“Oh, Nat, I’m so sorry you got taken in by such a conniving bastard. All I can say is that he’s lucky he’s behind bars. He’d damned well better keep looking over his shoulder when he gets out, though. Dev and Dominic both have long memories.”
* * *
Relieved by Sarah’s unqualified support but racked with doubts about Dom, Natalie was still agonizing over her decision the following Tuesday, when a taxi delivered her and Sarah to the tower of steel and glass housing her publisher. Spanning half a block in downtown Manhattan, the mega-conglomerate’s lobby was walled with floor-to-ceiling bookcases displaying the hundreds of books put out each month by Random House’s many imprints.
It was Natalie’s third time accompanying Sarah to this publishing cathedral but the display of volumes hot off the press still awed her book-lover soul. While Sarah signed them both in and waited for an escort to whisk them up to the thirty-second floor, Natalie devoured the jacket and back-cover copy of a new release detailing the events leading to World War I and its catastrophic impact on Europe. Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire were major players in those cataclysmic events.
Karlenburgh sat smack in the juxtaposition of those cultures and epic struggles. Natalie itched to get her hands on the book. She was scrambling for her iPhone to snap a shot of the book jacket when a shrill bark cut through the low-level hum of the busy lobby. She spun around, her jaw dropping as a brown-and-white bullet hurtled straight toward her.
“Duke!” She took two front paws hard in the stomach, staggered back, dropped to her knees. “What…? How…? Whoa! Stop, fella! Stop!”
Laughing, she twisted her head to dodge the Agár’s ecstatic kisses. The sight of Dom standing at the lobby entrance, his grin as goofy as the hound’s, squeezed the air from her lungs. The arms fending the dog off collapsed, Duke lunged, and they both went down.
She heard a scramble of footsteps. A frantic voice shouting for someone to call 911 or animal control or whoever. A strangled yelp as a would-be rescuer grabbed Duke’s collar and yanked him off her. Sarah protesting the rough handling. Dom charging across the lobby to take control of the situation.
By the time the chaos finally subsided, he’d hauled Natalie to her feet and into his arms. “Ah, Natushka,” he said, his eyes alight with laughter, “the hound and I hoped to surprise you, not cause a riot.”
“Forget the riot! What are you doing in here?”
“I called Sarah’s office to speak with you and was told you’d both flown to New York.”
“But…but…” She couldn’t get her head and her heart to work in sync. “How did you know we’d be here, at the publisher? Oh! You did your James Bond thing, didn’t you?”
“I did.”
“I still don’t understand. You? Duke? Here?”
“We missed you.”
The simple declaration shimmered like a rainbow, breathing color into the hopes and dreams that had shaded to gray.
“I planned to wait until I could bring the Canaletto,” he told her, tipping his forehead to hers. “I wanted you with me when we restored the painting and all the memories it holds for the duchess. But every day, every night away from you ate at my patience. I got so restless and bad-tempered even the hound would snarl or slink away from me. The team’s infuriatingly slow pace didn’t help. You probably didn’t notice when I called but…”
“I noticed,” she drawled.
“But it all boiled down to frustration,” he finished with a rueful smile. “Pure, unadulterated frustration.”
She started to tell him he wasn’t the only one who’d twisted and turned and tied themself up in knots but he preempted any reply by cradling her face in his palms.
“I wanted to wait before I told you that I love you, drágám. I wanted to give you time, let you find your feet again. I was worried, too, about the weeks and months my job would take me away. Your job, as well, if you accept the offer Dev told me about when I called to speak with you. I know your work is important to you, as mine is to me. We can work it out, yes?”
She pretty much stopped listening after the “I love you” part but caught the question in the last few words.
“Yes,” she breathed with absolutely no idea what she was agreeing to. “Yes, yes, yes!”
“Then you’ll take this?”
She glanced down, a laugh gurgling in her throat as Dom pinned an enameled copy of his soccer club’s insignia to the lapel of her suit jacket.
“It will have to do,” he told her with a look in those dark eyes that promised the love and home and family she’d always craved, “until we find an engagement ring to suit the fiancée of the Grand Duke of Karlenburgh, yes?”