>
Also by Bertrice Small:
The Kadin
Love Wild and Fair
Adora
Unconquered
Beloved
Enchantress Mine
Blaze Wyndham
The Spitfire
A Moment in Time
To Love Again
Love, Remember Me
The Love Slave
Hellion
Betrayed
Deceived
The Innocent
“The O’Malley Saga”
Skye O’Malley
All the Sweet Tomorrows
A Love for All Time
This Heart of Mine
Lost Love Found
Wild Jasmine
“Skye’s Legacy”
Darling Jasmine
Bedazzled
Beseiged
BERTRICE SMALL
Intrigued
KENSINGTON BOOKS
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
Table of Contents
Also by Bertrice Small: Title Page Dedication Prologue - SEPTEMBER 3 , 1650 Part I - ENGLAND AND FRANCE, 1650–51
Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5
Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12
Part III - MADAME LA MARQUISE 1656–1662
Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20
Epilogue - QUEEN’S MALVERN—SUMMER 1663 Copyright Page Notes
For my dearest friend,
Elaine Duillo.
Thanks, sweetie!
Prologue
SEPTEMBER 3 , 1650
James Leslie, fifth Earl and first Duke of Glenkirk, lay dying on the battlefield at Dunbar. Around him he could still see and hear clearly many of the brave, loyal men who would join him in death this day. The Scots were being brutally beaten by an army but half their size, yet with mindless arrogance they had moved the previous day from their position of strength on the hills surrounding Dunbar’s plain to boldly make their encampment directly before the English. It was a fatal mistake, for the terrain was impossible to defend, as the Scot Covenanter army of King Charles II quickly discovered. Of the twenty-three thousand who had seen the day begin, only nine thousand remained to see it end amid the smoking ruins of the Royal Stuart’s hopes.
Among the survivors was Red Hugh More-Leslie, the Duchess of Glenkirk’s personal captain, who, seeing his master fall, had leapt over the dead and wounded to cradle James Leslie in his arms.
“We’ll get ye out of here, my lord,” Red Hugh said.
James Leslie shook his head faintly, saying but one word before he died. “Jasmine.”
Cursing and weeping alternately, Red Hugh gathered the surviving men of Glenkirk to him. Of the hundred and fifty who had come to Dunbar, thirty-six remained. Putting their duke’s body over his horse, and taking mounts where they could find them, the Glenkirk men quickly departed the battlefield, swiftly heading northeast. Cromwell’s men were not noted for showing respect to the dead, or to the survivors; but Red Hugh would not allow his master’s body to be pillaged or savaged. James Leslie would be buried on his own lands, as had all those lords of Glenkirk who had come before him, except his own father.
And most of the past Glenkirk earls had died in battle, Red Hugh remembered. In battles precipitated by the Stuarts, the captain thought grimly. Solway Moss in 1542 had taken the second earl, and his heir, along with two hundred men and boys
