The Marriage Ring

by Cathy Maxwell

  He gave her arm a vicious shake. They were alone here. Everyone else was still upstairs dealing with the muddled mess the show had become.

  “Now, listen here, we lost a lot of money during the riots and you can make it up. You are becoming famous in London. Every day more people hear about you—”

  Chester, his arms still full of flowers, poked his head down and over the railing. “Miss MacEachin, they are lined up outside and howling to see you. Mr. Kemble said for you to come greet them.”

  “She’ll be right there,” Drayson answered.

  “Very good, sir.” Chester left to pass the word.

  “I won’t go out there,” Grace said.

  “You have no choice, if you value your place in this company.”

  “Then I quit my place in this company,” Grace answered. She shoved him out of her way with her shoulder and charged toward her room. With her growing popularity, Drayson had given her a private dressing room, another thing the actresses could hold against her. She now ran in there to hide, slamming the door behind her.

  At last she could breathe.

  So there it was: she was out of work.

  It was just as well. She hated London, and she’d wanted to leave anyway. She and Fiona had thought to find their fortune here. Fiona had succeeded. She’d married Holburn, but Grace had not been so fortunate. She’d thought she could handle the stage, this way of life. She couldn’t. After all was said and done, she was Scot.

  The wave of homesickness for the Highlands almost brought her to her knees.

  She wanted to go home.

  Grace dug out a valise from a corner of the room and began throwing clothes into it, slowly at first and then with increasing urgency.

  When she’d run away from Inverness five years ago, she’d thought of never returning. For the past month, it had been all she could think about. She’d started to wonder if things truly had been how she’d imagined them or if, perhaps, she’d overreacted, made more of what was happening than should matter. Funny how life’s twists and the tricks it played had finally brought her to her senses. She wanted to go back—and she wanted to make amends.

  Sitting at her dressing table, she began washing off the paints she’d used, silently vowing to never use them again. The woman in the reflection appeared apprehensive. Grace reminded herself she had enough money to see her through to the end of the month, but old worries died hard.

  How different her life would have been if her father’s path had never crossed that of the Lynsted twins. They had accused her father, a vicar at St. Ann’s Church, of stealing funds from the estate of Dame Mary Ewing, the widow of a well-known soldier who’d made a fortune during his service in the Indies. On their testimony, he had been sentenced to a penal colony for ten long years, years during which Grace and her mother had gone from being important members of Inverness society to outcasts living hand-to-mouth as best they could.

  She set aside the washcloth, not wanting to think about her mother. The woman was dead to her.

  But her father…he’d done nothing wrong save disappoint her mother. And Grace hadn’t the maturity to understand all that was happening between them. She’d blamed him for her mother abandoning her. The poor man. He’d suffered so much, and upon returning home hadn’t even had his wife to comfort him…or his daughter.

  But now she had a chance to right not only an old wrong but to prove her loyalty to her father. Perhaps her running away five years ago was God’s hand bringing her to London so that she could demand justice for her father and her family name.

  Who else but the Almighty could have led her to learn that the Duke of Holburn’s uncles, Lord Brandt and Lord Maven, the family members no one liked and avoided, were also none other than the villainous Lynsted twins?

  Grace had put it together when she’d met the twins while out shopping with Fiona. Their stern demeanors, slashing black brows, and hooked noses were etched into her childhood nightmares. She’d recognized them immediately and since that day had plotted ways to find justice for her father.

  She’d not told Fiona or Holburn about what she’d planned to do. Blackmail was a touchy thing. Fiona might not understand Grace’s motives.

  Their lordships were now very wealthy, probably from a fortune that built on Dame Mary’s once sizeable estate. Meanwhile, her gentle, educated, kind father was nothing more than a caretaker, living off charity in a tiny cottage on St. Ann’s grounds. He’d never left Inverness. She didn’t know why, but he’d stayed…without benefit of family or friends.

  Her father deserved a portion of that fortune.

  Grace had threatened to take her charges against them to a magistrate if they did not pay twenty-five thousand pounds for her silence. She didn’t worry about whether or not the magistrate believed her story. The twins were self-made men and society frowned on that sort of thing. Rumor had it their own father, Holburn’s grandfather, had disinherited them. No one knew why, but it spoke volumes against them.

  For all Grace knew, there was a host of crimes they were guilty of and she was doing the world a favor by making them pay up.

  She wondered what her father would say when she reappeared in his life with enough money to make him comfortable and begged forgiveness for the hurtful words she’d hurled at him five years ago. The image gave her peace—

  A knock sounded on the door. Before she could answer, it opened and Drayson stepped inside.

  Grace rose from her seat. “I did not invite you in, Mr. Drayson.”

  “We need to speak,” he answered, closing the door behind him. “You will not quit this company.”

  “I have said all I am going to say, Mr. Drayson,” Grace answered, reaching behind her for the hand-sized dirk in its leather sheath she had placed there. “I appreciate the opportunity to be part of such a fine company, but I regret I must leave.”

  He shook his head. “No, you won’t.” He moved toward her.

  Grace found the knife. Keeping her hand hidden behind her, she slid the dirk from its sheath. “Whatever you have to say can be saved for the morning,” she informed him. “I’m tired. I wish to go home.”

  “You know, there is quite a bounty on your head, Miss MacEachin. And many men wish to claim it.”

  “I don’t know what you are talking about,” she lied, the dirk now in her hand. She grasped the handle, ready to fight. She was a petite woman, no more than five foot three. He would try brute strength. They all did. He’d be surprised.

  “You do. You know very well. And you may put on airs and keep your distance, but you’ve been had before, Grace. Probably by more than one man. It’s there in the way you walk, the way you talk to us. I’ve seen the way you look at each of us. You know men.”

  Suddenly, he lunged for her.

  She whipped the knife around and plunged it into his forearm without so much as a blink of an eye.

  He yelped in pain and fell back a step. “You she-bitch.” He pulled the knife out of his arm. Looking at it in the candlelight, he tossed it aside and picked up one of her scarves to wrap around the wound.

  Grace wanted to leave but he stood between her and the door. Her only hope was to run for it.

  She dashed toward the door. He stuck out a foot and tripped her. She landed heavily on the ground. With a shake of her head, she scrambled to her feet and would have made it to the door except he took hold of her hair and yanked her back.

  The wind left her as he threw her against the wall. “Stabbing me is going to cost you dearly,” he said and laughed, the sound angry and mean.

  Grace reached out, blindly searching for something else to protect herself with, but he was on her in a blink. He shoved her against the wall, pinning her there with his body weight. His lips slobbered over her cheek, her ear. He squeezed her breast so hard she cried out.

  “This is what happens when you flaunt yourself,” he said against her ear. “And the best part of all is that I will claim those wagers, after you’re here tomorrow and singing exactly as I
say.”

  His hand was fumbling with the buttons of his breeches. Grace attempted to lift her knee, to kick him or hit him in any place she possibly could. He shoved his knee between her legs, blocking the move.

  He pressed his open mouth against hers. She sealed her lips shut, fighting back with everything she had, but he was too strong. She’d had her one chance with her knife and she’d failed—

  Mr. Drayson’s body came off of hers. Unprepared for such sudden freedom, she lost her balance and slid down the wall to the floor. She looked up, dazed, not knowing what Mr. Drayson was going to do next, until she realized he was being held in midair by the scruff of the neck, his feet dancing as they tried to touch the floor.

  And holding him up was the tallest, biggest man Grace had ever set eyes on.

  His dark hair almost brushed the low ceiling of her dressing room and his brow was furrowed with righteous anger. His nose was long and straight, his jaw square. He wore black evening attire under a black, caped greatcoat, the cut so severe it gave him a parson’s air.

  No one would call him a handsome man. His features were too bold for that word.

  Grace wasn’t the only one taken aback by him. Mr. Drayson whimpered as if he was looking into the face of the devil.

  “What’s going on here?” the man demanded, giving Mr. Drayson a shake.

  “’Twas between myself and her,” Mr. Drayson managed to say. He reached down to button his breeches up.

  “She didn’t appear to be a willing participant,” the stranger said.

  Grace shook her head, whether out of agreement or fear she didn’t know—and then realized her dirk lay on the floor close at hand. She grabbed it and leaned against the wall, holding the weapon in front of her.

  “Who are you to be coming in here anyway?” Mr. Drayson demanded, finding his bluster.

  “I am the man who will throw you through the wall if I ever see you treat another woman that way again,” the stranger answered. He dropped Mr. Drayson to the floor.

  The stage manager came to his feet. He shrugged his coat back up on his shoulders. “You don’t know what you saw. That lass is a whore. Why do you think she was given the opportunity to sing? She serviced me and she serviced me well. Nor am I the only one.”

  Grace was on her feet in a blink and charging toward Mr. Drayson. She would rip the tongue from his head—

  The stranger stepped in front of her. He easily caught both her wrists. He looked over his shoulder at Mr. Grayson. “I’d advise you to leave now, sir. I don’t believe I can hold her off much longer.”

  “I was leaving anyway,” Mr. Grayson answered. He curled his lip. “Whore,” he said as his parting epithet.

  Grace shook her fists in fury trying to escape the stranger’s grasp. “I’m going to bury my knife in your heart,” she promised him.

  “And I never want to see you in my theater again,” Mr. Drayson answered. He turned and realized the stranger had left the door open and a good number of the theater’s company stood there with raised brows and wide eyes.

  “Be gone,” Mr. Drayson ordered. They quickly dispersed and he stomped out.

  That there had been witnesses to what was happening to her and no one had offered to protect her infuriated Grace.

  She wrested her arms from the stranger and charged into the hall. “You were listening?” she shouted to the ones who still lingered there. “You knew what was going on in here but didn’t offer to help?”

  Marching back into the room, she slammed the door. It made such a satisfying sound she was tempted to do it again and again. She was that crazed.

  All her life she’d been the one everyone gossiped about—first because of her father’s ruin and then later because of her looks, which had condemned her to too much male attention, especially of the wrong sort.

  Her eye caught the tip of the knife she still held. How easy would it be to gouge her own face? To destroy what few blessings God had given her? And how freeing the thought was—

  The knife was taken from her hands.

  She looked up, startled. She’d been so lost in her anguish, she’d forgotten she wasn’t alone. She now reached for the knife. “That’s mine.”

  He held it away from her. “I’ll keep it for the moment. I don’t want you to hurt someone with it.”

  “You don’t know what I’m thinking.”

  A sharpness came to his eyes, a moment of quick understanding, and she realized he had known. She shook her head. Impossible. No one knew the dark thoughts that haunted her.

  “You are afraid I’ll hurt you,” she declared, hiding any vulnerability behind bravado. “And I might if you don’t give it back to me.”

  He laughed, the sound not particularly nice. “You’re a kitten. I’m not afraid of you with a knife.” He tossed the knife onto her dressing table, almost as if he dared her to go after it.

  “Who are you?” Grace demanded. She’d never set eyes on him and yet there was something familiar about his features.

  “What? No thank-you for intervening and tossing that scoundrel out of your room?” He had a deep voice, a melodic one. “Or perhaps my interruption was not appreciated? Perhaps that was the sort of play you two enjoyed?”

  Grace reached up to slap him, even as she was mortified to her soul that she should appear so ungrateful. She caught herself in time. Lowered her hand. “You are right, I am less than gracious. I do appreciate your coming to my rescue.”

  She ran a distracted hand through her hair and realized only then it was falling around her shoulders. In the short span of violence, the pins had come undone in her struggles and Mr. Drayson had ripped her sleeve to expose half her breast.

  Embarrassed, she pulled the fabric up to cover herself. Anger gave way to fear. The stage manager had come very close to raping her. She’d been raped once and had promised herself it would not happen again. Mr. Drayson’s attack left her vulnerable and feeling very foolish.

  Tears choked her throat. She held them back. She never cried in front of anyone. She had too much pride.

  “Thank you,” she managed to say. “I mean that truly. I fear what would have happened.”

  “There is always a price to pay for women like you who live on the outside of society.”

  Women like her…

  Once again branded. Her good will toward him evaporated and she gave him a hard look, truly seeing him for the first time and noting the harsh lines around his mouth. This man didn’t trust anyone.

  She could respect that. She felt the same way.

  “Again, I thank you,” she said stiffly. “Now, if you will excuse me, I need to pack.”

  “I have a note for you,” he replied, pulling a folded piece of paper from the inside pocket of his black greatcoat. “It is from the Duchess of Holburn.”

  Grace grabbed the note and opened it, turning so he could watch her reading it. She immediately recognized Fiona’s handwriting. Her friend apologized because she could not stay. A situation had arisen with a friend and she had to accompany her husband, but wanted Grace to know just how uniquely talented and gifted she was.

  Dear Fiona. Grace folded the note and pressed it between her palms. She faced the gentleman. “Thank you for delivering this. The duchess is very close to my heart. I shall value her friendship always.”

  “You sound as if you will not be able to convey that message to her yourself?” he observed.

  Grace frowned. This man paid close attention to her, but it wasn’t the sort she usually earned from his sex. She sensed he didn’t like her.

  “For all of your great height and breadth, you are not a dullard, are you?” she said. “You pick up on every nuance…or is that something you are doing only for me?”

  He smiled, his eyes going hard. She knew then her instincts were right—this man was not to be trusted.

  “You’re not a dullard either, Miss MacEachin,” he said. “Let me introduce myself. That might explain a great deal. My name is Lynsted. I’m the Honorable Richard
Lynsted, Lord Brandt’s son and heir. You and I have a few matters to discuss. Especially about your attempt to blackmail my father.”

  Now Grace understood why he had appeared familiar to her.

  So, this was the son.

  She smiled, certain of herself now. “I beg to differ with you, Mr. Lynsted. Is it blackmail to speak the truth?”

  Chapter Three

  Richard’s guard went up. Before his eyes Miss MacEachin transformed from a distraught, shaken creature who had struggled to fend off an attack to a calculating Scot.

  His father and uncle had always warned him about the Scots. They were ruthless and manipulative—two apt descriptions of the infamous Grace MacEachin.

  Well, she’d just met her match.

  “There is no truth in your charges,” he replied briskly. “And if you continue your threats, we shall be forced to take you before the magistrate.”

  “By all means, please take this before a magistrate,” she urged him. “In fact, that is what I’ve told your father and uncle I would do. I will be more than happy to have my day in court and speak my piece to the public and the papers. Although I’m surprised Lord Maven and Lord Brandt are so anxious to have me do so. What I have to say would tarnish their sterling reputations—”

  She broke off as if struck by a new thought. “They don’t know you are here, do they?” she said slowly, reasoning aloud. “You’ve come on your own…because, believe me, your father and uncle do not want what I have to say anywhere near the papers and gossip mongers.”

  She was right.

  Miss MacEachin had seen through his threat.

  This afternoon Richard had found his father uncharacteristically deep into his cups. He rarely drank and to see him in a drunken state in the middle of the day had been alarming.

  When he’d asked what was wrong, his father had confessed how Miss MacEachin was blackmailing him by accusing them of a crime they hadn’t committed. He and his brother had never embezzled money from anyone. Ever.

  Richard believed him. His father never lied to him. Besides, both he and uncle were the most morally righteous men Richard knew.