Page 30 of Crimson

Had she actually owned three?

And if so, how on earth had the Markovs gotten one of them?

Had the Lebedevs been forced to sell an egg?

It seemed unlikely. They’d never been that desperate for money—even now, this old house was falling apart from neglect, not from poverty.

Had the Markovs stolen the egg? Was that part of the ongoing feud between the two families?

It was absolutely confounding. Samara had never mentioned that she had once owned three eggs—not that she ever confided in Nadia. Still, it seemed worth mentioning, considering how much her mother prized the two remaining.

Nadia’s curiosity was inflamed.

She wondered if she could ask Nikolai? She’d promised herself she was going to avoid him. But she was so desperate to know...

She took the photograph out of the album and slipped it into her pocket.

Then she put the rest of the albums away, planning to return to her room to work on the diary once more.

As she was coming out of the library, she saw Rashel standing in the hallway.

“Oh, hello,” Nadia said. “I found the picture albums.”

Rashel nodded.

“Were you visiting grandfather?” Nadia asked, nodding at the closed door of Stanislav’s room.

“Yes,” Rashel said, after a slight pause.

“Auntie,” Nadia said, “did my mother used to own three Faberge eggs?”

“What makes you ask that?” Rashel said, a little too quickly.

“I saw a picture where she had three,” Nadia said. “But I’ve only ever seen two at her house: the Blue Swan and the Garden of Eden. It looked like she had another that was red.”

Nadia didn’t mention the Crimson Heart, wanting to see what Rashel would say.

But her aunt only shook her head.

“I don’t know,” she said. “The eggs were given to Samara, not me. I wasn’t even born yet when she got them.”

“And you never saw them later?” Nadia pressed.

Rashel just shook her head.

“We had a lot of old things passed down,” she said. “Father had coins from the 11th century, a sword that belonged to Ivan the Terrible. In his study he had old dueling pistols, and in his safe there was all sorts of jewelry. It’s all in storage now; we don’t keep it at the house anymore.”

She was speaking rapidly and urgently, her cheeks a little flushed.

Nadia took the hint and changed the subject.

“There were so many pictures of you and Samara,” Nadia said. “You looked like such good friends as children.”

“I suppose,” Rashel said, looking down at the floor and back up at Nadia again. “When we were little.”

“Even when my mother was at University,” Nadia said. “In her journal she—“

“What journal?” Rashel interrupted.