Wed to a Spy

by Sharon Cullen

  His wife.

  What a strange concept.

  He’d been sent to Spain and ended up in Scotland, married to a Frenchwoman.

  The path of his life had certainly been a strange one.

  Chapter 14

  As she had the morning before, Aimee woke slowly, languidly. She was so warm. She might even venture to say that she was overwarm, but she wasn’t going to complain. She opened her eyes slowly, blinking herself into full consciousness, only to find herself looking into the chocolate-brown eyes of Simon.

  She should pull back, jump out of bed, put distance between them. But merde, she was so warm she couldn’t move.

  “Good morn,” Simon said in a husky morning voice.

  She smiled at him, too content to think that she didn’t want to be wed to him. Not yet, anyway. Later, reality would come crashing in.

  “We left the shutters open,” Simon said. “I apologize that it’s so cold in here.”

  “Is it?” Now that he mentioned it, her nose was cold, but the rest of her was so warm that she hadn’t noticed.

  He chuckled. “I’m surprised you’re not freezing.”

  “I’m very warm.”

  He shifted, and she realized that her leg was flung over his. Embarrassed, she pulled it away quickly, only to find Simon grinning at her. She moved to get out of bed.

  “Don’t go just yet.” Simon put a hand on her arm, stilling her.

  The truth was that she didn’t want to move. She didn’t want to get up and step out into the cold room and face the unknown of the day, so she stayed put, safe and secure under the warmth.

  “Roll over,” Simon said.

  “Why?”

  He grinned again. She was beginning to like that grin. “Trust me.”

  She rolled over, because for right now she did trust him. She’d trusted him last night to get her safety, and he hadn’t let her down.

  Hooking his arm around her waist, he pulled her to him until she was nestled into the cocoon of his body, her rear end snuggled against his…well, she wouldn’t think about that.

  His arm stayed around her waist as she settled into him, unconsciously humming in contentment.

  “We’ve nowhere to be right now,” Simon said, his voice vibrating through her. “You can sleep a bit more.”

  She wanted to protest but felt her eyelids close.

  When she awoke, she was alone, and she panicked for a moment. The shutters were closed, keeping the cold March weather at bay. She longed for a hot fire to chase away the chill. She was shivering under the blankets, and Simon’s side of the bed was cold, telling her that he’d been gone for a while.

  Reluctantly she rose, pulling the comforter with her to wrap around her shoulders. There was an old chamber pot behind a privacy screen that she made use of, but after that she was left wandering around the small chamber, looking in empty drawers and bare cupboards. Her stomach growled and she put a hand to it.

  Where was Simon?

  She opened the shutters and stood to the side, like Simon had instructed her to do the night before. The garden was empty. Armed men were still stationed around the perimeter wall, making her shiver in fear.

  Where was Mary? Was she safe? Had they killed her? What of the child she was carrying?

  Aimee feared for the Scottish queen. And she feared for herself.

  Beyond the walls was Edinburgh and the docks and possibly the French ship.

  She felt her chances of escape shrinking by the hour.

  Oh, Pierre.

  But it wasn’t Pierre she was thinking of. Her mind had gone to images of Simon dragging her away from the murder of Rizzio, of the chaos and the screaming and the panic. She thought of their flight through the corridors and how he’d never let go of her and how she knew—she just knew—that he would protect her with his life.

  And she thought of that kiss.

  Oh, that kiss.

  Pierre had never kissed her like that. The kiss had been nothing like she’d ever thought a kiss would be. She’d wanted more, and at the same time she’d been afraid of what more would bring. Simon was masterful—not that she knew any different, but he made her blood sing and her soul sigh.

  She pressed her fingers into her dry, gritty eyes. Pierre. Every time she tried to think of Pierre, Simon intruded. The way he’d held her this morning as she slept. The fact that he knew she was always cold and was always trying to find ways to keep her warm.

  But Pierre…

  Pierre was her one true love. He was the man who held her heart and had promised to cherish it and keep it until she could return to him. She must return to Pierre. She’d promised him she would.

  The door opened and Simon slid through, his hands full of a bundle of cloth.

  With a small cry, Aimee rushed to him and threw her arms around him without thinking, just knowing that she felt infinitely better now that he had returned.

  “Whoa,” he said on a laugh. “What is this?”

  Embarrassed, she pulled away. “My apologies. I awoke and you weren’t here…”

  “Did you think I had left you?”

  “No.” No, she hadn’t thought that. She’d been sure that he was going to return. So why the overzealous welcome when he did? “What have you there?” She nodded to the bundle that he had transferred to one hand so he could catch her with the other.

  “Food.”

  “Food!” She clapped her hands in delight and dragged him to the rumpled bed, the only available clean surface to lay out food.

  He laughed. “I thought you might be hungry.” He placed the bundle on the bed and opened it slowly, as if revealing a priceless gift. At this point any type of food would be a priceless gift. He revealed half a loaf of bread and a hunk of cheese.

  “Oh,” she sighed. “This looks heavenly.”

  “I know it’s not a lot—”

  “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

  He drew a dagger from his belt and cut a hunk of cheese while she tore the bread into sections.

  They ate in silence, both too hungry for conversation. Aimee licked the bread crumbs from her fingers and looked up to find Simon watching her with dark eyes. Quickly she put her hand in her lap, her face heating. His eyes had looked exactly like that after he’d kissed her.

  “Where did you find the food?” she asked.

  “Sitting on a tray outside someone’s door.” He leaned against the headboard, pulling his feet up and crossing them at the ankle. “Aimee.”

  She looked over at him. It seemed so natural for them to be sitting on the bed like this, eating bread and cheese. Her life had certainly taken a drastic turn.

  “I discovered more than the bread and cheese,” he said, his expression serious and dire, making her heart hammer in dread.

  “The queen?” she asked softly.

  “Is still alive.”

  She breathed out a sigh of relief. “That’s good.”

  “But she’s been taken hostage, along with Darnley.”

  Aimee sat up straight, shocked. “What? Where? How?”

  “She is confined to her rooms under guard. Darnley is in his rooms under guard.”

  “They are not together?”

  “Not at this time, no.”

  “But why? Who is in charge of the country?”

  “I do not know at this point.”

  His tone was grave, and at that moment Aimee realized that they were both in serious danger. The queen was not in power. There had been a mutiny—an overthrow of the government.

  “What do we do now?” she whispered.

  “I was able to sneak about a bit. There are guards everywhere. Douglas men. Fierce warriors. Escape now would be disastrous. We must wait awhile longer and hope the guards’ presence will lessen enough that we can escape the palace.”

  “And where will we go from there?”

  “I fear the gates of Edinburgh are already closed by now. No one is allowed in or out. Escaping the palace is our first priority. After that we will figu
re out the rest.”

  Aimee hesitated, thinking about her own escape plan, engineered the day before. Had it been just one day ago? It seemed like years ago.

  “There is a ship coming from France,” she said slowly. “We can try to get on that.”

  Simon was already shaking his head. “I won’t go to France.”

  “But why? I’m certain P— I’m certain Catherine would accept us at her court.” What was she saying? Bringing Simon to Catherine would be disastrous. Aimee would be forced to admit that she and Simon were wed, and her life with Pierre would be no more. She’d spoken out of haste and fear and regretted her words. She was such a fool.

  “We will discuss this later,” Simon said in a tight, angry voice, causing Aimee to draw back.

  “So we just sit here doing nothing?”

  “Until the guards are pulled away from the castle, that’s all we can do.”

  “And why do you think they’ll be pulled away from the castle?”

  “Not everyone is an enemy of Queen Mary’s. She has faithful followers, and she has her own army of men. Bothwell is very much devoted to her. My guess is that he will raise an army and rescue her.”

  Bothwell. Aimee did not like the captain of Mary’s guard. There was an evil that lurked beneath his smile and easy demeanor. But Mary liked the man and went so far as to outrageously flirt with him at times. There were rumors that the two were having an affair and that the child Mary was carrying could be Bothwell’s. Of course, there were also the rumors that the child was Rizzio’s. So many theories that it made one’s head spin.

  But Bothwell was devoted to his queen, and if anyone could save her, he would be the one to do so. Still, it chafed that she and Simon could do nothing but sit here and wait it out.

  What if the French ship arrived and she was imprisoned in the palace?

  —

  “If you were in France right at this moment, what would you be doing?”

  Aimee and Simon were sitting side by side on the bed, leaning against the headboard, legs outstretched. Evening was quickly approaching. They had kept the shutters open, absorbing the light as long as they could. Clouds had moved in during the day, obscuring the sun and cooling the air. It was cold, but Aimee preferred the cold to the dark. She was wrapped up in the comforter. Simon had ventured out again a few hours ago but had quickly returned. The guards’ presence was heavier than it had been the night before, and that worried them both.

  What did it mean for Mary and the king? Were they still alive? Simon hadn’t been gone long enough to find out. They were rationing the bread and cheese but had only a few bites of each left.

  “What would I be doing if I were in France?” Aimee repeated. She would be with Pierre. Maybe they would have already been wed. Possibly she could have been carrying their child. The thought tugged a smile at the corner of her mouth.

  “You’re grinning,” Simon said. “Please share the excitement that you would be experiencing.”

  She quickly masked her smile, not wanting to tell Simon about Pierre. Pierre was special. He held a special place in her heart that she did not want to share with him. Pierre was her secret, and she still harbored a small hope that she could return to him.

  She drew her legs up and wrapped her arms around them, thinking of wrapping her arms around Pierre. “I would probably be in the French court still,” she said.

  “Not married?”

  “Mayhap.”

  “Whom would you have married?”

  She leaned her head back and sighed. “Whomever Catherine told me to.”

  “So it wouldn’t have been much different than here.”

  “What about you? If Queen Elizabeth hadn’t banished you from England, what would you be doing?”

  He looked into the distance. “I would be on my estate, in front of a fire, reading a book with dogs at my feet.”

  “That sounds…”

  “Boring?”

  “Wonderful.”

  He turned his head to look at her. “I would have thought you would find it boring.”

  “Having your own home, doing what you want. Reading. Dogs. It sounds heavenly. I would like to add children to that scene.”

  He raised a brow. “Children? Why, Lady Marcheford, are you proposing we have children?”

  Her face heated, and she could not meet his look. “That’s not what I meant. I meant that if the scene you described were mine, I would add a few enfants to it.”

  “It does not have to be a fantasy,” he said. “I have the home. We can easily get the dogs, and I am capable of building a fire. I’m also capable of making children.”

  She turned her face away from him so he didn’t see her burning cheeks. But, oh, what a picture he painted. She hadn’t realized how desperately she wanted children and her own home. A place that was hers. That no one could take away from her. She wouldn’t be a pawn in anyone’s game or a burden to her family. She couldn’t be sent away at the whim of a powerful woman like Catherine or Mary.

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “You do not have access to your estate.”

  “And you do not want to create children with me.”

  He sounded hurt. She couldn’t figure out why he would be hurt by that thought.

  “In all honesty, Sir Simon, my hopes and dreams did not have anything to do with an Englishman in the Scottish court.”

  He laughed. “Touché, Lady Marcheford.”

  “Why do you insist on calling me by your name?

  “Because it is your name now, is it not?”

  “It is, but…”

  He raised a brow again. “But what? You don’t like to be reminded of it?”

  She hesitated, the truth of his words too much, but she didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “I am just not accustomed to it, that is all.”

  “Come now, Aimee. We are stuck in an abandoned room, all but prisoners of the queen’s enemies, even if they don’t know it. The least we can do is be honest with each other.”

  “It is true that I am not accustomed to being wed to you. We barely knew each other before our wedding. It is true that I have…envisioned myself with someone different.”

  “Ah. Some honesty at last, if not full honesty.”

  “Sir Simon—”

  “Whether you want to admit so or not, we are wed, Aimee. Stop calling me Sir Simon.”

  “Very well. Simon. I am being as honest as I can be.”

  “So we have established that you do not want to be wed to me and that you desire children. Just not my children.”

  She hesitated. “Simon—”

  He held up his hand. “No worries, Aimee. I knew all of that from the beginning. Maybe not the part about the children, but definitely the part about our marriage.”

  “I did not say that to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t.” He turned his face away to look out the window at the nearly dark sky. The temperature had cooled considerably, and her fingers and nose were freezing. Simon got out of bed and closed one of the shutters, casting the room into semidarkness.

  “I was wrong,” she said to his back. “I did say that to hurt you. It wasn’t fair of me, and I apologize. I’m just so angry that the whim of a queen changed our lives irrevocably. We are tied to each other, and we do not even know each other.”

  “We can change that,” he said, still standing by the window. “We have nothing but time on our hands and nothing to do with it for the next day or so. We can learn each other.”

  She shook her head, aggravated and frustrated. “That is not my meaning.”

  He spun around, but she could see only his outline through the shadows, not his face or his expression. “Then what is your meaning, Aimee? What changed about your life? You admit that you would have married someone Catherine chose. Is it the fact that I am not French? Would you prefer a Frenchman over an Englishman?”

  “Yes!” she cried out, sitting up and releasing the hold she had on her legs. “Yes,” she repeated more softly. “I
am from France. Why wouldn’t I expect to wed a Frenchman? What in my life ever made me think that I would marry an Englishman?”

  He made a slight bow, and still she could not see his expression, and it was quite vexing. She wanted to know what he was thinking, if she’d once again hurt his feelings.

  “You’re right, of course,” he said. “My apologies if I’ve taken you from a particular Frenchman.”

  She fell back against the headboard as if deflated. “I never said there was a particular Frenchman.”

  “Was there?” His voice drifted toward her. The sun was almost gone. Soon there would be complete darkness until the sun rose in the morning. It was going to be a long night spent together.

  “No,” she whispered. “No one particular.” She dashed away a tear, hoping Simon couldn’t see her as she couldn’t see him, and sending up a silent apology to Pierre for denying him.

  “Well, then.” Simon moved toward the bed and sat on it, causing it to dip and Aimee to lean toward the middle. She caught herself and straightened. “My apologies if I assumed something that wasn’t so.”

  Chapter 15

  When Aimee awoke the next morning, Simon was already up and carving the last of the cheese and bread. His side of the bed was cold and she wondered how long he had been up. She missed his warmth and the length of his body pressed against hers.

  “Oh, good. You’re awake,” he said, his tone all business. He handed her a piece of bread as she pushed herself to a sitting position. The room was cold and she shivered.

  “It snowed overnight,” Simon said. “I wish I could build you a fire.”

  “I understand that you can’t.” They couldn’t risk a fire, but what she wouldn’t give to sit in front of one. She’d thought she could never get colder than when she first arrived in Scotland, but she’d been wrong.

  “I will be leaving shortly,” Simon said. “We can’t stay here much longer. I fear we’ve already stayed longer than we should.”

  “But the guards—”

  “Are certainly a concern, but staying here any longer is more of a concern.”

  “Simon…”

  He finally looked at her as he shrugged on his coat.