myself very, very lucky!"

"Why?"

"Because I'm still married to you! And I love you! And... and-that's why!"

"Hah! How can you expect me to believe that?"

"Because..." A wild, desperate light showed in his eye. "Damn it all, Tatiana, what do you want me to say? Because it's true?" "I do not know." And in truth she was as confused as he. "You just said nothing thrown about wildly in the course of an argument carries any weight."

"Yes, well..." His brow furrowed and he looked like a drowning man grasping at a fraying rope. "I lied." "You lied? Matthew Weston? Lord Honesty? I doubt if the rest of us mere mortals can accept such a concept."

"It's true, and I shall say it again." He raised his chin in a gesture she recognized at once as her own. "I lied. Or perhaps"-he thought for a moment-"I did not lie so much as I merely omitted a few pertinent facts, misstated a bit, dissembled somewhat."

She stared in disbelief. "You are making fun of me."

"Not at all." He stepped closer to her. "I am simply turning the tables on you."

"You are an annoying man."

"And you..." He jerked her into his arms. His blue eyes glared down at her intensely. A slow grin

spread across his face. Slightly wicked. Quite wonderful. "Are my wife."

His lips crushed hers in a kiss hard and powerful. A kiss of possession. Of reclamation. Of reunion. And she responded in kind to possess, to claim, to reunite.

An endless moment later, he raised his head from hers. "I too have a confession to make. I have lied

before."

"Oh?" She struggled to catch her breath.

"Indeed." He kissed her again. "When I said I had missed you only as the horse misses the flies about

his tail, that was a misstatement."

"Was it?" She sighed.

"It should have been more as the fox misses-"

"Oh, do stop that, Matthew." She slid her arms around his neck and stared into his eyes. "Are you angry

that we are still married? Or worse, disappointed?"

"No," he said without so much as a heartbeat of hesitation. "I am shocked, of course. It's rather difficult

to go from not married to married in the blink of an eye without benefit of ceremony." His arms tightened around her. "Beyond that, I feel... grateful, I think. As if we have been given a second chance." Her breath caught. "Then you are not going to insist on an annulment? I know it is extremely difficult in England, but in Avalonia, as I am a member of the royal family, it would take little more than a decree from my father. Although there would be rather a lot of explaining to do. And quite frankly, I would much prefer to explain why I have a husband I have never mentioned rather than why I want to get rid of one."

"No, I don't want a dissolution of our marriage." He shook his head. "I never wanted that."

"Are you certain?" She couldn't hide the concern in her voice. "You married a companion to a princess, not a princess."

"This is going to be extraordinarily difficult, isn't it?" His gaze searched her face.

She hesitated. "I do not know."

"There is a great deal to consider."

"I have spent more than a year considering it." Tatiana drew a deep breath. "Matthew, I fully intend-"

"Stop," he said firmly. "This is not the time for irreversible decisions. I don't want you to make promises-"

"Matthew, I-"

"No matter how well-meaning, you may not be able to keep."

"I have no intention-"

"Listen to me. Until the question of the Heavens is resolved, the question of our future cannot be. You cannot consider abandoning your family and your country in a time of crisis, and crisis for Avalonia indeed lies ahead if Valentina is merely a fraction of what you say she is. There will be time enough later to consider what is to become of us." He grinned down at her, but there was an odd shadow in his eyes. "For Lord and Lady Matthew."

"Lord and Lady Matthew," she said softly. "I quite like the sound of it after all."

"Do you?" He raised a brow. "It does not have the ring of Princess Tatiana."

"It has a lovely sound all its own." She beamed up at him and wondered if he could see the love for him in her eyes. "A sound made all the sweeter as it is a sound for two." A discreet knock sounded at the door. It opened almost at once and Lord Stephen poked his head in.

"I hope I am not interrupting."

Tatiana reluctantly moved out of Matthew's embrace, but he kept an arm around her.

"Actually, you are indeed interrupting," Matthew said wryly. "So if you would be so good as to come back later..."

"I would like nothing better." Lord Stephen stepped into the room. "But for some absurd reason we are to be off at once. I have been informed, by no less a personage than the duke himself, that we need to return to Weston Manor without delay."

"Tonight?" Matthew said Lord Stephen nodded. "If we leave now, we shall be home by dawn."