“That is enough, Lieutenant.” This outburst was quite extraordinary coming from the normally mild lieutenant. William found himself pressed to keep the anger out of his voice. He hadn’t meant for Cooke to speak quite so freely.
“I believe Major MacKinnon innocent, and—”
“I said enough!” Did Cooke actually presume to reprimand him?
Lieutenant Cooke started, then shifted his gaze to the window. “Yes, my lord.”
William’s hand drifted into his pocket, grasped the cracked black king as he fought to restrain his anger. First, Sarah’s rebuke and now a lecture from his lieutenant.
For a short time, I thought there were two men in this world with whom I could share my heart. You have shown me there is only one.
A strange feeling of guilt stirred inside him, cold and prickly.
He quashed it.
How dare either of them question him? She was his ward, and he had shown her all the kindness a devoted uncle could. Without his intervention, she would be utterly ruined, disowned by her father, outcast from society. And Cooke was William’s lieutenant, a commoner with little understanding of what was at stake.
“I’m curious, Lieutenant, how you can hold MacKinnon innocent when he clearly found his pleasure with Sarah. If his actions hadn’t been exposed by Sarah’s condition, he would have gone the rest of his days privately gloating that he’d stolen her maidenhead.”
“I’ve spent no small amount of time wondering what I might have done had I been in Major MacKinnon’s position in that Shawnee village. If all was as he said it was—and I believe he is telling the truth—I hope I would have had the fortitude to do exactly as he did. Would you have given me a thousand lashes, my lord?”
William did not know what to say. He had never imagined that what MacKinnon had told him was the truth. “Lieutenant, I—”
There came shouts from the guards outside, and the doors to his study were thrown wide.
“You sent for me, Your Immensity?” Fury on his face, Iain MacKinnon strode toward him, claymore in hand, his brother Morgan beside him. “I’m back.”
“So I see.” William gaze drifted to the doorway, hoping Lady Anne might have accompanied her husband.
In a heartbeat, the tip of MacKinnon’s blade rested beneath his chin, forcing him to meet the Highlander’s gaze. “My wife’s no’ here. She’s seein’ to Connor in the infirmary. You’ll no’ lay another stripe upon his back so long as I breathe. If you want my sword, revoke the remainder of his sentence. Now.”
“The balance between us has not changed, MacKinnon. With a shout I can have all three of you bound over and sent to Albany for trial on the charge of murder. I hold the power.”
“I hold a sword.”
As William looked into eyes that promised death, he wondered when he’d lost control of this entire state of affairs.
Sarah sat at her harpsichord trying to play, her fingers strangely clumsy. She stopped, started again, stopped, started again, stopped. Music had always been her comfort, her refuge. But not today.
She was certain the two men she’d seen this morning had been Connor’s brothers. She’d been asleep upstairs, when she’d been awakened by shouting. Though Agnes had tried to stop her, Sarah had hurried down the hall in time to see two men walk out the front door. They’d been so alike Connor in appearance that there could be no mistaking them for anything but kin. Both had held broadswords, their strides determined as they’d set out across the parade grounds.
Had they come to help him, to free him perhaps? Did they know about her? Did they know about the baby?
No one would tell her anything—her uncle’s orders, no doubt. She had hoped to speak quietly with Lieutenant Cooke to learn what had happened and to ask about Connor’s condition, but she hadn’t yet found a moment to approach the lieutenant. He’d spent most of the day behind closed doors with Uncle William. She’d waited for him, calling to him as he walked quickly from her uncle’s study out the front door, telling him that she needed to speak with him. But he’d acted as if he hadn’t heard her.
What she wouldn’t give for some word of Connor! She was almost certain the flogging had stopped before the count had reached one hundred. That could only mean that he’d fallen unconscious or been deemed too weak for the flogging to continue. Was he in the guardhouse lying in dirty straw, dreading tomorrow’s pain? Or was he in the infirmary, perhaps feverish, maybe even dying?
Remember this, Sarah. Remember me.
Sarah heard his voice as if he were beside her. For a moment, she resisted, afraid that allowing herself to recall any happy memory would only deepen her worry and grief. Slowly, she closed her eyes, turning her thoughts toward that day in the cabin, the two of them alone in the wild, his body joining with hers as he showed her the bliss that was hers as a woman, his entire body bound to her pleasure. He’d been strong, virile, alive.
Och, Sarah, how shall I call augh’ beautiful again unless it be the sight of you?
Somehow her fingers found the keys, and, without opening her eyes, she played, pouring out the passion of that memory, unaware what song she was playing, her mind wrapped in the joy she’d felt as he’d taken her and given himself to her, breath and bodies mingled, blood running hot in their veins even as the storm raged outside.
“You play beautifully.”
Sarah gasped, whirled about to find a woman standing beside her. About Sarah’s height, she was strikingly beautiful with flaxen hair and bright green eyes. She wore a simple gown of pink cotton, but her apron was of embroidered linen, the kerchief at her throat fine lace.
“’Tis sorry I am to interrupt you, my lady, but I fear we’ve no’ much time. Your uncle doesna ken I am here and will surely send me away when he finds me. My name is Annie MacKinnon, Iain MacKinnon’s wife and Connor’s sister-by-marriage. Can we go to your chamber and speak where others cannae overhear us?”
“We shall have to speak here. My lady’s maid is upstairs, and she is not to be trusted.” Overjoyed to have this chance to speak with someone from Connor’s family, Sarah began playing to mask their voices, her fingers finding the notes without effort now. “How did you come to be here?”
She listened as Mistress MacKinnon told her how Joseph had arrived on the farm in the middle of the night and shared with them all that had happened. Fearing for Connor, the entire family—Annie, Iain, Morgan, Morgan’s wife Amalie, and their four children—had set out for Fort Edward after breakfast, traveling through the night. On their way, they’d met the redcoat troops sent to press Iain back into service and had heard the terrible punishment that Lord William had decreed for Connor.
“I fear for him, Mistress MacKinnon! Have you any news of him?”
“Please call me Annie, and, aye, I do.”
Then Annie told her how Iain had cut Connor down from the whipping post and carried him to the infirmary, where Annie had tended him herself.
“My husband went to speak wi’ him and…persuaded Lord William to rescind his own orders and dismiss the remainder of the sentence.”
So that’s what had happened.
Sarah felt light-headed with relief. “Thanks be to God!”
“Connor is in pain, but we are givin’ him laudanum and watchin’ over him. He is stubborn and strong. He will heal. Each time he wakes, he asks about you, so I thought it best to come and see wi’ my own eyes that you are safe. How do you feel?”
From the hallway outside the door came the sound of approaching boot steps.
They fell silent, listening, Sarah continuing to play as the footfalls drew nearer—and then passed by.
Sarah gave a sigh of relief. “I am still sick in the mornings and very tired.”
Though Sarah had known Annie but for a few minutes, she felt she could trust her completely. She found herself pouring out her fears and doubts, telling Annie all that had happened since she’d heard Connor shouting and had come downstairs to find him and Uncle William at each other’s throat—Connor’s acc
usations against Uncle William, the shock of learning that her uncle had hoped to induce her to miscarry, her uncle’s refusal to let her child be raised either by Joseph or by Connor.
Annie frowned pensively, as if thinking over what she was about to say. “Your uncle can be a hard, prideful man. I believe he has a heart, but he doesna often pay heed to it. Connor spoke the truth. Your uncle still holds the charge of murder over their heads. He uses it to control them.”
Sarah wasn’t certain which hurt more—knowing that Uncle William had done such a terrible thing or knowing that he had lied to her about it. “I am sorry for the wrongs my uncle has done your family.”
“You dinnae need to apologize. You are no’ to blame for his actions.”
“Connor never spoke a word of this to me. When I asked him why, he said he didn’t wish to upset me by speaking ill of a man I loved.”
Annie smiled. “The MacKinnon men are very protective of their women.”
If only Sarah was Connor’s woman. But her father had given her to another, and nothing Sarah could do would change that. “If I might ask, how did you meet your husband?”
Boot steps again. And again they passed by.
Speaking with her soft Scottish burr, Annie quickly told Sarah how she’d been sold falsely into indentured servitude and how Iain had turned aside from a scouting mission to save her life when the homestead where she’d been living was attacked by a war party of French and Abenaki. “Lord William recognized me from a visit he’d paid long ago to my uncle, Lord Bute, and tried all means, fair and foul, to win me to his bed, but—”
Before Annie could finish, Sarah interrupted her. “You are of noble birth?”
“Aye. I was born Lady Anne Burness Campbell of the Argyll Campbells. My father, the Earl of Rothesay, died wi’ my brothers at Prestonpans.”
Connor’s brother had married a loyalist—a woman of noble blood.
Sarah’s fingers fell still. “I am happy for you that you and Iain are together. I wish I could remain and live as Connor’s wife and raise our child together, but my father has arranged a match for me in London. I do not wish to marry the man my father has chosen. Lord Denton is loathsome to me. Nor can I bear to think of returning to London and leaving my baby behind, but such choices are not mine to make.”
Annie took her hand, gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Take heart, Sarah, for there are always choices.”
William rose. He’d known she would come. “Lady Anne, how good it is to see you. What an unexpected pleasure.”
Despite two children and her plain cotton gown, she was as lovely as ever, her womanly shape fuller than he remembered, her skin still creamy and flawless, those green eyes of hers filled with trepidation. He had never stopped thinking of her, never stopped wanting her. Even now, his pulse beat faster.
She gave a slight curtsy. “My lord.”
He gestured toward a chair, waited until she’d taken her seat, then resumed his. “What can I do for you?”
“I’ve come on Lady Sarah’s behalf to ask that you permit me to raise her baby when it is born. I have two children—”
“No. It is absolutely out of the question.”
“But why, my lord? Would it no’ be best for the child to live amongst kin?”
“Do you think I would permit a child of royal blood to be raised in a nest of Catholics and Jacobites?” William found himself on his feet, angry that she had come to discuss this particular subject. He’d thought she would come to plead for mercy for MacKinnon. “The child shall be given to a loyal British family to be raised as is fitting for its mother’s lineage. No one but I shall know where it resides.”
“I dinnae ask this for Connor’s sake. I ask it for Sarah’s. She is sick in her heart to think that her child must be left behind to be raised by strangers. She finds comfort in the thought that it might live with its father’s family.”
“When Sarah has other children, she will forget her bastard. I will not allow MacKinnon to profit from his misdeeds by gaining a son or daughter out of my niece.”
“Connor is an innocent man, and in your heart you ken that! You have punished him unjustly! He saved Lady Sarah’s life when most men, including you, would have failed. It is not he who betrayed you, my lord, but you who betrayed him!”
Her words lanced through him, guilt stirring the anger inside his chest.
Lady Anne’s voice took on a pleading tone, a sheen of tears in her eyes. “Please, I beg you, let the child come to me. I will suckle it at my own breast and raise it with all the love I give the children of my body.”
“No.”
Her green eyes narrowed. “You are a cruel and evil man!”
She stood, turned, and was gone.
Chapter 30
May 19
“Sarah!” Connor jerked awake, his mouth thick with the taste of laudanum, his heart pounding.
Amalie’s face swam into view. “Hush, mon pauvre frère. Drink.”
Connor drank from the tin cup Amalie raised to his lips, the cool water sliding down his parched throat. “What day is it?”
“It is the nineteenth of May.”
He’d been in the infirmary for five days now, and still he felt as weak as a pup. “I must get back on my feet.”
“You’ll do no such thing.” The sternness in Amalie’s voice was softened by her French accent. “If you try to leave, I’ll go and find Morgan again, and you know what he’ll do.”
A vague memory of Morgan threatening to bind him to the bed flashed through Connor’s mind. “Fetch him if you wish, but I cannae be lyin’ abed forever. If Sarah should need me…”
He grasped the edge of the bed and pushed himself up, gritting his teeth against the pain as he slowly sat, dizziness assailing him, making the room spin.
“You do not need to worry about Sarah. She is well and sends her love. Annie went to see her again today. That odious lady’s maid caught her this time, but Wentworth did not send her away.”
“Why would he?” Connor fought to steady himself, his hands splayed on the bed on either side of him. “The bastard covets her. He always has. Does Iain ken she’s been there and that Wentworth has seen her?”
“Yes.” Amalie handed him the tin cup again once more, then spoke in French, apparently not wishing anyone nearby to understand her words. “Ne t’inquiète pas pour nous, Connor. Iain et Morgan sont ici, et Joseph et ses guerriers ont établi leur campement vers le nord.” Do not worry about us, Connor. Iain and Morgan are here, and Joseph is encamped with his warriors to the north.
Connor drank, her words reassuring.
He heard a little noise—and what he’d thought was a bundle of blankets on the bed behind Amalie moved.
Amalie rose from where she’d knelt on the floor and sat on the bed beside the bundle, lifting a wee bairn into her arms. “Allons, mon doux garçon. Il est temps pour toi de faire la connaissance de ton oncle.” Come, my sweet boy. It is time for you to meet your uncle.
She held the baby so that Connor could see him. “This is Connor Joseph.”
The baby—Connor’s namesake—lay quietly in his mother’s arms, his wee hands bunched into tiny fists. He was dark of hair like his parents, his eyes blue like Morgan’s. Not quite strong enough yet to hold up his head, he nevertheless looked over at Connor, his gaze open and innocent. Connor felt a hitch in his chest to think that a child like this one—his child—was now growing inside Sarah.
“Would you like to hold him?”
“Hold him? I dinnae think I…” But Amalie did not wait for his answer, and he found himself cradling the baby against his chest, its little cheek resting on the white bandages that were wrapped around him, one little hand raised to its mouth. Connor stroked the bairn’s downy hair, marveled at its little eyelashes, its fingers, its toes, able to see both Morgan and Amalie in the child’s face. It was so little, so helpless, utterly innocent.
“And this…” Amalie reached over and lifted Connor’s sleeping twin into her arms “…i
s his older brother, Lachlan Anthony.”
“They are bonnie lads.” It amazed Connor to think that Amalie had carried both of the bairns inside her when she herself was so small. “Morgan wrote that it was a difficult travail.”
Amalie nodded. “Yes, it was very hard, but Morgan was there beside me. His strength helped carry me through.”
And Connor felt a pang in his chest to think that Sarah would have to endure childbirth without the comfort of loved ones, without him. And the moment her suffering was over, another sort of anguish would begin as the child was taken from her. Neither of them would ever know whether she’d borne a son or a daughter, whether it was fair or dark of hair, whether it eyes were light blue like hers or dark blue like his.
He looked over at Amalie, saw the happiness on her face as she gazed at her sleeping son. And it struck Connor as monstrous and cruel that anyone should try to sunder a mother and child.
Or a husband and wife.
He’d been wrong to think that it was right for him to let Sarah go. They’d given themselves to each other, each for the sake of the other, and if that was not true marriage, nothing was. Through that giving, she’d come to love him and he to love her, and their love had created a child.
Connor would be dead ere anyone took Sarah’s baby away from her—or took Sarah away from him. He ducked down, pressed a kiss to Connor Joseph’s head.
“I must speak with Morgan.”
Redcoats arrived before Morgan came.
Amalie, wee Lachlan in her arms, was thrust aside. “No, please! He is not healed!”
“Keep your bloody hands off her!” Connor was jerked to his feet and placed in shackles, a half-dozen redcoats crowded around him.
“Move, you.” A redcoat gave Connor a shove, his hand pressing square in the middle of Connor’s back.