Ravished by a Highlander (23 page)

“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.

D
ear 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.