"And when did you procure it?" His voice was cold, but beneath the anger Lucy could feel pain. She could see it in his eyes too, the searing hurt of betrayal.

"When, Lucy?" His voice was very steady.

"On the morning of our wedding," Lucy said. Her voice was thin, shaking. "But I didn't take it! Please believe me! I never took it!"

Robert shook his head. He looked weary, heart sore. "I thought you trusted me," he said. "I told you that you could. Yet it seems you never believed me."

"It wasn't like that!" Lucy said. "Yes, I trusted you, but-"

She stopped. That one small, betraying word was all it needed because it showed just how little faith she had placed in his word.

"You know how it was for me," she whispered. "I was terrified. I needed to feel safe."

"You were safe," Robert said. "You were always safe with me. The pity of it is that you never trusted me." His voice changed and she knew it was the end. He would accept no justification, no further explanation. Maybe in time he would be prepared to listen, but the lovely, bright and infinitely precious future they had only just started to build lay smashed in pieces at her feet. Lucy was stubborn and determined, but she could not find the words; her throat felt raw and tears smarted in her eyes.

"You must be cold," Robert said. "You have done much for Golden Isle tonight and I am grateful." His chilling politeness felt like another blow. "I will take you back to the Auld Haa and then I must get to the village to help my men."

"Of course," Lucy said stiffly. Her heart cracked a little more. "Do not trouble to take me back-"

"I insist."

He held out a hand to help her mount before him. She could not help a tiny wince of pain as her burned hand touched his. He turned it over so that the palm was cradled in his.

"You're burned," he said.

"It's nothing," Lucy said. "No more than a few blisters."

Robert let her go and she missed the warmth of his touch so badly it pained her more than the burns. They rode in silence down the track and he left her at the gate of the Auld Haa without another word.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

ROBERT WORKED THROUGH the night alongside his men to damp down the fires and make sure that all his people were safe. He did not rest. He did not want to think, did not want to feel. Cardross had been captured and all his men taken. In an even greater feat the privateer Le Boucanier had been captured too, drawn out by Jack, who had used Cardross's yacht to lure him to a rendezvous. The press-gang had swept in and taken the pirate as their prize. It was a rough justice that worked in the islands, so far from the rule of the king's law, but Robert was satisfied with it. Cardross would be tried for treason and Robert's lands were safe.

Eventually, as dawn was breaking over the eastern sea, Jack came up to him, filthy and smelling of smoke, looking, Robert thought, very much as he must look himself. Jack handed him the leather drinking bottle and he gulped down the liquid gratefully, feeling it ease his rough throat.

"You need to rest, Rob," Jack said.

"There's more to do," Robert said tersely.

"And time to do it all," Jack said. "Go. Sleep. Talk to Lucy-"

Robert made an uncontrollable movement and Jack paused, his green eyes steady on his cousin's face.

"Lucy was trying to save Methven for you," Jack said. "You fool, don't you see? Lucy needed to feel safe in order to wed you. She had been through a terrible ordeal when she was too young to be able to deal with it. She was trying to protect herself against anything like that ever happening again. The potion gave her the courage to marry you and help you save Methven from Cardross."

"She should have trusted me," Robert growled.

Jack sighed. He ran his hands through his hair, smearing soot all over his face. "Yes, she should have trusted you," he said, "but at that stage she could not." He looked up. "She could have refused you again, Rob," he said simply. "But she did not. She believed in you and she wanted to save Methven."

Robert glared at his cousin. "You have an interesting way with an argument," he said. "You should have been a lawyer."

Jack grinned. "You know I'm right."

"What I don't know," Robert said, "is how you know all this."

"That deceitful bitch of a maid told me," Jack said. "I think she thought it might help save her miserable hide." His gaze narrowed. "Everyone on Golden Isle loves Lucy for her courage tonight." He sighed. "You love her too. Don't let Cardross ruin it, Rob. Don't let him win."

"You're a brave man," Robert said. "To dare to say this to me."

"Someone had to," Jack said.

Robert rested his forearms on the top of the gate and watched the ripples of dawn light the sea. He was exhausted, bone tired, but deeper than that he felt sick at heart. Jack was right. He loved Lucy so much that to know of her betrayal hurt like a physical blow. It hurt all the more because he had heard his people talking of her courage and the way she had helped them, when all the time she had been prepared to deny them the one thing that they needed to be safe from Cardross, his heir.

He had thought that Lucy trusted him completely and although he understood deep down that this was not about him but all about her terror and her past, he felt cheated and betrayed. All the lovely warm intimacy that had filled the past week was lost, cheapened because all the time she had been deceiving him, knowing that there would be no child. He felt heartsick.

But Jack was right about something else too. If he turned from Lucy now, Cardross would have won in every way that counted. Not only would he have tried to steal Robert's estates, but he would have destroyed his joy and his hope and his love. He would have stolen his future.

Robert straightened and thrust the water bottle back into his cousin's hands. "I don't know why it matters to you," he said.

"Because I would see you happy, you fool," Jack said, clapping him on the shoulder. "Now get back to the house and find her."

"There's something I have to do first," Robert said.

He crossed the field and walked up the rough path to the estate office. Mercifully it had been untouched by the fire that had swept through the village. In the pale morning light he rummaged through his desk drawer and found the sheets of paper he had secreted there. He read what was written on them. He shook his head ruefully.

Then he set off across the fields to the Auld Haa to find his wife.

LUCY HAD NOT slept. As the first light of dawn slipped through the window, she got up stiffly, pulled out her portmanteaus and started to pack. She did not want to wait for Robert to tell her to leave. She wanted to be ready. Even so, when she heard his step on the stair and saw his tall figure duck beneath the lintel of the bedchamber, her heart started to race because she had not quite prepared the words she was going to say.

One look at him undermined her completely. He had washed off the worst of the smoke and dirt and sweat, but he still looked rumpled and so tired she wanted to take him in her arms and soothe him to rest. She doubted that such an intervention would be welcome, though. She would do better to sit on her hands than touch him.

He had a battered leather knapsack over one shoulder. He let it slide down and onto the bed. His gaze took in the portmanteaus, the crumpled clothes, her own disheveled appearance.

"Where are you going?" he said.

"Away," Lucy said. There was a big lump in her throat. She was not sure she could say anything else at all.

"Where?" Robert was looking puzzled. She ached to touch him, to reach out to him, to throw herself into his arms.

"To the mainland." How husky her voice sounded. "I don't know. Away. Home. Somewhere."

Now he was looking even more confused. She would have laughed had she not felt so damned miserable. "Why?" he said.

"It's better that I should." Lucy threw the last of the crumpled petticoats into her portmanteaus. "It's best that I go away."

"Best for whom?" Robert said. There was a new note in his voice now, more authoritative, less confused.

"For you," Lucy said. "Of course."

"How very thoughtful of you," Robert said. Then: "I assure you, I should not be the least better off were you to leave me."

Lucy's heart started to slam hard. She looked at him. There was mockery and tenderness in his eyes. It made her heart pound all the harder to see it there.

"Lucy," he said.

She trembled. "I went to the cliff," she said. She spoke quickly, the words tumbling over each other. "I was trying to find the pot of pennyroyal I threw away so that I could prove to you I had not opened it."

His gaze was steady on her. "Did you find it?"

"No," Lucy said. A sob caught in her throat, startling her. "I think it must have fallen into the sea. I am better at throwing than I thought."

She remembered numbly that she had wanted to explain, to tell him that she had never really intended to take it. She had thought that her greatest fear would be if she fell pregnant. Now she realized that her greatest fear had been eclipsed. What she feared most was living without Robert. She could do it, of course. Very likely she was going to have to do it now. But the color and the joy would be gone from her life because she had learned too late that what really mattered was not to live in the shadow of fear but to embrace life. In life there were no certainties, but while there was hope and love and the strength to build something good, that was what mattered.

"I expect they taught you how to throw at the Highland Ladies Bluestocking Society," Robert said. He strode over to the dresser, turned and looked at her. "You don't have to explain, Lucy," he said.

Lucy's heart broke then. He did not want to know. Her intention had been to cheat him of the heir he needed, and even if she had not done it the intent to betray was sufficient.

She could not blame him. He had told her from the first that she could trust him, but she had been unable to believe him.

She sat down on the bed-her legs were trembling too much to stand-and tried to resist the urge to bury her face in one of the shifts and simply cry.

"You have nothing to prove to me." Robert's voice was soft. "If you tell me you did not take the medicine, then I believe you. I trust you. And even if you did, I understand. You were terrified, haunted by the past. I cannot blame you for that." He rubbed his eyes. He looked so weary that her heart ached for him.

"I was angry at first," he said. "I did feel betrayed. It was a shock. But I know that you trust me now, and that is what matters. I know I love you and that you love me too."

For one long, long moment Lucy was quite still and then she threw herself into his arms. They closed about her hard and sure, holding her against his heart.

"You do understand," she said. A button scored her cheek. She could taste her own hot tears.

Robert was stroking her hair in a long tender caress and she reveled in the gentleness of it. "Hush," he said. "It's all right." He picked her up and carried her over to the bed, sitting down with her on his knee. He brushed the hair away from her hot, wet face and kissed her soothingly, as though she were a small child in need of comfort. Gradually her shaking ceased and the fierce dread inside her eased.

"I have something to tell you, Lucy," Robert said. He looked around at the open chest, the piles of clothes and the battered portmanteaus. His blue gaze touched her like a caress. The heat trapped in his eyes was enough to burn her down.

"You always said I was no poet," he said. "That I was too blunt and unscholarly to be poetic. Well, hear this. If you leave me I will be in pieces. Shattered. You are my perfect ideal, Lucy. Once upon a time I was foolish enough to think no such thing existed. Well, I have learned better now."

Despite herself Lucy gave a snort of laughter. "Perhaps I was wrong," she said. "Perhaps you do have the makings of a poet after all."

Robert did not smile in response. Instead he reached for the knapsack and opened the battered leather flap, tipping the contents out onto the bedcover. "Is this romantic enough for you?" he asked. "If not I shall go away and try again."

Lucy stared at the crumpled piles of paper. Each one looked as though it had been screwed up into a ball by a bad-tempered hand. "What on earth-" she began.

"Look at them," Robert said.

She unfolded the first sheet and smoothed it out. It contained a couple of lines of writing, disjointed words, some underscored, others crossed out. The second sheet was the same, and the third. Lines scribbled, repeated, crossed through, then finally discarded.

"Robert." She put the paper down slowly. "You wrote this yourself? For me?"

He looked part proud, part shamefaced, like a schoolboy. "It's not very good, I'm afraid."

It was not.

"My love is like a cloud of rain that lightly falls upon the plain..." She spluttered with laughter and tried to turn it into a cough.

"My love for you is tender and true..."

"You copied that one from somewhere else," Lucy said. "I have heard it before." She was trying to stop the smile that was tilting her lips, but it burst out, defiant. "But you tried," she said. "That is what counts." She could feel tears roughening her throat again. "Oh, Robert!" She looked at him through eyes made brilliant with unshed tears. "You really do love me if you are prepared to do this for me."

He took her hands. "I'd do far more than write poetry to prove how much I love you, Lucy." He gave her fingers a tiny squeeze. "You do understand?"

She did. She could imagine him swearing at the ink stains on his fingers; she could see him sitting at his desk in the estate office this past week with his head in his hands after discarding the tenth sheet of paper.

"I love you too," she said. "So very much."

He drew her back into his arms and kissed her hair. "If it's too soon," he said, his voice a little rough, "if you still feel afraid to have a child, we can wait. I am prepared to go to the courts and argue my case-"

Lucy pressed her fingers to his lips. "I'm ready," she whispered. "I don't want to go back. And who knows..." She smiled, hope radiant and bright in her heart. "I may already be carrying your child."

With one movement Robert pushed the portmanteau off the bed. It fell with a crash, spilling its contents across the rush mat. As Lucy opened her mouth to protest, he kissed her deeply, bearing her back against the yielding pillows. His fingers strayed to the buttons of her bodice. One popped open, then a second.

"Just in case you are not," he said, "shall we try again?"

EPILOGUE.

Methven Castle, September 21, 1813 LUCY WROTE THE date at the top of the page and paused in thought, tapping her pen against her lips. A letter such as this was going to be difficult to phrase correctly. It required a great deal of thought.

Her gaze slid to the window. It was too beautiful a day to be indoors. The glen dozed in a misty golden glow and the high mountains were etched against a sky of perfect blue.

On the terrace below, Lucy could see the Dowager Marchioness of Methven sitting surrounded by dogs, looking out across the topiary garden to the mountains beyond. Lucy suspected that she was asleep, although Lady Methven would most certainly deny that she was any such thing. As Robert had predicted, his grandmother most heartily approved of his wife. He had told her so only the other day.

"Grandmama is a frightfully high stickler," he had said. "It is very hard to earn her approval."

Lucy had not contradicted him, but she had not agreed. In her opinion it was very easy to please the dowager, who had taken one look at her, realized that she was utterly in love with Robert and had therefore taken her to her heart. It was a very soft heart underneath that starchy exterior.

The dogs set up an excited barking and Lucy saw that Robert was walking along the terrace toward his grandmother, carrying in his arms the four-month-old heir to Methven. James Gregor Methven was blissfully and silently asleep. Lucy watched with amusement as Robert handed the small bundle to the dowager with care and concentration. As though aware of her scrutiny, he looked up at the window and raised a hand. A moment later she heard his step on the stair and he came into her study. He smelled of sunshine and fresh air and he rested a hand on the back of her chair and bent down to kiss her with satisfactory thoroughness.