The Virgin's War (19 page)

“Who?” the queen barked.

“Against all odds and expectations, Mary Stuart has landed in Scotland.”

M
aisie received the first notice of disaster three days before departing Dublin. Long accustomed to keeping her own counsel, she swallowed against the shock of the letter from Edinburgh and awaited further news. It came swiftly—by the time they boarded ship she had received eight letters in all. Each, unfortunately, elaborating on the same theme.

In your absence, your brother Robert is making a serious play for the Sinclair Company.

It wasn't that she was shocked by Robert's attempt. But she had never dreamed that he might be successful. How easily he would be able to subvert men who she believed trusted her. It seemed her sex was a bigger obstacle than she'd feared. Success wasn't enough. She would always be second choice because she was female.

Andrew Boyd was still on her side. Several of the warning letters had come from him. And three other members of the board still held with Boyd. If her brother had been the extent of the threat, Maisie would have been confident in her ability to handle it. But Robert, either with shrewd advice or through his own cunning, had gone to the king.

Maisie cursed colourfully when she received that news—a string of dockside words that would have confirmed the bad opinion of many about women who meddled in business. Because King James, from an excess of caution as well as an inborn distrust of ambitious women, had sided with Robert.

No matter what the king thought, however, he could not simply hand over the company to Robert or override the decisions of the company's board. But he could—and apparently had—put pressure on the board. Robert had not argued directly for her removal. Rather, he had pointed out her youth, her innate fragility as a female, her susceptibility to sentiment, the fact that—at only nineteen—surely she would marry again. Which meant unscrupulous men wishing to marry her simply to get their hands on the Sinclair Company.

Would it not be wise, Robert had proposed to the king, to require her to marry
before
she could wield such control? That would allow the board to consider her future husband as a critical factor in determining her leadership. And so the king had decreed: if Maisie Sinclair wished to be considered a fit leader, she must marry.

Robert did not expect her to, of course. He knew her stubbornness enough to guess that she would rather keep her pride and abandon both their grandfather's company and, perhaps, Scotland. And so she would have to do. If the king could not be brought to change his mind—and Boyd wrote that he did not consider it likely at this point—what choice would Maisie have but to leave before she could be thrown out?

But she did not want to leave Scotland. She could take the mercenaries, they belonged entirely to her—but their commander? Stephen was needed where war was most likely to break out. Without her, surely he would return to England and take up the place the queen wished for him.

Maisie would have preferred to remain on deck in the open air as they sailed out of Dublin into the Irish Sea, but late November was not kind. Though the winds were favorable, there were bursts of sleet and the deck was slippery underfoot. So she sat in her tiny cabin and pondered what she would do when they landed.

A knock sounded and she sighed. “Come in,” she called.

“What's wrong?” Stephen asked straight out.

“What makes you think something is wrong?”

He stared for a moment, then abruptly sat down next to her on the edge of the narrow bed. For all her vaunted self-possession, Maisie found it difficult to be in such close quarters. Stephen's hand came up to her face, and she waited dizzily for him to touch her. But he didn't, quite. Instead, he sketched the air above her cheek. “When you are angry, your eyes become the grey of the North Sea in storm.”

She handed him the latest letter from Andrew Boyd wordlessly, and waited for him to read it. She knew every word by heart.

King James commands your presence at court as soon as you reach Edinburgh. He will tell you that you are temporarily suspended from the Sinclair board, subject to making a respectable marriage. I'm sorry, lass. I do not think he will be moved from this point.

Bless him, Stephen did not waste time in outrage or surprise. “I can think of three responses,” he said.

“First?”

“I march your mercenaries into Edinburgh and persuade the king to change his mind.”

Despite herself, Maisie grinned. “Tempting but impractical. Unless you are looking to be banished from every European nation one after the other. Second?”

“I march your mercenaries against Robert and persuade him to renounce his claims and banish himself from Scotland.”

“Persuade?”

“Perhaps with a shade more violence behind it.” He said it with a disconcerting relish.

“And third?”

“You comply.”

Maisie's eyebrows shot up so far she could almost feel them against her hairline. “By marrying some greedy stranger the king or my brother proposes?”

“By marrying me.”

The silence was tangible, and Maisie felt as though something heavy had landed on her chest. She could hardly draw breath to speak.

“Also highly impractical,” she managed, with what she hoped was amusement.

“But tempting?” Those hazel eyes of his slid across her face and she looked away.

Not for anything would she reveal just how tempting. “I can manage. There is no need to offer yourself as sacrifice.”

“It would be no sacrifice.” He spoke as though deliberating which words to choose so there would be no misunderstanding. “Surely such a clever woman recognizes how important you have become to me.”

Important.
Not quite the same thing as loved. “Your family and your queen would be horrified.”

“I think you underestimate my family. And the queen cannot have it both ways—if I am no longer one of her nobles, then she can have no say in my personal life.”

“Marry me and you will never be restored to your title.”

He smiled grimly. “All the more reason. I do not want it.”

“Stephen—”

“Mariota, you need not be afraid. If it helps, consider this simply an extension of our friendship. There need be no personal awkwardness. The marriage would be for you to define. I would never press you for…well…”

No more he would, more's the pity for her. “Yes, I see,” she found herself saying despite her better judgment. “May I have time to consider it?”

“To weigh the benefits and drawbacks? I would expect no less of you.”

He stood as abruptly as he'd done everything else in this astonishing conversation. Maisie stayed where she was, watching him covertly, his height and elegance and the straight lines of his back and shoulders. There was an awful lot to notice in just the two seconds before he reached the door.

Then Stephen paused, and she got to her feet, wondering wryly if he had come to his senses and was about to get himself out of a situation he'd never intended to wander into.

He looked back at her, a slanting glance over his shoulder. “There is no one else I could envision marrying. Not after Ireland.”

Because of Ailis,
he surely meant.
Because I will never love again as I loved her, but you could forgive me that and live with what is left.

Could she live with what was left? Stephen would never love her, not as he had loved Ailis. And not as Maisie herself loved him. He would be kind, for he was incapable of being other than that. Clearly he was not interested in her body, but she believed that their minds did connect.

It was far more than Maisie had ever expected to have. She just didn't know if it was enough.

After his abrupt proposal to Maisie, Stephen took himself equally abruptly out of her way. He could hardly believe what he'd said and was afraid if he stayed any longer his matter-of-fact logic would give way to an outpouring of sentiment that would surely frighten her. Fortunately, the seas proved troublesome and every hand was needed to effect the difficult crossing. They had to put in at Belfast for two days and at the Isle of Arran for three. It was easy in those conditions to maintain a distance of cordiality and politeness.

But the first week of December the skies cleared, and finally their ship began the tricky navigation through the western peninsula to the mouth of the River Clyde and the port of Dumbarton. It was only then that Maisie approached him.

“We should speak before we land,” she announced. There was no indication of what she meant to say. With heart beating irregularly, Stephen followed her to her cabin.

Neither of them sat. Stephen leaned against the closed door, hoping he looked more cool than he felt. Maisie faced him with an expression that gave nothing away.

She had only to speak two words. “I agree.”

The relief that swept him kept him against the door, this time for support rather than effect. He had to swallow against his first reaction, which was to smile broadly and take her in his arms. He could not frighten the bird just when it had flown into his hand.

“I'm glad,” he said, striving for the practical tone she would expect.

“On one condition,” she added.

He cocked his head curiously.

Maisie looked away as she stated her condition. “That we marry before reaching Edinburgh. King James may not entirely approve of an Englishman, and I will not risk anyone else meddling in the arrangement we have come to. Better to confront them all with a fait accompli.”

“Agreed.”

“Your parents won't mind?” she asked. “I mean, of course they will mind, they've already had one child marry without notice this year and I am hardly the wife they would choose for you. I suppose I mean, will they ever forgive me?”

That brought him away from the door with a jolt. She sounded so…uncertain. He took her cold hands in his. “There is no need for forgiveness. We will do what we must to protect your company and yourself. And when we have secured your position in Edinburgh, we will ride south and explain it to my parents.”

Stephen wanted to smooth her hair, to cup her chin in his hands, make some gesture of affection. He refrained. “They will love you, Mariota. Rather more than they love me, I expect. You have nothing to fear.”

“I appreciate what you are giving up, Stephen. I do. I will make no demands on you. You must consider yourself free in every important respect.”

That was not encouraging. “Demands?”

She blushed, a subtle wash of colour across her cheekbones. “You surely must want children. Title or not, you are the oldest son in an important family. It will be expected of you. I have no objection…that is…”

Stephen had to drop his eyes, certain Maisie would mark his disappointment. She was hardly throwing herself at him, was she? Not very flattering. But perhaps, in time, she would come to love him the same way he loved her. Soul and body.

Or perhaps not. “I have no objection to bearing your children,” she continued firmly. “I also have no objection to how you choose to meet any other…needs you might have. I am quite certain you will be discreet.”

After that extraordinary speech, what on earth was he supposed to answer? Tell her she had misread him completely? Confess that for months now, without even being aware of it, he had not been able to envision any woman in his bed but her? Maisie needed him in order to protect her place in the company. That was all.

He had promised her that the marriage would be hers to define. And Stephen was, if nothing else, a man of his word. “That you will allow me to help you is quite satisfaction enough. Children need not be a question between us. Certainly not now.”

But as he pressed a chaste kiss to her cheek to seal their bargain, Stephen felt as though the children the two of them might have were haunting him forlornly. Dark like him, or moonlight pale like Maisie? Her brains, of course, and her courage. He was twenty-six years old—he'd never especially thought about children. Until now, when the woman he loved seemed prepared to bargain for them simply as an offering to his pride.