by Paula Quinn
Jamie Grant looked up and smiled at the server placing his trencher on the table. “Padraig MacLeod is actin’ as chieftain while his faither is in England. He stopped through here on his way back from meetin’ with Alisdair MacKinnon’s son in Torrin to bolster their alliance wi’ us all in these uncertain times. I had a missive penned to the MacDonalds in Portree, vowin’ the MacGregors’ support, should they need it.”
“Good,” Rob said, bringing his cup to his mouth. He felt a wee bit guilty about thinking Jamie had left Camlochlin to pick flowers. He should have known there was another reason for his going to Torrin. Though many Highland clans fought against each other, if the new king thought to bring his English laws down on them, they would stand together.
“The MacKinnons are with us then?”
“Of course. Skye will always stand secure against outside influences. Our hope is that King James will… Rob?” Jamie paused until Rob looked away from the entrance and back at him. “She must be an extraordinary lass to be able to distract ye from yer passions.”
She was his passion, and he was past caring who knew it. Hell, what in blazes was taking her so long? He hadn’t seen her since this afternoon and he missed her face so much he was tempted to go get her himself.
“I’ve grown accustomed to havin’ her near,” Rob said, his gaze already being pulled back to the stairs.
“I’ve been informed that she is a princess, mayhap even a goddess.” Jamie winked at Finn, sitting across from him, and then dipped his bread into his stew. “But I doubt yer faither will accept divinity as a good enough reason no’ to return to his side.”
“I made my choice, Uncle.”
“And ye couldna’ have chosen to take her to England with ye?” Normally, at this point in any conversation with this particular nephew, Jamie would never have pressed on. Rob was someday going to lead this clan and he’d learned well not to be rash in his thinking. He weighed and measured each decision he made before acting upon it, and once he set his course there was no changing his mind. But he’d never set his course in a different path than his father’s, and never for a lass—who came attached to an English soldier.
Rob ground his jaw, deciding how best to begin. He had intended on telling his kin the truth about Davina, but exactly how could he do so without sounding like an impetuous whelp ruled by his emotions? “Her life is in grave danger,” he said, knowing in his own heart that that was the emotion that ruled him first. “I pledged myself to protecting her, and this is the safest place I know.”
“Why is she in danger?” Jamie asked him evenly.
“Because she is…” They had a right to know, to choose whether or not to stand with him, should anyone come to Camlochlin to remove her. “She is King James’s firstborn daughter and heir to the throne.”
Everyone at the table sat motionless and mute, save for Finn, Will, and Asher. Rob expected shock and dismay and was about to close his eyes to wait out the silence.
“I thought James’s daughter Mary was the Princess Royal,” his aunt said, also seemingly unfazed by the news.
“So does everyone else in England.”
“How did she come to be in yer possession?” Jamie asked him calmly, though he’d dropped his bread into his food and left it there.
Rob told them about the attack on St. Christopher’s, and who was behind it and why. “There is likely a rebellion brewin’ involvin’ the Duke of Monmouth, the Earl of Argyll, and possibly William of Orange. Connor has agreed no’ to tell the king anything aboot her—”
“She is his daughter,” Jamie interrupted.
“A daughter he cloistered away in a convent and has never seen,” Rob bit out.
“If ye don’t plan on telling her father that ye have her,” Maggie asked, “what do ye intend to do with her?”
Here was the part of the tale that would prove all the other emotions that had subsequently directed him. “I intend to keep her.”
“Fer how long?” Jamie stared at him so still that Rob wondered if he was breathing.
“Fer as long as she’ll have me.”
His uncle leapt to his feet, startling Maggie, who then glared at him to show her disapproval. “Ye’ll bring the entire realm doun on our heads!”
“That is what I’ve been trying to tell him,” Asher interjected smugly, but then looked away when Rob’s eyes sliced through him like hot irons through butter.
“Robert,” Jamie continued as if the captain had not spoken at all. “Tell me ye dinna’ mean to claim the king’s daughter. Tell me ye are no’ willin’ to throw away everything ye’ve worked at protectin’ fer this lass?”
“I dinna’ know if I can tell ye that, Uncle,” Rob said, staring at the entrance where Davina stood, her small hands twisting the scarlet and green earasaid draped over her skirts. Her hair was swept away from her temples with two small pearl pins while the rest fell like liquid sunshine down her back. When their eyes met, she smiled slightly, as if the very sight of him reassured her. Rob rose to his feet as the need to go to her overwhelmed him. Behind him, he heard the others push out their chairs as well.
“Good evenin’, yer Royal Highness.”
Rob turned his smile on Jamie, understanding all too well the reverence replacing the anger in his uncle’s voice. He knew every man in the hall was overcome by Davina’s unearthly beauty. He didn’t like it, but he would learn to live with it.
When he looked at her again, her smile had vanished.
Chapter Twenty-two
Dear God, he’d told them. He’d told them all. For a sickening moment, despite Alice’s gentle nudge behind her, Davina stood motionless in her spot. Her anxious gaze passed over the man who had addressed her as no one had before him. What should she do—besides resist the instinct to turn and flee back to her room? She wouldn’t do that. The time for hiding was over. This was Rob’s family. If he trusted them enough to tell them who she was, then she too would trust that they would not betray her. She realized, as that moment passed into another, that it was not fear that paralyzed her when the people at Rob’s table stood at her entrance, but harsh, stinging reality.
She was Lady Davina Stuart, Royal Princess, heir to the three kingdoms. No matter how far she ran, how well she hid, or how right she felt in her new Highland garb, she would never escape it. Whether here on Skye, or in an English castle, no smile would ever be sincere.
But Rob’s was. Her weary heartbeat faltered when he moved toward her, his smile intimate and reassuring. He didn’t care who she was. He’d kissed her, touched her as if she were his to possess. He watched her with eyes that burned to touch more of her, that warmed at the sight of her, and danced at the sound of her laughter. She wanted him to kiss her, touch her, possess her. She wanted to stay with him here in this busy fortress, surrounded by common folks while she grew heavy with his babe and became the mother she had missed having.
When he reached her, he fit her hand into his broad one. “Come,” he said on a breath as ragged as her own. “Meet my kin before the sight of ye fells them to their knees next.”
She went with him, walking at his side until they reached the table and the men still on their feet. He introduced her to his uncle and the others who were meeting her for the first time, simply as Davina.
She liked Jamie Grant twenty breaths after she sat down. It wasn’t the guileless charm of his smile or the worried look in his eyes that he tried so hard to conceal when he spoke to her that warmed her heart to him so quickly, but the way his smile broadened with love when he looked at his wife.
“How does Connor fare?” he asked Rob while Maggie cast Davina’s cabbage soup and crisp oat cakes an approving look.
“He fares well,” Rob said, and washed down his mouthful of bread with a swig of ale. “But I fear he’s no’ as brave as ye or Graham had hoped.”
“And why might that be?”
“Mairi,” Rob told him, bringing a heaping spoonful of rabbit stew to his mouth. “He near wet his breeches when I told
him she was still in England.”
Will agreed with a hearty laugh, ignoring Finn’s insulted glare.
“That’s no’ fear, lad,” Jamie corrected, taking less offense. “’Tis wisdom.”
Rob nodded, conceding the point, and went back to eating. Davina watched him beneath the shadow of her lashes. Compared to Edward and the men who had lived with her at St. Christopher’s, Rob ate like a starving bear. She liked his lack of table etiquette and the passion of his appetite, and then remembered that he hadn’t eaten a hot meal in weeks.
“Captain Asher.” Jamie turned to Edward next, doing his best at keeping the conversation light. “D’ye know that Connor Grant and young Finlay here are the High Admiral’s nephews?”
“I wasn’t aware of it until recently,” Edward answered, bringing his cup to his lips. He took a sip and shivered in his seat. “That’s quite potent,” he said hoarsely.
Brodie, Will’s father, cast him a contemptuous look. “English.”
“D’ye know him then?” Jamie continued.
“Who?” Edward cleared his throat behind his fist.
“Connor Stuart?”
“I saw him only once, briefly. I hope to have the pleasure of meeting him someday.”
“Ye’ll find him less amiable than his nephew o’ the same name,” Will said, reaching for the bread. “Admiral Stuart is a wee bit less concerned aboot guttin’ a man based mainly on suspicions.”
“I didn’t know ye’d seen him,” Finn said to Edward while the men around the table agreed that Stuart was a wary bastard.
Davina had gone back to watching Rob when he cast a curious look at Finn. He appeared to be about to say something, but Maggie’s soft voice stopped him.
“Robbie”—she offered him a slightly less contented look than the one Davina was giving him—“is the rabbit tender enough?”
Rob’s spoon paused on the way to his mouth. He slanted a guilty glance in Maggie’s direction and murmured, “Aye, ’tis fine.”
“That’s good, dear. I’m sure yer approval would be a great consolation to its mother—if she wasn’t roasting over the pit with the rest of her offspring.”
Will snickered behind his cup. Brodie delivered a sharp elbow to his ribs, and Rob, looking at his spoon with a measure of distaste, dropped it into his trencher and pushed his supper away. Maggie smiled at him, then shot her husband a critical frown.
“Ye would do well to show as much wisdom as my nephew one of these days.”
“That’s no’ wisdom, my love,” Jamie defended. “’Tis fear.”
Soon, the conversation flowed to other, less passionate topics. Davina basked in the joy around her, especially Rob’s. His laughter was rich and robust when Jamie told him about the pig that escaped the pens and bit Brodie on the arse hard enough to keep him asleep on his feet for two nights. They shared toasts to the demise of the hated Fergussons and to the MacPhersons’ defeat in the next raid, but it wasn’t until supper was over and a small group of them retired to the private solar that they discussed the king and Davina’s relationship to him.
They asked her questions over warm wine, pillowed chairs, and the crackle of a toasty hearth fire. Why had she been hidden away since her birth? Did she know of anyone outside of St. Christopher’s who knew of her? Did she have contact with the king? What were her father’s ultimate plans for her? Each query stripped Davina of another layer of her guard. And as she answered each one with the truth, she understood how it must feel for a soldier to finally shed his heavy armor after a battle.
When they were done, Rob lifted his cup to her and claimed her heart once and for all with a slant of his mouth and a soft nod of his head.
“So.” Maggie, sitting closest to her, leaned in so that only Davina could hear her. “Ye were imprisoned and set free from yer bars. I understand better now how ye feel about my nephew.”
Davina looked down at her and thought that Maggie MacGregor was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen, and at that moment, the saddest.
“Rob”—Jamie’s voice stopped Davina from pondering the reason for Maggie’s regret—“I dinna’ have to tell ye how concerned I am about all this. But we will discuss that later, in private.” He turned to Edward without waiting for Rob’s reply. “Tell us what ye know aboot this Admiral Gilles. How many men are at his disposal?”
Edward shook his head. “I don’t know much. He is a close ally to Prince William and commands a fleet of over a thousand men.”
“Dinna’ ye mean that he is a close ally of the Duke of Monmouth?” Rob’s eyes glittered like a snowy, starlit night as he set down his cup.
“What?” Edward looked as visibly shaken as he had on the morn of Monmouth’s attack. “That is what I said.”
“Edward, dear, you said Prince William.” Davina offered him her tenderest smile, sympathizing with his tenuous place here among men who considered the En—glish as detestable as the plague.
“Did I?” His breath broke on a strained chuckle. “I fear your strong whisky has muddled my thoughts.”
“’Tis Angus’s whisky, blame him,” Brodie drawled from his seat. “And ye’ll no’ be tellin’ him that I wasted any on ye when he returns.”
Jamie asked other questions and Brodie threw in some of his own, but Rob remained quiet—like the night air just before a storm. Davina looked at Edward. The storm was heading for him.
By the time the wine was finished and the fire died down, Davina was a wreck. What had Edward said to produce such a murderous gleam in Rob’s eyes? When she tried to ask Rob, he pushed her gently aside and followed up the stairs after Edward.
“Something is troubling him,” Finn said, appearing at her side and following her gaze. “And me, as well.”
“What is it?” Davina turned to him, hoping he could shed some light on Rob’s foul mood.
“Well, Captain Asher told us tonight that he had seen my uncle once. But the night after we left Ayrshire, he told me that he hadn’t left St. Christopher’s Abbey in four years.”
“That’s true. He hadn’t.”
“But then when did he see my uncle?” Finn’s green eyes widened on her, as if she should know the answer. She didn’t. “Admiral Stuart has been in France for the past four years. Before that, he was in Holland.”
“Holland?” Davina repeated softly, her gaze rising up the stairs. Was Edward in Holland before he came to her? It would explain how he’d known that an exiled duke and a banished earl were her enemies. But why would he not have told her he was there among them? And why hadn’t he told her that he’d seen Connor Stuart? He knew the High Admiral was her cousin. Why had he kept so much from her? She could feel the blood leaving her face and growing cold in her veins as her trust in Edward fell to pieces at her feet. She realized with heart-stopping clarity why Rob had gone after him. No. No! There had to be an explanation—one that did not involve treachery. Edward would never have betrayed her. He couldn’t have. Not Edward. Never.
Chapter Twenty-three
Rob prayed to God he was wrong. If he wasn’t, En—gland’s new king was about to lose one of his captains. He found that once Davina had stopped following him from the solar, his steps lost their fervor. He wanted to reach Asher before she could stop him, but he wished he didn’t have to. His hands curled into fists as he climbed the stairs. He prayed he was wrong. So what if Asher was the only other man in the king’s garrison, including the king himself, who knew of Gilles’s ties with the Dutch prince? It meant nothing. Surely, it didn’t mean that Da—vina’s closest friend had betrayed her. But something else, that suddenly made sense when Asher spoke of William of Orange, did.
When Rob reached the captain’s door, he fought to harness his fury and pushed it open without knocking. “I have some questions of my own to put ye, Asher,” he announced from the doorway.
“I suspected as much,” the captain said, turning from the narrow window with weariness marking his features. “If this is about Prince William, I assure you I—”
<
br /> “’Tis aboot the Abbess at Courlochcraig.”
“The Abbess?” Asher asked, perplexed. “I don’t—”
“She was expectin’ Davina,” Rob told him, stepping inside and closing the door behind him.
“That’s right.” The captain smiled, relief clearly etched in his features. “I sent her a missive asking her if I could bring the Lady Montgomery to her.”
“Aye, I thought so.” Rob didn’t smile back as he stalked across the room. “The thing that nagged at my thoughts at the time was how ye knew Gilles’s men were comin’.”
Asher almost swayed on his feet at the unexpected turn the conversation had taken. At this, Rob would have smiled if he didn’t want to kill the man directly in front of him now so badly.
“But now I believe I have figured oot the great mystery. Ye knew Gilles was comin’ because ye had told him where to find her when ye met with him and William in Holland. ’Tis where ye saw Admiral Stuart, aye?”
Asher opened his mouth, likely to deny the charge, but Rob’s palm in front of his face stopped him.
“I could hold ye here in the cellars until Stuart visits Camlochlin again, but that might be years from now and I doubt he will recognize what’s left of ye by then.”
“I had not yet met her,” Asher admitted, surprisingly composed, as if he’d carried his own secret for too long and was relieved to finally be released from it. “I was young and you do not know Admiral Gilles. He is ruthless and cruel.”
Rob felt sickened by the sight of him. He had to call upon every shred of control he possessed not to draw his sword and run the traitorous bastard through. “So, ye didna’ tell them where to find her fer a purse, but because ye’re a coward.”
“I was a fool. I did not—”
“Ye would defend yerself in this?” Rob snapped his hand outward, closing his fingers around Asher’s neck. “Nothin’ ye say can justify what ye did to her. Ye led those who would kill her straight to her door!”