“Then you’re an even bigger fool than your brother was,” she said in an even, deadly dispassionate tone. His face tightened angrily, but she met his hot glare with an icy calm which shed its heat effortlessly.

“We’ve had this discussion before, Stefan. And, yes, Pavel was an idiot. I warned him that going after Harrington, especially the way he did it, was like following a wounded hexapuma into the underbrush with a butter knife. But he insisted, and I was only an employee, so I set it up for him. Now he’s dead… and she isn’t. Not only that, but she’s enormously more powerful now than she was then, and she’s learned how to use that power. Pavel underestimated her then; if you’re not afraid of her now, with all the power and allies she’s gained since and the evidence of what happened to him in front of you, then you are a fool.”

“She wouldn’t dare come after me,” North Hollow protested. “Not after the way she shot Pavel. Public opinion would crucify her!”

“That didn’t stop her in Pavel’s case. What in the world makes you think it would stop her now? The only two reasons she hasn’t gone after you already are that her political allies, like William Alexander, have been restraining her from going after anyone at all and that she doesn’t know—not for certain—that you were the one who suggested this particular line of attack to High Ridge. If she were certain of that, I’m not at all certain even Alexander or the Queen herself could stop her, given all the history between her and your family. So be afraid of her, Stefan. Be very afraid, because you’re never going to meet a more dangerous person in your life.”

“If she’s so dangerous, why’s she been so meek and mild? There are ways she could have counterattacked without resorting to violence, Georgia! So why hasn’t she come out swinging and used all that power you say she’s got somehow?” Stefan demanded, but the questions came out petulantly, not challengingly.

“Because we hit her with the kind of attack she’s most vulnerable to,” the countess told him patiently. “She doesn’t have the experience to respond in kind to this sort of assault. She’s been mostly on the defensive from the outset, because it’s not her sort of battlefield. That’s precisely why they went out and recruited Emily Alexander to serve as her general. But if you push her too hard, or make the mistake of coming into the open and hurting someone she cares about when she knows who did it, she won’t waste any more time even trying to fight your kind of battle, Stefan. She’ll come after you directly, her way, and hang the consequences. Your family should know that better than anyone else.”

“Well, we’re just going to have to come up with something else, then, aren’t we? If Plan A isn’t going to put her down for the count after all, what do we suggest to High Ridge for Plan B? Now that Emily Alexander’s busted our columnists’ balls for daring to suggest that her husband and her ‘dear friend’ Harrington could be humping each other, how the hell do we get the two of them off our backs? You know they’re going to be harder to handle than ever now that we’ve pissed them off!”