Fuck. Cam recalled the feeling of being watched as he’d left the roundhouse that day. But he hadn’t followed up on it.

No wonder MacAllister had been so solicitous of Elise’s wellbeing. He had likely been formulating this trap for her from that moment.

“The only way to preserve the princess’ honor is for you to take her as your bride.” There was no hint of amusement in MacAlpin’s voice now. “I don’t think you’ll care for the alternative, MacNeil.”

What fucking alternative? “I will not coerce her.”

The king scrutinized him through narrowed eyes, and then shrugged as though the matter no longer concerned him. He turned, strolled around the great desk and sat down on the carved chair.

“Very well.” He waved a regal hand. “I have many warriors who are not hindered by your scruples. Before the night is out one of them will only too eagerly compromise the princess and leave her no option but to accept their suit.”

Something akin to horror gripped Cam’s heart at the thought of Elise being so cruelly betrayed. “No.” He slammed his hands down on the desk and leaned across, momentarily forgetting this man was his king and held his life in his hands. “I won’t stand by and let Elise be used in this manner. She doesn’t deserve it.”

“What do you suggest?” The king’s voice was hard. Cam straightened. There was only one thing he could do. It was the thing he most wanted in the world, but this was the last way he had wanted to achieve it.

“Even if I ask the princess and she accepts, there’s no guarantee her mother, the queen of Circinn, will agree to it. For all my royal blood.” The last words dripped with bitterness.

“Your royal blood,” MacAlpin said, “is the sweetener that will remove any resistance the queen of Circinn might have raised. We certainly don’t need to wait on her permission for the marriage. As to whether the princess will accept you, MacNeil—you had better ensure she has no reason not to.”

***

Elise and her ladies followed their escort to the feasting hall. When they had arrived some hours ago, they’d been taken to a chamber that Elise was sure had once belonged to the queens of Fortriu. Refreshments had been brought and they had been treated like honored guests.

But something was wrong. She couldn’t quite fathom what, but had the uncanny certainty that the guard outside their door was there not to protect them from possible attack, but to prevent them from possible escape.

And now, finally, she was to meet Kenneth MacAlpin, upstart king of Dal Riada and murderer of the nine Pictish nobles who had also laid claim to the kingdom of Fortriu.

Her cousin Aila had met him and told Elise of his cold-blooded arrogance and lack of mercy. A shiver skated over her arms and her stomach churned at the prospect of facing him. But it was the only way she knew of trying to secure Droston’s release.

They were led to an antechamber adjacent to the feasting hall. There were about a dozen men who all bowed as she entered. She scarcely glanced their way. Because at the far end of the chamber was Cam.

Relief flooded through her at the sight of his familiar face. He even wore his usual scowl and somehow that comforted her more than a welcoming smile would have. Cam, after all, was not the kind of man to offer welcoming smiles.

“Elise, Princess Clodrah of Circinn.” MacAllister stepped forward. “Kenneth MacAlpin, King of Dal Riada and Fortriu.”

Elise stiffened. How dare he call himself king of the Picts’ supreme kingdom to her face? Had he no shame?

“I welcome you to the palace of Forteviot.” The man standing beside Cam gave her an elegant bow and took her reluctantly proffered hand. He kissed her knuckles, but his eyes never left hers. She hoped he couldn’t read her thoughts. Droston would have no chance of freedom if so.

She inclined her head. Nothing would induce her to extend the courtesy of a curtsey as she would to any true-born king.

“Please accept our heartfelt condolences on the recent loss of your husband, my lady.” Insincerity dripped from MacAlpin’s words like deadly acid. Did he truly think she would believe anything he said?

Then she remembered why she had engineered this meeting in the first place. Her personal feelings had no place here.

“I’ve arranged for Ferelei mac Uurguist’s body to be taken to Fib with all haste,” MacAlpin continued, as though he had the right to interfere with her arrangements. But since he was merely doing what she wished to do herself she could scarcely complain.

“You are too kind.” Her voice was chilly but she couldn’t help it. With luck, MacAlpin would put her attitude down to her mourning. The most important thing was she elicited a promise from MacAlpin to receive her the following day, when she could make a formal request for Droston’s release.

But before she could draw a calming breath, MacAlpin indicated Cam. “You know, of course, Cameron MacNeil of Dunmar, prince of Northumbria.”

All thoughts of Droston and the need to speak with MacAlpin fled. She stared at Cam, shock ricocheting through her body. He was a prince? Of Northumbria? Why had he never told her of his royal heritage?

She desperately wanted to ask him. But instead, she remained cool and aloof and merely once again inclined her head. As if the revelation that Cam was a prince meant nothing to her.

MacAlpin wanted to shock her. He wanted to feed on her reaction like a demon fed on fear and decay. She didn’t know why she was so certain, only that she was right. And if MacAlpin wanted that from her, she most certainly would not oblige him.

“Come, let us join the feast.” Far from appearing irked by her refusal to rise to his bait, MacAlpin appeared faintly amused. She ignored him and focused on Cam who came to her and offered her his arm.

“Would you do me the honor of allowing me to escort you?” He growled the question. Anyone would think he asked her under duress. She smothered the smile that wanted to surface and accepted his offer.

She resisted the urge to stroke her fingertips over the back of his wrist. His muscled forearm fascinated her and she had to forcibly drag her mesmerized gaze away as they followed MacAlpin into the feasting hall.

Great goddess. Bride had not simply thrust the finest Scots warrior in creation in Elise’s path. She had ensured that warrior possessed royal blood.

Why would Bride go to such trouble unless she wished far more for Elise than a simple affair?

Her stomach fluttered as she took her place at the high table, Cam by her side. She stole a sideways glance at him. His face was stony.

As MacAlpin gave a sickening speech about how honored he was to have her as his guest, her thoughts wandered into possibilities that until now she had never allowed herself to hope for.

Could Cameron MacNeil be her second husband? Would he want to be? Until this moment, the prospect that she would one day have to remarry had been something she’d tried not to think about. But if that man was Cam, she not only wanted to think about it…

She wanted to do everything within her power to ensure it came about. The sooner the better.

But first, she had to discover if this was something Cam wanted. But how could he not? Bride had sent him to her. It didn’t matter whether he believed in her goddess or not. It didn’t change the facts.

MacAlpin finally sat down, to a storm of applause. Elise realized it was not only Scots warriors in the hall. There were many Picts, and they looked relieved that one of their princesses was a treasured guest in the palace.

As servants brought in steaming platters and conversation filled the hall, she leaned toward Cam.

“I am astonished you forgot to tell me you are a prince of Northumbria, my lord.” It was the first time she’d addressed him as my lord. It had never before even occurred to her, but she decided she enjoyed the words on her tongue when they referred to Cam. The dark glare he shot her, however, indicated he didn’t feel the same.

“I have never considered myself a prince of that cursed place.”

Her smile wavered. “It must be hard to trace your heritage through two peoples who have been enemies for so long.” She paused but Cam didn’t appear inclined to respond. “For many generations it was like this in Pictland. Clans intermarried but their descendants still fought for land and honor.”

“The Northumbrians have no honor.” He stabbed a slab of beef with his knife. “Save for my mother.”

Elise watched him tear the meat with his teeth. It was obvious he had no desire to continue this conversation. She took a sip of wine but it was no good. She was consumed with the need to know everything about his tangled lineages.

“Your mother must have loved your father very much to give up her people and live in a foreign land.” Even as she said the words, there was a strange throb of discontent in her mind. Something was out of balance but she shook the feeling aside. Because the idea of voluntarily giving up everything she had been used to in order to follow her lover to a foreign land was wonderfully romantic.

It also seemed a favorable portent. Cam’s mother must have been a princess too.

Cam dropped his meat onto his platter and turned to her. There was such a look of fierce anguish in his eyes that she instinctively recoiled.

Goddess. She had been wrong. So wrong. Why hadn’t she listened to the voice of caution in her mind?

“My mother was a younger princess in one of the borderland royal houses. My father had seen her during a raid and pledged to make her his. One day when she escaped her bodyguards he abducted her and took her to Dunmar.”

There was no need to wonder whether the Northumbrian princess had secretly wished for such an abduction. The look on Cam’s face told her everything.

She licked her lips and swallowed, but her mouth was dry. Now she understood why Cam had been so blunt when she’d escaped her own ladies and bodyguard that time he had come upon her by the sacred stones.

To be sure, the Vikings were a more pressing threat in the north of Pictland. But it was his mother’s fate he had been thinking of.

“Cam,” she whispered, her heart aching, but it appeared he hadn’t finished.

“My father thought his fortune was made. He thought her family would prove useful. He had a foreign princess as his bride, what could be finer than that?” Bitterness hammered through every word. Elise slid her fingers through his and held him tight. He didn’t appear to notice. “He demanded a dowry fit for a princess in exchange for visitation rights.” Cam’s lip curled in disgust. “Her family disowned her. She’d been ruined and as such, was of no further use to them. They didn’t even try to get her back. They cut her completely, as though she had died.”

A hard knot lodged in Elise’s breast. With every word he uttered she could feel the hopeless love he had borne his mother. And while Cam hadn’t said, Elise knew in her heart that his mother was dead. The loss radiated from him. A frustrated, forlorn loss that could only manifest from a young child.

Goddess. How old had he been when his mother had died?

“I’m sure having you gave her great joy.” Her voice was husky. She hoped Cam couldn’t see the tears prickling the back of her eyes. How dearly she wanted to take this tough warrior into her arms and soothe his pain.

How dearly she would love to take him into her arms every night, for the rest of their lives.

“I couldn’t protect her.” He stared down at their entwined fingers. “I was barely five when she died giving birth to Isla. But I can remember her smile, even now. Although God knows she had little enough to smile about.”

Elise stared at Cam’s averted face. His jaw was clenched and she knew it wasn’t only his mother who was now haunting his mind.

His sister Isla had died in his arms when she was eleven years old.

If only they were alone. If only this feast wasn’t destined to drag on for endless hours. Even by holding hands, they were doubtless drawing unwanted attention, but what did the idle speculation of strangers matter?

She caressed his fingers with her thumb. “I am so grieved for your losses, Cam.”

He looked at her, his dark eyes filled with pain. “I wanted to hate Isla as only a child can. But the first time I looked at her she stole my heart.” He gave a low, mirthless laugh. “Yet when she needed me most, I wasn’t even there.”

Elise pulled his reluctant hand to her lips and brushed a kiss across his knuckles. She didn’t know how Isla had died, but guessed it was from some cruel disease. “You were there when she needed you most. You told me yourself. She was in your arms.”

A spasm of such intense agony flashed across his face that she again ignored protocol and pressed her lips against his knuckles. He hitched in a ragged breath and she held hers, as the sudden certainty assailed her he was about to share something of utmost importance.

But then he gritted his teeth and forced their hands back to the table. Tension thudded in the small space between them but Elise already knew the moment had shattered.

He was not yet ready to confess the unwarranted guilt that tortured his soul.

But that day would come. She would ensure it. Because otherwise the memories would consume him forever.

***

Later that night Elise sat on a stool in her chamber as one of her ladies combed through her hair. The feast had been magnificent and the entertainment lavish. She had barely tasted a mouthful and the epic songs of the bards had slid over her head, unnoticed.

All she could think about was the man by her side. The man who had spilled the darkness in his soul, and yet she knew he harbored so much more.

Another of her ladies entered from the antechamber. “Madam, Cameron MacNeil requests audience with you.”

Elise attempted to contain her delight, but knew she failed when her ladies glanced at each other and smiled. “Please, bid him enter.” She fingered her hair and rearranged her shawl and then simply stared at him as he marched into the bedchamber. She scarcely noticed her ladies retire to the antechamber. All she could see was Cam.

“I didn’t know if you would visit me tonight.” He had given no indication that he would. She had feared his sense of propriety would prevent him but thank goddess he was here. Now, at last, she could hold him in her arms the way she’d wanted to all evening long.

“My chamber is next door.” His heavy glower suggested this fortuitous arrangement didn’t meet with his approval. She wanted to tell him it was only proper he had a chamber of his own but she bit her tongue. He didn’t care for his royal blood and now that she knew how his Northumbrian relatives had treated his mother, she understood why.

She stood and went to him and held his hands. It seemed the only time buried anger and heartache didn’t etch his features was when they made love. She was happy for it, but how she longed to possess the power to heal his hidden wounds so they no longer continually haunted him.

“And why is this such a terrible thing?” She tilted her head to one side and smiled at him.

He let out a tortured breath. “Give me the word and we’ll leave Fortriu this night. I swear on the memory of my mother and sister I’ll see you safely to the kingdom of Circinn.”

Her smile faltered. They were not the words she’d expected from him, but when did Cam ever do the expected? He spoke from his heart and swore on the memory of his beloved mother and sister. It was obvious he was still concerned for her safety. So concerned, he was willing to risk the wrath of his king.

She pressed his fisted hands against her breast. “Do not fear for me. MacAlpin will not harm me.” She didn’t know why she was so sure of that. MacAlpin was, after all, an unscrupulous barbarian without honor. But the feeling wouldn’t shift. She could only hope Cam believed her.

He wrenched his hands free and cradled her face in a hard, possessive gesture. His gaze roved over her, his eyes dark with bridled lust. Desire quivered between her thighs and she gripped the front of his shirt.

“Be sure this is what you want, Elise.” His voice was harsh. “For if you stay with me tonight I will never let you go.”