Her Unforgettable Royal Lover(53)

She half rolled over. “You’re going out in the rain?”

“That’s one of the penalties of being adopted by a racing hound. He needs regular exercise whatever the weather. We both do, actually.”

Natalie grunted, profoundly thankful that she wasn’t invited to participate in this morning ritual.

“I’ll bring back apple pancakes for breakfast,” Dom advised as he and the joyously prancing Agár headed for the door. “Then we’ll need to leave for the appointments at the embassy and the Tax and Customs Administration.”

“And shopping,” Natalie called to his back. “I need to shop!”

The prospect of replenishing her wardrobe with bright colors and soft textures erased any further desire to burrow. By the time Dom and Duke returned she’d showered and dressed in her one pair of jeans and tank top. She’d also made the bed, fussed with the folds in the drapes and dust-mopped the loft’s wood-plank floors.

Her welcome smile slipped a little when the runners tracked wet foot- and paw-prints across the gleaming floors. She had to laugh, though, and hold up her hands against a flying spray when the hound planted all four paws and shook from his nose to his tail.

She and Dom feasted on the pancakes that he’d somehow protected from the rain. Then he, too, got ready for the morning’s appointments. He emerged from the bathroom showered and shaved and looking too scrumptious for words in jeans and a cable-knit fisherman’s sweater.

“You’d better bring the Canaletto file,” he advised.

“I have it,” she said, patting her briefcase. “I made copies of the key documents, just in case.”

“Good.” He held up the jacket she’d pretty much claimed as her own. “Now put this on and we’ll go.”

Natalie was glad of its warmth when they went down to the car. The rain had lessened to a misty drizzle but the damp chill carried a bite. Not even the gray weather could obscure the castle ramparts, though, as Dom negotiated the curving streets of Castle Hill and joined the stream of traffic flowing across Chain Bridge.

The US Embassy was housed in what had once been an elegant turn-of-the century palazzo facing a lush park. High metal fencing and concrete blocks had turned it into a modern-day fortress and long lines waited to go through the security checkpoint. As Dom steered Natalie to a side entrance with a much shorter line, she noted a bronze plaque with a raised relief religious figure.

“Who’s that?”

“Cardinal József Mindszenty, one of the heroes of modern Hungary. The communists tortured and imprisoned him for speaking out against their brutal regime. He got a temporary reprieve during the 1956 Revolution, but when the Soviets crushed the uprising, the US Embassy granted him political asylum. He remained here for more than fifteen years.

“Fifteen years?”

“Cardinal Mindszenty is one of the reasons Hungary and the United States enjoy such close ties today.”

Dom’s Interpol credentials got them into the consular offices through the side entrance. After passing through security and X-ray screening, they arrived at their appointment right on time

Replacing Natalie’s lost passport took less than a half hour. She produced the copy of her driver’s license Dom’s contact had procured and the forms she’d already completed. After signing the form in front of a consular officer and having it witnessed by another official, the computer spit out a copy of her passport’s data page.

She winced at the photo, taken when she’d renewed her passport just over a year ago, but she thanked the official and slipped the passport into her tote with an odd, unsettled feeling. She should have been relieved to have both her memory and her identity back. She could leave Hungary now. Go home to the States, or anywhere else her research took her. How stupid was she for wishing this passport business had taken weeks instead of minutes?

* * *

Their second appointment didn’t go as quickly or as well. Dom’s Interpol credentials seemed to have a negative effect on the two uniformed officers they met with at the NTCA. One was a spare, thirtysomething woman who introduced herself as Patrícia Czernek, the other a graying older man who greeted Natalie with a polite nod before engaging Dom in a spirited dialogue. It didn’t take a genius or a working knowledge of Hungarian to figure out they were having a bit of a turf war. Natalie kept out of the line of fire until the female half of the team picked up the phone and made a call that appeared to settle the matter.

With a speaking glance at her partner, Officer Czernek turned to Natalie. “So Ms. Clark, we understand from Special Agent St. Sebastian that you may have knowledge of a missing painting by a Venetian master. One taken from Karlenburgh Castle during the 1956 Uprising. Will you tell us, please, how you came by this knowledge?”