Connor made his way through the encampment, calling out the correct countersigns, Lake Champlain glimmering in the moonlight below. He came to the place where Joseph and his men were encamped to find his Mahican brother still awake.
Joseph sat speaking with two of his most trusted men—Daniel and Joshua. But one look at Connor’s face, and Joseph sent them away. “Something troubles you.”
“A dream.” Connor tried to recount it as best he could, fear snaking through as he spoke, seeping into his bones, turning his blood to ice for reasons he did not understand. “I saw Sarah standin’ naked and alone in the midst of a storm. In her hands, she held a flame. It didna burn her, but danced on her cupped palms, small and bright. She fought to protect it, and there were tears on her face. The storm pressed in around her, the sky blacker than the blackest night. I tried to help her, for I kent if the flame went out, she would perish wi’ it. But no matter how I tried, I couldna reach her.”
Joseph’s face was bent in a worried frown. “If we were in the village, I would speak with our sachem about this.”
“We dinnae ha’ time for a sachem or songs. Everything inside me tells me Sarah is in grave danger.”
“Then, brother, you must listen to your heart.”
It was late on the seventh day of their ten-day mission when Connor led the Rangers out of the forest and back to Ranger Island. Spurred on by a growing sense of urgency, he had cut the mission short, turning back south of Crown Point and driving the men hard, returning in three days over ground it had taken four days to travel. The lads had learned a thing or two about being a Ranger during that long, forced march. That much was certain.
Connor dismissed his men, leaving them to settle in with their nightly ration of rum, while he quickly bathed and shaved, washing away a week’s worth of sweat and dirt. He donned a clean pair of breeches and a clean shirt, searching for a pretext to meet with Wentworth. There was little of worth to report. No skirmishes. No French troops. No supply trains. They’d found some Wyandot canoes and supply caches hidden near Lake Champlain north of Ticonderoga, a sign that the Wyandot were keeping an eye on the British at Crown Point.
Regardless, Connor would report to Wentworth despite the late hour—and he would ask about Sarah. He’d carried a knot of fear in his chest for her since having that nightmare three nights ago, and nothing but the sight of her, alive and safe, would banish it. He drew on his belt, sheathed his hunting knife, then slipped a dirk into his leggings and set out for the fort.
He found Joseph waiting for him at the bateau bridge. Joseph rested his hand on Connor’s shoulder. “Tell her I keep her in my prayers.”
“Aye. I will.” Connor crossed the bridge, made his way through the outer entrenchments, through inner gates, and across the parade grounds toward Wentworth’s quarters, praying with each step that Sarah was safe.
The guards at Wentworth’s door stopped him.
“Is the brigadier general expecting you?”
“Nay, but I’ve just returned from a weeklong scout and must speak wi’ His Gracefulness now.” Connor put just enough sharpness into his voice to put fear in the young redcoats’ eyes.
One of the guards disappeared inside, returning with Lieutenant Cooke.
“The hour is quite late.” Cooke peered at him through the open doorway, clearly apprehensive. “His lordship is somewhat indisposed. Is it urgent, Major?”
“Aye, or I wouldna be standin’ here after a three-day forced march and scarcely a moment’s sleep.” Not waiting for an invitation, Connor pushed past him.
There, through the open doors, Connor saw Wentworth.
He sat at his writing table in a state of undress, his back turned toward the door. His wig had been tossed onto his desk, his short dark hair tousled and exposed, his coat thrown carelessly over a nearby chair. On his writing table stood a half-empty bottle of cognac.
Connor had never seen him like this in five long years of war, not even in battle. And the knot of fear in Connor’s chest climbed into his throat. “My lord.”
Wentworth gave a start and turned, frowning. He seemed a different person in his natural hair rather than a powdered wig. “Major MacKinnon. I wasn’t expecting you back for another three days.”
If he was drunk, he didn’t show it, his words spoken without slurring, his gaze steady, his motions graceful.
Connor entered his study. “I’ve come after a forced march of three days to report news of some urgency.”
Wentworth seemed distracted while Connor described finding the Wyandot canoes and supply cache in British territory. He embellished the tale somewhat—something he’d never done before—suggesting without proof that the French planned to use their allies to strike at British forces and supply trains north of Ticonderoga. But Wentworth seemed uninterested.
He gave a wave of his lace-cuffed wrist. “Yes, very well, Major. Is that all?”
“Is augh’ amiss?”
“Is aught amiss?” Wentworth’s expression chilled Connor to the marrow. “Would that you had slain Katakwa when you had the chance. That first night when Sarah was alone with him, the bastard ravished her, and she now carries his child!”
The breath rushed from Connor’s lungs, the room seeming to fade around him. “Lady Sarah…is wi’ child?”
Och, lass!
“Yes, she’s with child—and you will not breathe a word of it, or I’ll have your head.” Wentworth glared at Connor, stood, and walked to the window, something in his hand—a black marble chess piece. “I asked Dr. Blake to help find some means of causing her to miscarry, but it seems there is no way to get rid of the thing growing inside her without also risking her life. Dr. Blake tested a tea of pennyroyal on himself and is now gravely ill. Still, I must find some means of freeing Sarah from this burden, for she is expected in London two months hence for her wedding to Lord Denton, whom she loathes and believes is behind the scandal that got her sent here. Yes, Major, I’m afraid a great deal is amiss.”
Sarah carries your child, laddie.
For a moment, Connor could think of nothing else, but slowly he began to comprehend the rest of what Wentworth had just revealed.
Sarah was with child. Wentworth believed the child was Katakwa’s and was seeking some means to kill it so that he could send her to London to marry a man she hated, the man she believed had circulated Lady Margaret’s journal. In the meantime, Dr. Blake lay grievously ill after testing a deadly potion Wentworth had intended for Sarah on himself.
A cold rage flared in Connor’s chest, sharpening his mind, and he understood. Sarah had lied to protect him, leading Wentworth to believe Katakwa was the child’s father.
“Does Lady Sarah know that you intend to kill her bairn?”
“Of course not!” Wentworth snapped. “I hadn’t planned to tell her, but rather let her believe she had miscarried naturally. She speaks of the whelp as if she feels affection for it.”
The mac an uilc planned to poison his own niece in secret?
Long had Connor hated Wentworth. Long had he awaited the day when he would at last avenge the wrongs Wentworth had done to him and his brothers. But only now did he know what it was to look upon a true son of evil.
Abruptly, Wentworth whirled about to face him, a strange look on his face. “Did Captain Joseph return with you?”
“Aye.”
“Lieutenant, send for Captain Joseph immediately!” Wentworth called out the door. Brow furrowed, he stood before Connor, chess piece still in hand. “Perhaps his people know of some way to end—”
Connor grabbed Wentworth with both hands about the throat, shoved him back against the wall, and pinned him there, cutting off his breath, leaning in until his eyes were inches from Wentworth’s, and speaking between gritted teeth. “I willna suffer any man to harm Sarah or her child. Katakwa didna ravish Sarah, nor is he the father of her bairn.
“I am.”
Chapter 28
“Y ou?”
William stared into MacKinnon
’s eyes, some part of him unable to believe what he’d just heard. How dare one of his officers betray him in such a fashion? How could Sarah have lied to him after all he’d done for her? And how could he, William, not have seen the truth?
“Aye.” MacKinnon released him and stepped back, his gaze boring warily into William’s. “I took Sarah’s maidenhead. The child is mine.”
Rage made William’s head thrum. “I sent you to save her! Instead, you ravish her yourself?”
“I didna ravish her. What happened was forced upon me, too.” There was anguish in MacKinnon’s eyes, but William was too angry to see it. “You told me to do whatever I must to save her. Joseph and I tried every means we could think upon to free her. In the end, I had no choice but to fight Katakwa for her hand. The village leader wouldna allow us to depart until we were wed and the union consummated before a witness. We were told they’d have burnt Joseph and me at the stake if they’d caught us tryin’ to escape, and God only knows what Katakwa would have done to Sarah.”
William cringed inwardly at MacKinnon’s familiar use of Sarah’s name.
“The only other choice was to leave her wi’ Katakwa and return later wi’ my men, hopin’ we could find where they’d hidden the village. I couldna risk that, for we might have lost her forever, nor did I wish to see your niece made a slave. I took the one chance I had and did the best I could to keep her safe.”
“You’re saying you were forced to ravish her?” William poured himself a drink, his gaze dropping to his desk drawer where he kept a loaded pistol. He’d likely be dead before he could fire a shot. It was best to wait for Lieutenant Cooke to return. “You’re lying—just like you lied when you made your report. It included nothing of this.”
“I promised Sarah I wouldna speak of it to anyone, and I kept that promise. If you dinnae believe me, ask Joseph. He kens the way of it. He was there.”
William looked up. “Did he have her, too? Is that why she wears his wampum?”
“Nay! She is as a sister to him.” A muscle clenched in MacKinnon’s jaw. “What I’ve told you is the truth. I swear it upon my honor as a MacKinnon.”
“Your honor?” William gave a snort, then drank, the cognac burning its way into his gut. “You have no honor.”
The muscle in MacKinnon’s jaw clenched again. “I treated her with the kindness I would show my own true wife, giving her dogbane to protect her from my seed—”
William squeezed his eyes shut to ward off the repulsive image of MacKinnon rutting upon his niece, but MacKinnon went on.
“—but it didna work.”
“No, of course it didn’t.” William felt the dark urge to laugh. “You MacKinnon brothers are nothing if not virile. Your brother Iain fucks Lady Anne, and she conceives. Two children she has borne him in but two years of marriage. Morgan sticks his cock in his little demoiselle, and she bears him twin sons. Why should you be any different?”
MacKinnon took a step toward him. “Dinnae you be speakin’ of Annie and Amalie in that way. We both ken what you tried to do to Annie.”
Wentworth’s fist closed tightly around the black king, pain and rage and cognac igniting into fury. “I offered Lady Anne a life of luxury, of silks, fine wines, and feather beds! She chose a life of wool and straw and muck instead.”
“She chose love!” MacKinnon’s voice thundered through the room.
And William wanted Connor MacKinnon dead. He wanted to flay the skin off his back, geld him, and watch him hang. He wanted to hurt him, to break him, to end him.
Then he understood.
“This is how you take your vengeance. I sent you to rescue my niece, and you seized the chance to defile her. You, the man I trusted to save her, used her innocence against her, bent her to your will, and ravished her to get your revenge on me!” William was shouting now, but he didn’t give a damn.
“I would never harm an innocent woman to take revenge upon her male—”
“Stop this! Please, stop!”
And there just inside the doorway, wearing only her shift and dressing gown, stood Sarah.
Sarah watched as the two men she loved most in the world stopped shouting and looked over at her, clearly taken aback to find her there. Connor’s face was dark with rage, but it was Uncle William’s appearance that startled her most. He stood there in his shirttails and vest, no wig, no coat, his face red and pinched with fury. They were fighting about her.
And she knew why.
Uncle William had told Connor she was with child, and Connor had done exactly what she’d feared he would do—he had claimed the child as his own.
Though surely he was in peril, he seemed not to be afraid for himself. “Sarah, lass, are you well?”
It made her heart sing to see him.
She nodded, her hands sliding instinctively to her belly. “I am queasy in—”
“So it is true.” Uncle William cut across her. “The whelp inside you is his?”
Sarah was shocked to hear her uncle refer to her baby like that. “Yes, Uncle, but he did not ravish me.”
Sarah quickly told him what had happened, wanting Uncle William to know the truth, hoping to blunt his anger with Connor, but her words seemed to have the opposite effect. And Sarah’s fear for Connor grew. “In the end, Major MacKinnon let me decide. I did not wish him or Joseph to risk such a horrible end on my account. It seemed a small price to pay for freedom. Major MacKinnon was most careful of me, Uncle, doing all he could for my sake and—”
“You call me ‘uncle,’ and yet you lied to me?” Uncle William walked slowly toward her. “You let me believe Katakwa had done this.”
“I did not lie, my lord.” Sarah would not let his anger cow her. “You refused to hear of the ordeal from me, and when you learned I was with child, you assumed Katakwa was the father. I did not correct your assumption because I feared for Major MacKinnon. Had the major not done what he’d done, then I would be carrying Katakwa’s child now.”
“Come no closer to her, Wentworth.” Connor stepped into Uncle William’s path. “You’ll no’ lay a hand upon her.”
“She is my niece! I would never harm her.” Uncle William glared at Connor. “But you…You betrayed me and deceived her, taking advantage of her plight to ravish her and exact your long-promised revenge—and what a sweet revenge it must have been, fucking a virgin of royal blood. You managed not only to ruin my niece, but also to get her with child. You are to be congratulated on your thoroughness.”
Stunned by Uncle William’s vulgar language, Sarah struggled to understand his meaning. “But I told you, Uncle, he did not ravish me. He did not deceive me. I was there. I know what occurred.”
Uncle William turned on her. “Do you, my dear? How much of it was spoken in a tongue you understand? Do you know for certain that Katakwa’s people would not let you leave the village, or did you hear it only from MacKinnon?”
Was Uncle William saying that Connor and Joseph had lied to her? That he had tricked her into yielding her virginity for the sake of revenge? Sarah did not believe it.
“I might not have understood every word, but all were faithfully translated, I am certain. Everything I was told would happen did happen.” Sarah paid no heed to the anger on Uncle William’s face, but pressed on. “What of the midwife? Why would she have sat there through the night if not to see the marriage consummated? Major MacKinnon argued with her, and only after he showed her proof of our union did she leave us in peace. No, Uncle, you are wrong. In your rage, you would blame him, but he is no more to blame for this than I!”
“Is that so?” Uncle William walked a small circle around Connor, his eyes hard and dark. “Did you know that Major MacKinnon and his brothers despise me? They murdered a man in Albany, and I offered them a place in my army to spare them from the gallows. You’d think they would be grateful, but they are unrepentant Jacobites and feel no loyalty to His Majesty or to me, their commander.
“What is it you and your brothers call me, Major? ‘Wee German lairdie???
? ‘Pretty wee prince?’ ‘Your Immensity?’ ‘Your Gracefulness?’” Uncle William mimicked Connor’s Highland burr. “That alone is treason, yet I have tolerated it for the sake of victory. But now you’ve gone too far, MacKinnon. How you must have enjoyed defiling her, knowing she comes from the family that defeated your clan at Culloden!”
“That is a bloody damned lie!” Connor turned to Sarah. “All of it is a lie, Sarah. Your noble uncle saw my brother fight a thief in the streets in Albany and decided he wanted men like us in his army. He framed us for a murder we didna commit, vowin’ to see us hang on false evidence if we didna fight for him. He stole our lives!”
Feeling sick, Sarah looked from Connor to Uncle William and back again, uncertain whom to believe. Was Connor a murderer spared the gallows or an innocent man pressed unjustly into service by her own flesh and blood? She knew Connor came from a Jacobite clan and that he and his men had not forgotten Culloden. She’d sensed he did not care for her uncle, but she had never asked why.
She met Connor’s gaze, unwilling to believe that the tenderness he’d shown her had been part of some plot for revenge. “If my uncle had so wronged you, Major, why did you not speak of it before tonight?”
“I didna wish to upset you or speak ill of a man you love.”
And in his simple answer, Sarah found her truth.
“See now easily he deceives you, Sarah? He is a murderer and a liar—”
“You are the liar—Lord William Wentworth, the prince of lies!” Connor took a step toward Uncle William. “Why dinnae you tell her what you planned for her bairn, how you asked Dr. Blake to use pennyroyal to poison it and force it from her womb?”
“Wh-what?” Stunned, Sarah gaped at Connor, her hand sliding down to the hard lump in her lower belly.
“Dr. Blake is gravely ill tonight because he tested the pennyroyal tea on himself. Your uncle didna plan to ask you or even warn you afore he gave you the potion. He told me this himself. He wanted you to miscarry.”
Dr. Blake tells me that it is not uncommon for a woman in the early stages of breeding to miscarry. Let us pray your womb rejects the bastard before it quickens.