Free The Virgin's Daughter by Laura Andersen

cleric—short and compact, with flyaway brown hair that curled at the edges of his tonsure—maneuvered Julien into a secluded corner of the chamber and said softly, “Have you really not worked it out? You’re slipping, LeClerc. You know about John Dee. He’s almost as canny a character as Walsingham, and his scholarly connections are but a thin veil for intelligence activities. He’s here to find out what he can about plots against his bastard queen.”
    “So?” Julien challenged. “What’s that to do with me? Unless you want me to abandon my promise to spend the next six weeks at Blanclair and remain here in Paris instead?” He asked it almost with a lift of hope. It would surely infuriate Charlotte, and he couldhardly tell his sister the reason why, but then at least he wouldn’t have to deal with the profoundly unsettling Lucette.
    But Ribault dashed that hope. “You are slipping. It is the girl herself who’s the real interest, LeClerc.”
    He stared dumbly. “Whatever for?”
    “Surely you know who she is—or who Elizabeth thinks she is. Those blue eyes?”
    Of course there had been rumours, even here. That Lucette’s blue eyes were a legacy from her true father, the late king of England. That Elizabeth treated the girl as her niece, whatever the protests of her putative father, the Duke of Exeter. Julien had never thought much about the truth of such rumours, but suddenly he put together their significance. And why the Catholic network was so very interested in her.
    “Do you honestly think Walsingham would employ a woman?” Julien asked in disbelief.
    “Of course not,” came the withering reply. “But that doesn’t mean she would not make a very valuable source of information for our cause. Whatever her true relationship to Elizabeth, it is undeniable that the Princess of Wales is extremely close to the Courtenay family and continues to spend her summers at their country home. Whether she will continue that practice this summer is something of a question. A question to which I daresay Lucette Courtenay could provide an answer.”
    Julien’s head spun even more. He was already juggling so many balls, how on earth was he supposed to add this one to the mix? “What do you want?” he asked bluntly.
    “What do we ever want? Information.”
    “And how do you propose I go about it?” He must be rattled, or he would not have posed such a stupid question.
    The cardinal, with as much righteous delicacy as possible, said, “I am not aware that you have ever encountered difficulty in gathering information from comely women. Surely you do not need a man of the Church to tell you how.”
    “Lucette Courtenay is a guest of my family, and I can hardly seduce such a guest in my father’s home.” Never mind that the thought instantly brought with it irresistible images of seduction, with Lucette in his arms, that dark hair tumbled round her bare shoulders…
    Heaven above, but he was in trouble.
    “I don’t care how you do it, LeClerc.” Ribault leaned closer, words barely above a whisper that made the threat all the more intense. “This girl is the best chance we have ever had of gaining inside information about the very heart of the heretic’s court. Get us what we need to bring us nearer to restoring God’s light to the benighted people of England.”
    The cardinal stalked away in a swirl of crimson robes while Julien cursed inventively and soundlessly. He didn’t dare openly disobey. Which meant spending more time with Lucette than was wise for either of them.
    If his heart leaped treacherously at the thought, he shoved it firmly away. Lucette was nothing more now than a job. And he was very good at his job.

FIVE

    M ary Stuart had not been in such a good humour in a very long time. Indeed, she had difficulty remembering when last she’d felt so hopeful. When she’d first married Darnley, she supposed. She had been carried away then both by her passion for the handsome young man and the