Page 23 of Mikhail
Belishaw brought your clothes down from London this morning. Your suitcase is in the other bedroom. Feel free to freshen up and shower. Come down to the kitchen when you arehungry.
—M.
Belishaw?How had he gotten into her hotel room? Scratch that—given what they’d pulled off last night, breaking into a hotel room couldn’t have beendifficult.
She set the note down and glanced at the bathroom. She really could use a shower. She had to start her day feeling clean or else she got cranky, and that was the last thing she needed if she was going toescape.
The bathroom was stunning, with smooth marble surfaces and expensive faucets. She’d been too busy focusing on the scalding wax last night to appreciate it. The shower was a massive glass box against one wall. There was a heated floor tile switch, which she experimented with when she got in and turned on the water. So much of the house she’d seen so far hadn’t been modern, yet this bathroom certainly was. It seemed Mikhail had kept the renovations to just the rooms he lived inmost.
The rest of the house might have been cold, but not this room. The water warmed her chilled skin, and the heated tiles made her feel as cozy as a kid by a roaring fire in a pile of blankets. She got out, dried her hair, and got dressed. Then she returned to her bedroom to check her luggage. But there was only so long she could put off the inevitable and faceMikhail.
She followed the heady scents of eggs and bacon down the stairs into the kitchen. Mikhail stood in front of the stove, wearing jeans and a button-up white shirt, holding a cast-iron skillet over a blueflame.
“Good morning.” He offered her one of those sexy smiles that hit her right behind herknees.
How could he always make her want to forget that she was supposed to be resisting him, trying to get away? It was so hard to ignore the “Fuck me, baby” vibes that rolled off him in waves. It gave her way too many wild ideas, like curling her arms around his body from behind and breathing in that woodsy pine scent ofhis.
Get a grip.Piper gave herself a little shake and placed the stovetop island between herself and the sexy Russian jewelthief.
“How do you like your eggs?” he asked as he scooped a helping of scrambled eggs onto aplate.
She couldn’t help but lick her lips. “Er, scrambled isfine.”
He added shredded cheese to the eggs, just like her mom did. “And bacon, I assume?” He raised a gloved hand with a second skillet where several fat, thick stripssizzled.
“Yes, please.” She held back a moan as he plucked the strips from the pan with a fork and set them on the plate next to theeggs.
Mikhail turned to the fridge. “Coffee, tea, orjuice?”
“Orange juice, if you have it,” she replied. She picked up a spare fork on the counter and sat down at the nook table with theplate.
A tall glass of orange juice was soon sitting in front of her. When she finished eating, she looked up to see Mikhail leaning against the counter, watching her with open amusement. She chose to ignore him. She didn’t want to know what was making him smile. It was likely at her expense. Having breakfast with a jewel thief was something she’d never thought she’d experience in her life, yet he acted so casually and put her at such ease that she couldalmostforget how she’d ended uphere.
“So…” she said. “Is Randolph Belishaw somehow involved with your connection to the jewels or just your getawaydriver?”
Mikhail shrugged. “A bit ofboth.”
Piper raised a brow. That answer left the door wide open for a dozen morequestions.
“Last night you said the jewels were yours, that the Belishaw family gave them to your family as part of a treaty long ago. Was that true?” Maybe she could catch him in a lienow.
“All true.” He walked over to a small side table near the fridge and retrieved a packet of letters bound with twine. He carefully slid a letter out of the middle of the stack and set it down in front of her. He kept the other letters carefully out ofreach.
“I pulled these from my private safe earlier this morning. I thought you’d want to readthem.”
The yellowed parchment was crinkled when she unfolded it to read. The ink had changed from black to brown with age, but she could see the date, 1559, inscribed at the top of the letter. She squinted at the letter but was eventually able to stumble through the words. It was from the Belishaw family to the Barinov family, detailing a treaty between the two noble houses with a payment of an immense hoard of jewels to the Barinovs. In exchange, the two families would be tied by an oath to come to the defense of the other in times ofwar.
There was an itemized list of jewels which included: boxes of rubies, an emerald watch, diamonds, emeralds, amethysts, a cloth sack of pearls, and many other special items, including a fist-sized ruby in the shape of a person’s heart. That one she remembered clearly, the Dragon Heart Stone. The piece was so valuable that they had not even put it on display at the V&A museum or at the reception last night. It had stayed safely locked in a vault at the Thorne Auction House. Piper read the rest of the letter. It was clear the jewels had belonged to Mikhail’s ancestors, assuming the letter wasreal.
She set the letter down. “How did the jewels end up in Cheapside if they belonged to your family?” She was ready to unravel his story if she found a single thread to pull on. A lot could happen to a family in five hundred years, and it was entirely possible that the jewels could’ve been lost, sold, or stolen. They could rightfully belong to someone else now. The options wereendless.
Mikhail collected the letter and carefully tucked it back into the stack before he finally answeredher.
“My family was betrayed. Elizabeth I took advantage of—my ancestor—and drugged his wine and tricked him into revealing where he’d stored the jewels. My ancestor was forced into prison but he never forgot what she did with thejewels.”
“But why?” Piper asked. “It wasn’t out of some kind of greed, wasit?”
Mikhail considered his words. “No. She believed herself to be in the right. She believed the jewels were a part of her father’s royal treasury, and they had been, once. But her father had given them to the Belishaw family in the early years of his reign for their services. And the Belishaws, in turn, had given them to us. Henry, however, grew to resent the deal in his later life and no doubt told all who would listen that he believed them to be rightfully his. He was a bitter man, petty and vengeful. And there were other voices that poisoned the queen against my ancestor…” Mikhail’s face darkened, a host of storms surging in his green eyes, and once again he spoke as if he had beenthere.
