The Missing Heir

by Ranstrom, Gail

  “It takes a very singular kind of coward to prey on women. I do not like you, Leland. Do not come here again.”

  Dianthe closed the door and Adam turned back to Grace. “He struck you?”

  She nodded. “It will not show, if that is what you are wondering. Leaving no marks is Leland’s particular talent.”

  Adam felt sick to his stomach thinking of Grace at that man’s mercy. No wonder she had buried Ellie deep beneath the surface. Men like Leland York would not find a free and joyful spirit of any significant value.

  “Just the same, Grace, I think it would be best if you stayed home tonight. I doubt your brother is in any condition to lay in wait, but I do not want you risking your neck on it.”

  She sighed and shook her head. “I must, Adam. I really have no choice. Time is short and…I really must dress.” She turned and hurried up the stairs.

  “I have other plans, Grace. I cannot escort you.”

  “I understand,” she called over her shoulder. “I shall be on my guard. And now that Leland has been stopped, I’ll be fine.”

  Adam turned to Dianthe. “What the hell is she up to?”

  “Oh, I…um, you’d have to ask her, Adam. I’m sure I wouldn’t…that is…I think I’ll go lie down. The afternoon has been quite taxing.”

  When Dianthe, too, disappeared up the stairs, Adam went to the library and poured himself a sherry. What the bloody hell was so important they couldn’t trust him?

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sitting cross-legged on the floor in the darkest corner of the room, Adam knew he’d be almost impossible to see in the dim glow of the fireplace. He was absolutely still. Even his breathing was silent. He’d hunted enough men in Canada to know that he could remain in his current posture for hours. And he’d wait as long as he needed to wait.

  He’d been with Freddie most of the night, chasing leads, following Barrington and Leland York. He was not particularly surprised when they’d met with a small group of disreputable-looking men in a seedy waterfront tavern. Could one of them have been the mysterious man in black who had attacked him and Grace, and who had been seen next to Eddy Clark before he’d collapsed on the street?

  Adam stood and edged toward the door, ready to follow him outside, but the man quickly disappeared out the back. By the time Adam made his way to the stable yard in back, the man was already gone. The stable boy said that he’d exited down a side street away from the river. Adam had been furious, but he was calmer now. He’d find the man again. Yes, sooner or later, he’d find the man, and when he did…

  The incident had revealed two certain clues. One he’d expected—that his accidents, and possibly Grace’s, were connected to York and Barrington through that man in black. The other clue had actually surprised him—that his inquiries into the Canadian incident were also connected to Barrington and therefore, in some way to Grace. Was she even aware that there was a connection between Barrington and her accidents?

  His stomach burned as he considered the possibilities. Either Grace was in more danger than she could imagine, or she was only in danger as a result of her proximity to him.

  Either way, he’d know tonight.

  When Grace came home, the house was quiet but something felt strange. Not dangerous, but slightly odd. As she passed Dianthe’s room, she opened the door and peeked in. A soft sigh broke the silence as Dianthe turned over. She, at least, was safe. She closed Dianthe’s door and continued to her own. She hesitated and then went to Adam’s door. She opened it just enough to verify that he hadn’t returned from his “other plans.” Wherever he was, she prayed he was safe.

  Frustrated and tired, she dropped her reticule on her dressing table and kicked her slippers off. She sat and pulled the pins from her hair and combed the knot out with her fingers before applying her brush.

  She’d gone from hell to hell tonight, and never managed to find Lord Geoffrey. Had he taken a night off? Was he ill? If he suddenly stopped coming to the hells, what chance would she have to free Laura Talbot? One thing was clear—because of the risk that Lord Geoffrey might become unavailable, she could not afford any more distractions. She must forge straight ahead until her task was complete. And she must complete it at the first opportunity.

  She put her brush aside and stood again. Unfastening her gown, she let it fall to the floor. She was exhausted tonight, but she’d pick it up for Mrs. Dewberry tomorrow morning. She lifted the hem of her chemise and unfastened her garters and rolled her stockings carefully down her legs to avoid snags, then removed her garters, too. That done, she pulled the chemise over her head and dropped it on top of her gown.

  Naked, she went to her bureau to fetch a nightgown but before she donned it, she went back to the cheval looking glass beside her dressing table. Examining her arms, she was relieved to note that the bruises Barrington had inflicted were gone and the ones Leland had left were in places that would never be visible. She slipped her hand down to the bruise on her hip where she’d fallen against the tea cart—livid now, but soon to fade away, like Leland himself.

  She closed her eyes, remembering the incident, and how Adam had challenged Leland on her behalf. No one had ever found the courage to come between Leland and what he wanted. She had no doubt that Leland would disappear for a time and then reappear as if nothing had happened. One way or another, he would eventually have his way. But not, she thought, with Adam.

  Her heart bumped. When had she grown to love Adam? Had it happened the moment he’d turned to her in the library and said, absurdly, Hello, Aunt Grace? Or had it happened when, after Barrington’s scene at Belmonde’s, he’d quietly told her that she’d have an escort? She couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment, but it had happened somewhere between their first hello and their last wager in the library.

  Oh! Those wagers!

  She shivered in the night air drifting through her window and tilted her head to one side to study the effects of thinking of him. Chill bumps covered her arms and her nipples had firmed and formed little peaks. She closed her eyes and touched them, then let her hands slip downward over her belly to the thatch of nether hair between her legs. “Adam…” She sighed, remembering.

  No, she wouldn’t have risked so much if she hadn’t loved him, if she hadn’t been willing to surrender everything to him. And now she could not draw breath without thinking of him, wondering where he was and if he was safe.

  How odd that she had accepted that love would never come to her. Or the kind of soaring happiness her friends had managed to achieve. For her, happiness had been a fragile thing, ephemeral, elusive. Always, when she’d allowed herself to think she’d found it, took the tiniest taste of it, it disappeared in an instant, like mist in a morning meadow. So she’d settled for contentment, knowing to expect anything more was ridiculous—a prelude to pain. “Adam,” she said again, savoring the feeling of belonging that came with it. Oh, how she prayed that this fragile happiness she felt in Adam’s arms would not also turn to pain.

  “Ellie,” he said, his breath hot in her ear.

  Her eyes flew open and there, behind her in the mirror, was Adam, dressed in his buckskins, his head tilted to one side to give attention to her earlobe. He cupped her shoulders, holding her motionless.

  She watched him, took in the fierce hunger of his touch, the manner of his dress and the strength in his stance. “Where have you been?” she asked.

  “Hunting.”

  His hands came around her waist and moved up to cup her breasts and she suddenly felt vulnerable and exposed. How had he surprised her so completely? She spun around in his arms and looked up into his face. “What…where?”

  “The corner by your bed,” he said against her lips.

  She hadn’t even looked in the shadows when she’d come in. “When?”

  “I’ve been here an hour or more, waiting. And let me say, Ellie, you are well worth the wait.”

  “Oh!” She pulled away, burning with embarrassment, and snatched her nightgown off the floor and str
uggled to drop it over her head.

  “In fact,” he continued, “it very nearly makes up for the fact that you’ve been lying to me.”

  “I do not know what you mean,” she squeaked.

  “We are going to get some things straight tonight. I’ve waited for you to tell me the truth, but it is apparent that you will not volunteer it. So, since your secrets appear to intersect mine, we need to talk.”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Of course you do,” he said, lifting her chin on the edge of his hand.

  Grace had the sinking feeling that she was not going to bluff her way out of this. Adam had that single-minded look on his face, and she knew he was right. It was long past time to tell him what he wanted to know. She sat on the edge of her bed. “Where…do you want me to start?”

  Adam went to the fireplace and rested one arm on the mantel, evidently preferring distance to proximity. “Just start.”

  “I think everything is yours, Adam. Everything but, perhaps, a small annuity for me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, given what Mr. Evans and Mr. Ogilby have told me, I believe your uncle’s will was a forgery.”

  A long moment passed and then Adam nodded. “What were you told?”

  “That Lord Barrington and my brother brought the will to Mr. Ogilby directly after Basil’s funeral. They told him Basil had signed it just days before his death. And they urged both men to accept it since there were no other heirs anyway.”

  Adam’s eyebrows shot up and she noted that his muscles tensed. His expression did not change, but everything seemed different. As if he suddenly understood something that had been troubling him. “If there were no other heirs, why did they need a will?”

  “I…don’t know. To prevent lengthy court hearings?”

  “When did you find this out?”

  “I went to Mr. Evans’s office on Saturday. He told me everything then.”

  “Did you suspect something before then?”

  She looked down at her hands folded in her lap. Her answers were making her look suspicious and guilty of some sort of conspiracy, but she could not stop now. “Since your return,” she said, “Lord Barrington started behaving oddly, and then there were his threats.”

  “What threats?”

  Grace shivered at the ice in Adam’s voice. “That I would regret sending him away, and some other veiled insinuations.”

  “Anything else?”

  “I believe Lord Barrington and Leland are in league with one another. For the past several years, every time I tried to distance myself from Barrington, Leland would send a letter and threaten to fetch me back to Devon. I began to think that Leland was encouraging my relationship with Barrington, but I thought it was because he wanted an alliance with a peer. Now I think Barrington would warn Leland when I moved toward independence, and Leland would then make the threat he knew I could not resist.”

  “But you did this time, and that is why your brother turned up on your doorstep.” Adam nodded. “How did you find the courage this time?”

  You, she wanted to say. Where could she have found the courage without Adam’s presence in her life? “Because I knew I was not alone,” she murmured, knowing that was the truth.

  The silence stretched out and Grace realized that he was waiting for more. But what more did she have to confess?

  “I know, Grace,” he said at last.

  “What?” she asked.

  “About you.”

  Was he referring to the rumors that she had killed his uncle?

  “Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”

  She stopped breathing. No. Not that.

  “You were a virgin, Grace. How did that happen? Were you actually married to my uncle? Or was that a lie, too? A lie you told to gain his inheritance?”

  “No!” she gasped. “It wasn’t like that, Adam. We were legally married, but…it was Basil. He…he couldn’t. He tried, but he just couldn’t. I tried to help, but—” She shrugged and fought the tears stinging her eyes.

  “He couldn’t,” Adam finished for her.

  Did he believe her? She could barely see his face in the dim light and shadows.

  “And so, four years later, you surrender to me? With all the men who have tried, who have coveted the position as your lover, and you abandon your fate to the one man who could use it against you?”

  The tears finally spilled over and trickled down her cheeks. She nodded, knowing it made no sense.

  “Why?” he asked quietly.

  “I do not know.” She wept. “I am unraveling! My whole life is unraveling! I do not know me anymore. Nothing—nothing—is familiar and everything is completely beyond my control. I am doing things, thinking things, saying things that are beyond my ken. I—I feel as if I am disappearing and a stranger is inhabiting my body!”

  “No stranger,” Adam said, his voice softening. “’Tis Ellie. The real you. Ellie does not care what society will think or what people will say. One last question, my dear, and then we can go forward.”

  She sniffled and nodded, anxious for the question that would put this inquisition to rest and be done with the deceptions.

  “For the last time, why are you gambling? I know it is not for the excitement. If you are addicted, Grace, I—”

  She groaned and shook her head. This was the one question she could not answer without compromising Miss Talbot and the work of the Wednesday League. “I cannot tell you that. I don’t understand what you want from me.”

  “What I want?” He gestured to her door. “I want to close that door, Grace, and forget the world outside. I want to be just you and me, with none of the secrets we’ve kept or the things we’ve done intruding. I want the blood to disappear from my hands and the hate from my heart. I want the hurt to fade from your eyes. I want it all to go away while I lie down with you and feel the rightness of the world and the perfect balance of the universe. You in my arms. There is nothing beyond that but the abyss. Make that happen, Grace. Tell me the truth.”

  She yearned to be in his arms, but how could she betray the Wednesday League and Laura Talbot? And how could Adam ever forget Nokomis? She shook her head, burying her face in her hands. “I cannot break that confidence. Do not ask me, Adam. It is because of you that I must go forward.”

  There was disbelief in his voice when he spoke. “You blame me for your gambling?”

  “No.” She shook her head. She could have left Laura Talbot to Lord Geoffrey’s care in good conscience, until she’d learned that Laura was in love. After loving Adam, how could she consign Laura to a loveless marriage? “If I hadn’t known you, I wouldn’t have understood.”

  “Understood what?”

  She could only shake her head.

  “There are things afoot here. Things that could be a threat to your life. And mine. If you will not tell me what I need to know, I will continue to seek the answers on my own. And make no mistake, Ellie, I will not rest until I have those answers. Make a choice, my dear. Your secrets or me?”

  If she betrayed the confidence of the Wednesday League and told him, he would go to Lord Geoffrey. But Lord Geoffrey would never give up the debt—it was not in his character. And once alerted to Grace’s intention, he would never wager with her. She shook her head.

  Adam stepped back, a look of profound regret darkening his hazel eyes. “You’ve made your choice. I hope you will be happy with it.”

  Lady Annica removed a wad of bank notes from her reticule and passed them to Grace. “Send to me if you need more, Grace. I am making a trip to the bank today and shall withdraw more should you need it.”

  Grace pushed the wad into her own reticule and glanced around at the other ladies of the Wednesday League, seated in a circle in Madame Marie’s largest dressing room. Mr. Renquist stood in one corner, looking quite uncomfortable. He was the only man allowed at their meetings, but was rarely invited and his discomfort was clear.

  Charity and Sarah both passed banknotes to Grace with nods of
encouragement.

  Grace took it all, praying that it would be enough. “Thank you. I shall repay you when my funds are unfrozen.”

  “Nonsense! You should not bear this cost alone, Grace,” Lady Annica said. “Do not worry about repayment. Just find a way to stop this wedding.”

  “That’s the problem, ladies,” Mr. Renquist said, stepping forward. “Mrs. Forbush has not been able to catch him cheating, and I haven’t been able to turn up anything that would help. That Morgan fellow is a slippery one. As time is growing quite short, I’d advise you to make alternate plans.”

  Grace shrugged. “I do not know if there are other options. Sunday afternoon, I talked with Miss Talbot. I presented her with several options should our plan fail, but she refused to consider them.”

  “What options?” Sarah asked.

  “That she should simply refuse to honor her brother’s debt. If she could not, or if he should become violent, she would have a place with me until such time as we could secure her future. She and Dianthe are already friends, so I thought that would ease the strain of unfamiliar territory.”

  “Well, I am not altogether sorry she refused,” Dianthe said. “Miss Talbot is…rather weak. If I did not dislike him so much, I would almost pity Lord Geoffrey.”

  Dianthe’s opinion validated her own but she wondered what Dianthe had based her view on. “Why do you say so?” she asked.

  “When we went dancing last week, Miss Talbot shunned every man who asked her. I thought she was keeping herself for her upcoming marriage, but that was not the case at all. When a young man of effeminate manner arrived, Miss Talbot fawned over him as if he were the Prince Regent himself. I found it quite disturbing that she should make a spectacle of herself over a man who, at best, had only a passing interest in her.”

  “I was afraid of that,” Grace said. “She confessed that she had set her affections on a particular beau. I offered to give them the wherewithal to make a dash for Gretna Greene, but she would have none of it. Her suitor was honorable, she told me, and just needed more time to win her brother’s approval.”