The Royals Collection. Rebecca Winters

know.”

      She laughed, feeling a light airiness that buoyed her through the crowd.

      “Demyan!” a feminine voice called.

      There was no mistaking the way his body tensed at the sound, not with him so close to Chanel as they walked.

      He was coiled tightly, even as he turned them toward the woman who had called his name, with one of those fake smiles Chanel hadn’t seen since their very first dates on his face. “Madeleine.”

      Madeleine’s fashion sense and poise was everything Chanel’s mother wished for her daughter.

      Unfortunately, Chanel refused to make it a mission in life to live up to such hopes. She’d learned too young that nothing she did would ever be enough; therefore, what would be the point in trying to be someone she was not?

      Madeleine’s blond hair probably wasn’t natural, but there were no telltale indicators. She wore her Givenchy dress with supreme confidence, her accessories in perfect proportion to the designer ensemble.

      Chanel couldn’t tell the other woman’s age by looking at her but guessed it was somewhere between thirty and a well-preserved forty-five.

      The look she gave Demyan said he knew her age, intimately.

      If this had happened a month ago, Chanel would have withdrawn into herself and given up the playing field.

      But what she’d denied on their third date was a certainty now. She was head over heels in love with Demyan Zaretsky, though she hadn’t had a chance to tell him yet. Wasn’t sure exactly when she wanted to.

      While he’d never said the words, either, he hinted at a future together almost every time she saw him.

      That love and his commitment to their future gave her strength.

      Drawing on a bit of her mother’s aplomb, Chanel stepped forward and extended her hand. “Chanel Tanner. Are you an old friend of Demyan’s?”

      Madeleine didn’t miss Chanel’s slight emphasis on the word old, her eyes narrowing just slightly with anger but no righteous indignation. So, she was older than she looked.

      “You could say that.” Madeleine put her hand on Demyan’s sleeve. “We know each other quite well, though I admit I didn’t know he wore glasses.”

      Demyan adroitly stepped away from the touch while keeping a proprietary arm around Chanel. “Is your husband here tonight, Madeleine?”

      Stress made Chanel’s body rigid. Had Demyan and this woman had an affair? He’d said he didn’t believe in infidelity.

      Had he been lying?

      “He couldn’t get away from the Microsoft people. I’m quite on my own tonight.” Madeleine smiled up at Demyan, her expression expectant.

      It was clear she was angling for an invitation to join them, though Chanel wasn’t sure how that was supposed to happen.

      Their tickets had assigned seats.

      Demyan ignored the hint completely. “The cost of being married to a man with his responsibilities.”

      The older woman frowned again, this time genuine anger lying right below the surface. “Does your little friend here know that? Or is she still in the honeymoon phase of believing you’ll make her a priority in your life?”

      “She is a priority.” He pulled Chanel closer.

      She didn’t know if the move was a conscious one, but Madeleine noticed it, too.

      That made Madeleine flinch and Chanel felt unexpected compassion well up inside her. “I’m sure you’re a priority to your husband. He works to make a good life for you both.”

      That’s what she remembered her father saying to her mother.

      “I knew what I was getting when I married him.” Madeleine gave a significant look to Demyan. “And what I was giving up. I liked my chances with Franklin better.”

      “He married you. You read the situation right.” There was a message in Demyan’s voice for the other woman.

      He was telling her he wouldn’t have married her, and her words had put Chanel’s mind at rest about the affair. Oh, it was clear the two had shared a bed at one time, but it was equally obvious that circumstance had ended before Madeleine married Franklin.

      “How long were you two together?” Chanel asked with her infamous lack of tact but no desire to pull the question back once it was uttered.

      It might be awkward, but it struck her how very little she really knew about Demyan.

      “Didn’t he tell you about me?” Madeleine asked, her tone just this side of snide.

      And still Chanel couldn’t feel anything but pity for her. She didn’t look happy with her choices in life.

      “No.”

      The other woman didn’t seem happy with the answer. Maybe Madeleine had thought she’d made a bigger impact on Demyan’s life than she had. “You’re a blunt one, aren’t you? Did your mother teach you no tact?”

      “To her eternal disappointment, no.”

      That brought an unexpected but small smile to Madeleine’s lips.

      Demyan leaned down and kissed Chanel’s temple, no annoyance with her in his manner at all. “She is refreshingly direct,” he said to Madeleine while looking at Chanel. “There is no artifice in her.”

      “So, she does not see the artifice in you,” Madeleine opined, sounding sad rather than bitter.

      “He holds things back,” Chanel answered before Demyan could, but she did the older woman the courtesy of meeting her gaze to do so. “But if I know that, he’s not hiding anything. I understand how hard it can be to share your true self with someone else.”

      “Heavens, don’t you have any filters?” Madeleine demanded.

      “No.”

      It was Demyan’s turn to laugh, the sound genuine and apparently shocking to the other woman. Madeleine stared at him for a count of five full seconds, her mouth agape, her eyes widened comically.

      Finally, she said, “I’ve never heard you make that sound.”

      “He’s just laughing.” Okay, so he didn’t do it often, but the man had an undeniable sense of humor.

      “Just, she says. This young thing really doesn’t know you at all, does she?” Madeleine was the one looking with pity on Chanel now.

      “It was a pleasure to run into you, but we need to find our seats. If you will excuse us,” Demyan said, his tone brooking no obstacles and implying the exact opposite to his words.

      Madeleine said nothing as they walked away.

      When they reached their seats Chanel understood how the other woman had thought she might be included in their evening. Demyan had a box.

      Although there was room for at least eight seats in it, there were only two burgundy-velvet-covered Queen Anne-style chairs. A small table with a bottle of champagne and two-person hors d’oeuvres tray stood between them.

      Demyan led her to one of the seats, making sure she was comfortable before taking his own.

      He looked out over the auditorium, stretching his long legs in front of him. “She’s wrong, you know.”

      “Madeleine?”

      “Yes.”

      “About what?”

      He turned his head, looking at her in that way only he had ever done. As if she was a woman worthy of intense desire, of inciting his lust. “You know the man at the base of my nature.”

      “I hardly know anything about you.” The words came from the