by Paula Quinn
And then he did. His words blurred into each other, jumbled about in her mind, refusing to fit together. It had to be a terrible jest of the queen’s. But even as she told herself what she needed to believe, her heart crumbled at her feet.
Again.
She listened, numb, mute, while he told her about the Horse Guard, the Blues Henry and Colin were speaking of last night, and how the king feared losing Oxford’s support. But she could only absorb one thing.
“So, are ye going to wed her?”
She knew losing him again would hurt worse than the first time, but she had let herself fall anyway. Her dreadful gaze fell to his lips, waiting… waiting for his reply.
“I must go along with this. Just fer now, Mairi.”
Nae, he couldn’t be breaking her heart this way again.
“I’ve no inten—”
She silenced him with the fingers of one hand pressed to his mouth, and the hilt of a dagger clutched in the other. The tip held to his neck.
“Dinna’ follow me. There is nothing more I want to hear ye say.”
She stared into his eyes for a moment, letting the crushing truth of it settle over her, then withdrew her blade and walked away. Out of his life for good.
He was wise and did not go after her. And it made the last bit of her heart shatter to pieces.
Connor felt the separation like a blow to his guts. The kind that brings a man to his knees. He was doing this for her good, he told himself, watching Mairi leave. He wasn’t going to marry Elizabeth, but he needed some time to figure out a way to break the betrothal without deserting the king. It was best if she stayed out of it. He was sorry he had to break her heart to keep her safe. He understood the betrayal he saw in her eyes and it frightened him to think she would not forgive him for it this time.
He touched the drop of blood on his neck and felt the rest of it boil within him. How could he love another when his heart belonged to a passionate hellcat whose only adornments were her mane of unruly black curls and the small arsenal hidden beneath her skirts? He loved her more than life or death, more than king or country. But he didn’t go after her. Let her stay as far away from this as possible. If the de Veres went to such lengths to force the king’s hand into a union with his kin, who the hell knew what they would do if they knew Mairi stood in the way of it? More, if he told her his plans to discover anything foul about the earl, she might reattach herself to Henry to find out what he knew. She would likely get herself thrown into prison for killing Elizabeth.
He didn’t go after her. But he wanted to.
It was better if he focused on Elizabeth for now. The sooner he found something out, the faster he could take Mairi home. He could pretend fondness for Elizabeth for a few days without Mairi in his sight. If he couldn’t persuade the wench to tell him what he wanted, perhaps Colin could. Mairi had told him that her brother needed little speech to strip souls of their secrets. He hated involving Colin. This never should have taken place, and he had no one to blame but himself for falling into the de Veres’ trap.
He didn’t return to the palace. His investigating could wait one night. He had no stomach for it. Not after what he’d just done to Mairi. He left the grounds through the West Gate and walked the narrow streets alone until he came to The Troubadour. His men weren’t there. He was glad. He didn’t want any company. He wanted to get good and drunk by himself.
He was well on his way to accomplishing that goal when the door to the tavern opened and a hooded woman stepped inside.
For an instant, he thought it might be Linnet come to finish what she’d been paid to do. Then she swept her hood off her head and he saw the glimmer of golden curls dangling over her ears, instead of chestnut ones. Elizabeth. Hell, he was a fool to think he could pretend fondness for her. What he wanted to do, thanks to his drink, or perhaps not, was close his hands around her throat until she confessed to her father’s treason.
“What do ye want?”
“I already got what I wanted,” Elizabeth said, pulling out the chair opposite him. “Now I want you to return to the palace where you belong. A captain should not—”
“Ye better leave,” he cut her off coolly, “before ye discover what ’tis exactly ye’ve won.”
She smiled watching him lean back and stretch out his long legs before him. “My mettle is quite strong, Captain Grant. May I call you Connor now that we are betrothed?”
He had never wanted to strike a woman before… “Ye can call me whatever ye like, wench, as long as ’tis not husband.” So much for wooing her.
“But you will be just that. My father—”
“Clearly doesn’t love ye as much as ye think if he would bind ye to me.” Now it was Connor’s turn to smile when she gave him an irritated look. “I will make ye unhappy. Ye have my word on that.” He called for another drink and winked at Vicky when she hurried over with more ale.
“Do you intend to be unfaithful then?” Elizabeth asked through tightly clenched teeth.
“Aye, I do,” he replied, lifting his cup to her. “Often.”
She shrugged and reached for his cup when he put it down. “I can live with that as long as it’s me you come home to. Speaking of home, where shall we live? I understand from my father that you have lands in Perth.”
“We will live right here,” he told her, snatching his cup out of her hand. “At Whitehall, where I will have my seat in Parliament beside yer father, and where I can better serve my king.” Hell, this wasn’t going the way he’d planned. He didn’t want her to know yet how much he despised her and her role in this farce. He was a warrior and not cut out for being charming to gain information, as Mairi was. Presently, he was too deep into his cups to give a rat’s arse. He wanted Elizabeth to know how utterly miserable she would be if she married him. He wanted her to run for her life, to go to her father and beg him to find her a different victim.
“Ye will convert to Catholicism, of course, fer I will not wed a Protestant.” He didn’t think he would ever take joy in anything again for at least another se’nnight, but watching Elizabeth’s skin crawl was quite satisfying—in a cold, cruel sort of way. “I don’t want any bairns with ye, but ye won’t mind not sharing my bed. I tend to like it rough.” He swigged his ale and shouted for more. “What else?” He thought about it for a moment, trying to clear his muddled head. “Ah, yes, ye will end all contact with yer brother, lest I see his face and am tempted to hack what remains of it off.”
That got her mettle faltering. He smiled, but felt mildly ill at making plans with her for their life together.
“You will not tell me what to do!” she screeched at him.
“I will, and ye will obey. Ye’re a spoiled bratling used to getting what ye want. But that’s about to change.” When she sprang to her feet, he snatched her back by the wrist and pulled her down so that her face was close to his. “Ye forced my hand one time. Ye never will again.”
She yanked her hand and he released her and smiled when she stormed out the door.
Chapter Thirty-seven
Mairi did not leave her room for the remainder of the night. She refused to unbolt the door when Claire and the queen, and even Colin, tried to speak to her through it. There was nothing they could say to ease her torment.
Connor was going to wed Elizabeth. Dear God, she still could not believe it. Once again, he had chosen England over her. She had tried, between her fits of sobbing, to tell herself what losing the Horse Guard could mean for the kingdom. The possible, ultimate end of the Stuart line. Even if they were wrong about William of Orange wanting the throne, the Duke of Monmouth or the Earl of Argyll were no better. Both were Protestants and would quickly try to extinguish all Catholic beliefs. Argyll was a Campbell, and unlike his cousin Robert before him, he held no affection for the MacGregors. If that one claimed the throne, his first order of business would be to come after and destroy his clan’s long time enemies, beginning with Mairi’s kin.
She knew the consequences of Connor’s ref
usal to marry the Earl of Oxford’s daughter, but none of it mattered compared to losing him. She wanted to go home. She wanted to forget her days… and nights with Connor. But she knew she never would. She cursed him for it, and the king… and God help Elizabeth de Vere if Mairi saw her before she left this wretched place. She was getting the hell out of here as soon as she could, alone if she had to. She would find the road to Scotland. She knew how to fight if she came against any ruffians on the way. She certainly wasn’t going to wait around for Claire and Graham to bring her home after their son’s wedding. They would want to be here for that. Och, God, she couldn’t watch Connor pledge his life to someone else. She couldn’t.
She would leave just as soon as she stopped weeping. She hated weeping, but there seemed to be no end to the tears flowing out of her like a damned river. She felt as empty inside as her borrowed English gown strewn across the chair.
How could he do it? How could he marry that contemptible creature? He would be miserable listening to her screech demands at him every day. She almost felt pity for him. Almost. She loved him too much not to feel anything but her own anguish. Och, why had he struck Henry? How could they have lost so much in one day, one instant? How would she live without him?
A harsh rap on her door startled her. “Go away,” she cried out, burying her head in her pillow.
“Mairi, ’Tis Connor. Open the door.”
No! She didn’t want to see him. She was afraid one look and her heart would cease to beat without another, and then another.
“Go away, Connor.” His name hurt on the way out. “Leave me alone.” Please.
He pounded again. “Ye and I need to have words. Open the door.”
His speech sounded the tiniest bit slurred. Was he drunk? She’d seen him sharing cups with his friends, but never without his composure intact. The perfect English soldier with the Highlands in the edge of his confident smile.
“Mairi?” he called from beyond the door, then silence before he set his fist set the wood. “Open the damned door!”
“Nae!” she shouted back. “I told ye to go away. Now go do so!”
“I’ll kick it down!”
“Ye’ll break yer leg, fool. But dinna’ let me stop ye from trying!”
He didn’t. She felt the vibration of his powerful kick and then heard him bounce back off and hit the ground. The door remained shut.
She rolled her eyes heavenward then grew a little concerned at the prevailing silence.
“I know ye’re angry with me,” he finally said on the other side. “But there is no need to be. Let me inside to explain what ye did not let me finish the first time.”
“Go away!” she shouted again, this time reaching for the painted pottery bowl at her bedside and flinging it at the door.
“Ye’re a stubborn wench! Did ye know that?” He gave the impenetrable door another smack. “Fine, I’ll tell ye from out here. Is that what ye want? Ye want everyone to hear me tell ye that I love ye? Verra well, I love Mairi MacGregor! And I’m not at the mercy of any damned master!”
His voice echoed down the halls.
Lord, he must indeed be drunk. Mairi left her bed and hurried to the door. “Connor, ye bloody fool,” she warned, pressing her mouth to the crack in the door. She still didn’t trust herself not to weep all over him and beg him not to wed Elizabeth if she opened it. Och, how could she ask him to refuse the king? This wasn’t Charles. She didn’t want King James to fall. She liked him. He was Catholic. He was her kin. With him on the throne, the MacGregors would always find favor rather than malice. The queen had become her friend. What would become of her if one of their enemies took over the throne? Dear God, why did the fate of the kingdom have to fall on Connor’s shoulders? She didn’t want to lose him. Damnation, he’d had no choice in this. He was doing the only thing he could. She didn’t hate him for it. She couldn’t. “Dinna’ shout treasonous words.”
“Mairi,” he said more softly, closer to the door. “I have loved ye all my life. I see yer face at the dawning of each new sunrise and in the fiery stars at night. I hear yer laughter in the tinkling of cups, the crack of yer tongue in the thunder. I have thought of ye in battle and it kept me alive, determined to be with ye again. And now that I am, I am haunted by yer tears.”
Mairi fell against the door, cursing the barrier between them but needing it. “I canna’ bear the thought of ye marrying her, Connor. Not even for the kingdom. I am no longer a child. I understand yer duty.”
“To hell with my duty. I don’t intend to, Mairi. I never did.”
He never did? She straightened and stared at the door. “What d’ye mean, ye never did?”
“I’ll probably feel more insulted later that ye didn’t trust my love fer ye yet again. ’Tis getting rather irritating…”
He closed his mouth when she pulled open the door and stared at him. He was drunk, all right. He looked terrible. His normally crisp uniform was wrinkled. The collar of his coat, along with the shirt beneath, hung open around his neck. His jaw was dark and rough with a day’s worth of whiskers, but it was his gaze that revealed just how truly tormented he was. His sapphire eyes had lost their luster, his dimples—even a shadow of them—were nowhere to be seen.
“Ye’re so beautiful.”
Mairi’s heart fluttered against her ribs as they stared at each other across the threshold. It was not because she hadn’t heard Connor compliment her every day since his return to Whitehall, or that he found her bonnie, even in her plain shift. Tonight, his melancholy added something more profound to his praise, as if he loved her more than the air he breathed. His eyes proved her correct as they basked in the vision before him, their vibrant color returning. And then he stepped across the threshold like an emperor coming to claim his spoils and hauled her into his arms.
“Fergive me,” he whispered along her cheekbone, his lips kissing her swollen eyelids. “I thought not telling ye would keep ye safe, but I couldn’t stand the thought of hurting ye again.”
Locked in his beloved embrace, Mairi was tempted not to breathe, let alone think clearly, lest doing either would break this magical spell she’d fallen under yet again.
And then she remembered the hellish night she’d just endured.
Pushing him off her, she looked up into his handsome face, and then slapped him across it. “Ye let me believe ye were going to wed that little—”
He pulled her back, ignoring the sting of her fingers. “I thought it best. Ye risk yer life to gain information about Cameronians. How much more would ye do fer me?”
“Anything. I would do anything fer ye. But what in blazes are ye talking about? What does my gaining information for the militia have to do with any of this?”
He told her his plans, his hopes to discover something about the de Veres, the Blues, Parliament… anything that might change the king’s mind about needing—or even having—the earl’s support.
“And if there is nothing, Connor? I have spent many hours with Henry and he has expressed nothing but allegiance to James.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he told her, “I will not wed Elizabeth. If I have to take ye to France to escape this, I will.”
“Could ye do that?” she asked him quietly, lifting her fingers to his jaw. Dear God, she thought she had lost him again. Lost all the dreams he stirred back to life in her. Dying slowly with a dozen enemy arrows in her chest would not have been as painful. But she hadn’t lost him, just as she had never lost him seven years ago. He would defy his king and shame his name for her. She loved him even more, if that were possible, but she couldn’t let him do it.
“I want to help ye.”
“Nae. I want ye away from here.” He dipped his head and kissed her with exquisite care until she went soft against him. “I want to bring ye to the manor house fer a few days. If anything happened to ye—”
“Nothing will happen to me, Connor. Let me aid ye…”
He shook his head even before she finished what she wanted to say. Hell, b
ut he was stubborn. And so strong when he lifted her in his arms, kicked the door shut behind them, and carried her to her bed.
Connor couldn’t speak. What does one say to a goddess, a siren come to lure him away from everything that ever had meaning in his life?
Mairi was his life.
He would rather be shot in the back as a traitor than live his life with anyone but her. Her safety came before all else, but he’d had too much to drink at The Troubadour and not enough to distract him from the memory of her walking away from him in the garden. She had done it before, walked away, cut him out of her life without looking back. He couldn’t let it happen again. He wouldn’t. He’d left the tavern, knowing he had to tell her the truth. He wouldn’t lose her to the de Veres and as sure as hell not to her stubborn resistance.
She answered the desire in his eyes now with a provocative smile and pulled her shift over her head.
Connor didn’t rush to have her the way his body wanted to. He simply stared at her, thinking that every moment he’d spent waiting for her, wanting only her, was worth it. Her breasts, so round and firm, heaved beneath the silky curtain of her tresses, her nipples peaking through and waiting for his mouth. He moistened his lips, taking in the rest of her while he fumbled with his coat. His gaze slid over the creamy satin of her belly, the tantalizing curve of her hips, and then settled on the scintillating ebony thicket between her legs.
His cock pushed against the tightening fabric of his breeches.
She pulled him down to meet her in an eager, hungry kiss. Her fingers tugged at the shirt clinging to his tight muscles. He couldn’t get enough of her mouth, the seductive wantonness of her swirling tongue, the alluring yield of her lips. He thought he might burst if he didn’t have her soon.
He smiled, groaning with the pain of his desire and the pleasure of her boldness when she pushed him onto his back and straddled him. She liked being dominant, untamed by any master, and Connor liked it too.
