To Make a Marriage

by Cheryl Anne Porter

  “I would never—”

  “I know that. But he’s insane, remember. And that makes him very dangerous.”

  Victoria’s next thought brought determination to her stance. She stood taller. What she intended to do next might be foolhardy, or much worse, but she had to make the attempt. “All right, then, it’s me he wants.” Gathering her courage, she stepped around Spencer’s protective body. “I’ll go to him. I’ll talk to him, tell him about the baby and make him see— Ack!”

  Spencer had pulled her to him. His nose was now mere inches from hers as he snarled: “Over my dead body, Victoria.”

  “That is exactly what I’m trying to avoid, Spencer,” she hissed.

  “Once he gets you, he’ll have no qualms about killing me and Edward.”

  Though her knees went watery with fear, Victoria stuck to her determination to be the one to end this awful scene. “But he has no qualms now. You said so yourself.” She was very nearly in tears. “Let me go to him. Maybe I can reason with him—”

  “You are going nowhere near that Atherton bastard! I will die first.”

  Victoria hit his arm hard with her fist. “You big, idiot man, I will not just stand here and allow—”

  “Stop it.” His grip on her had tightened. “We have to see what Loyal Atherton wants, Victoria. We don’t have a choice. We must be alert and smart—and look for a chance.”

  “What chance? He has Edward, as you said.”

  “But Edward is not without his tricks. He’s eluded more than one angry man with a gun pointed at him. Usually it was an irate husband, granted. But, nevertheless, Edward is experienced. I think our other chance lies with Neville, whom our villain seems to be ignoring.”

  “Neville?” Victoria made a feint to turn to see. “Where is Neville—?”

  “Don’t look. Not yet.” Spencer’s tug on her arm gained him her attention. “Does Neville like Loyal Atherton?”

  “No. Not since Loyal kicked him when Neville was no more than a half-grown puppy and made a mistake when Jeff and Loyal were hunting. Neville never got over it. We had to lock him up when Loyal visited. Neville would actually stalk him and try to bite him.”

  Looking grim, though satisfied, Spencer nodded. “That explains his behavior now.” With a wag of his chin, he indicated the direction of the Atherton house. “Be very discreet, but look at your dog.”

  Victoria did, shifting her gaze from the two men across the street to Neville. He had vacated the street and was padding quietly up the steps to the porch of the Atherton house. He could, and in one great bound, Victoria reasoned, jump up onto the wide, flat top of the porch rail and, from there, launch himself onto Loyal—who was armed and hated the dog.

  Victoria’s heart nearly stopped beating … all this crazy bravery on the part of her men. If they all survived this, she intended to kill every one of them herself for putting her through this. Despair entered her heart, telling her she was the one who had set them on the path that led inexorably to being here at this moment and with no other choices facing them. The pain of that knowledge was almost more than she could bear. She had to do something to end this—

  “Sorry, old man, for this,” Edward suddenly called out to Spencer.

  Spencer shoved Victoria behind him. “Here we go,” he whispered to her. Victoria again poked her head around her husband’s solid body, just enough to see. Spencer called out to his cousin: “No need to apologize. I’ll take it out of your hide later, Your Lordship.”

  “I certainly hope you get the chance, Your Grace—Aww.” Edward’s abrupt sound of pain and awkward twist of his body came as Loyal evidently shoved the butt of his pistol into the earl’s back.

  “Shut up,” Loyal growled at Edward, loud enough for his voice to carry. “I am done arguing with you, sir.” He then focused on Spencer. “You will get rid of your weapon, Your Grace, or I’ll use mine on the earl. Throw your gun over to the grass in the square. Do it now.”

  Spencer hesitated only a second before tossing his gun away, just as Loyal had ordered. Victoria’s mind shrieked an instant protest for her now-unarmed husband. Reacting on daring instinct, yet terrified her suddenly nerveless and fumbling fingers would cause her to drop her gun to the street, Victoria stealthily poked it in the back of Spencer’s waistband.

  He inhaled sharply. “Victoria, what are you doing? You might need your gun—”

  “No. Shhh. It’s all right,” she whispered back. “I have another one with me. It’s stuck in my pants pocket.”

  Standing tall and brave, Spencer grunted a chuckle. “You are a wonderfully cunning woman, Victoria Whitfield. And very frightening.”

  Smiling, overcome, she momentarily allowed herself the comfort of touching Spencer. Pressing her palm against his back and feeling his muscled warmth, she kissed him through his shirt. “I love you,” she whispered, hoping against hope that Spencer did not have to find out that she had lied. She didn’t have another weapon on her.

  “Victoria! Come over here right now.”

  Loyal Atherton’s shouted order thoroughly incensed Victoria. How dare he? “I will not. You can go straight to hell in a handbasket, Loyal Atherton.”

  Spencer inhaled sharply. “Are you certain it’s wise to—”

  “Hush,” she whispered urgently. “Maybe I can fix this.” She then said loudly: “Loyal, you put that gun down right now, you hear me? We know everything you’ve done, but nothing’s happened yet that can’t be forgiven. But if you shoot one of us, you can’t take that back.”

  “But I’m not going to shoot you, Victoria. I love you and need you.”

  “You what?” Anger and outrage propelled Victoria around Spencer. She heard him gasp and felt him reach for her, but she surged forward, out of his reach. As she talked, she walked … slowly, threateningly, toward Loyal Atherton. “You don’t need me, Loyal. What you need is for me to marry you so you’ll have access to my daddy’s money.”

  “What are you talking about, Victoria? That’s not true.” Loyal pulled Edward back a few steps with him.

  “It is true. All those shady deals you got mixed up in—and involved my brother in—are losing money now. You’re going to be exposed to all of Savannah and ruined. A lot of these fine people here are going to lose money, too, based on your schemes. Why, they’ll tar and feather you, if they don’t lynch you first.”

  “You’re talking crazy, Victoria.” Loyal sounded scared and a little erratic. He couldn’t seem to settle his gaze on her. Instead, he kept looking from Victoria to Edward and over his own shoulder. “That Englishman has turned your mind against me—”

  “No he hasn’t, Loyal. My mind was turned against you long before I ever knew my husband.”

  “Don’t call him your husband!” Clearly agitated now, and still clutching the back of Edward’s frock coat, Loyal pulled him back several more steps with him.

  He was retreating from her, Victoria realized. Was he afraid of her? It could be, but though her heart raced with fear, too, Victoria knew she could not let it show on her face or in her voice. Right now the only weapon she had was her bravado. “But I have to call him my husband, Loyal, because he is. And I’m going to have his baby. You wouldn’t shoot a pregnant woman, would you? Not one you need because of her daddy’s money?”

  While Loyal made strangled noises of shock or disbelief, Victoria chanced a darting look into Edward’s brown eyes and saw equal measures of fear and admiration there. With no more than a quirk of her lips, she smilingly acknowledged his trust in her. Edward flicked his eyes to his right. What…? Victoria tested the limits of her peripheral vision—and caught a glimpse of her husband close behind her. No wonder Loyal was retreating. But for how long would he? How long, or how far, would it take for him to remember he had the advantage in his grip? The Earl of Roxley.

  “We’ll get rid of these two now, Victoria,” Loyal argued, indicating with nods of his head Spencer and Edward. “And when this baby comes, we’ll get rid of it, too. I’ll give you
other babies. You won’t even miss it.”

  Even as she heard Spencer’s gasp and saw Edward’s outraged expression, Victoria fought a scream of horror. Dear God, the lengths he would go to in order to get what he wanted! Victoria had all she could do not to drop to her knees and retch. Now that she was close enough to see the huge bruise on Loyal’s jaw where Spencer had hit him days ago, Victoria wished she’d never stopped Spencer from pounding the life out of him.

  “No, Loyal, you won’t give me babies.” Her voice was a snarl of contempt and disgust. “The idea alone of you ever touching me again makes my skin crawl.”

  “Don’t say that, Victoria.” Loyal’s shout of emotional pain was somehow inhuman. His brown eyes appeared hollow and sunken into their sockets. But then, his expression hardened. “If you keep saying lies like that, Victoria, I’ll shoot this man right here, right now, in the back of the head.” He moved his gun to the back of Edward’s head. “You know you love me. Don’t lie!”

  “No, don’t!” Terrified, sweating, weak in her knees, Victoria held a placating hand out to Loyal. She’d gone too far. Quickly, she backtracked. “All right, Loyal, I won’t lie. But you have to tell me the truth, too. Remember, I know how you need my money to cover your losses and your bad business deals.”

  Peering around Edward, who was shorter than he was, Loyal protested: “It’s not just money, Victoria. I love you. I do.”

  She realized then that he probably did, in his own sick and twisted way. But just the thought of it made her want to die … or bathe. “Then why are you doing all of this, Loyal? Why? Think of the people you’ve hurt—”

  “I haven’t hurt anyone.” For whatever reason, perhaps a tired arm, he lowered his gun from Edward’s head, but only so far as his back.

  “But you have.” Victoria’s voice choked on her emotion. “You hurt my brother, and he loved you like a brother. And Jenny … Oh, Loyal, how could you have made her write such a letter as you did? How could you take advantage of her and Jeff’s pain like that? How?”

  “So you found Jenny.” It wasn’t a question. Loyal’s frown of distaste twisted his features into an ugly mask.

  Victoria shook her head. “No. Jenny found her way home in the middle of the night, and Miss Cicely sent for me this morning. Jenny told me all about how you’d been holding her prisoner so my brother and Jenny’s family wouldn’t act against you. But Jenny escaped that sharecropper’s cabin where you took her. We know all about Tillie’s family being paid to hold her and keep their mouths shut. We also know how Tillie kept you informed of our comings and goings. She put the notes on my pillow, too. Oh, Loyal, my mother is going to be very hurt that her compassion for Tillie was so abused.”

  “Compassion? How much compassion would she have had for that colored child of Jeff’s and Jenny’s? That’s right—he and Jenny are lovers. How’s your lily-white mother going to feel about that?”

  So close was she now to Loyal and Edward that Victoria had to stop walking or run up against them. Loyal could go no farther, either. One more step and he would be off the sidewalk and literally in the tall and woody shrubs that fronted his house. Victoria, despite her heightened emotions, was very much aware of Edward in front of her, Spencer at her back, and Neville, hidden off to her right. While Edward and Spencer might realize what she was doing, she knew the dog didn’t—and he could jump at any moment. If he did, they’d better all be ready.

  “I don’t how she’ll feel about that, Loyal. But I know about Sofie. And I know Jeff should never have confided in you all those years ago about her. But Jenny told me the truth: Sofie died from a high fever when she was an infant. I know now that my brother loves Jenny and that’s why he’s never married. He can’t bring himself to abandon the one woman he does love. And you knew that. And you waited, all these years, to use that knowledge against him. How could you? You ought to be glad Jefferson isn’t here right now because he’d tear your head off and feed it to my daddy’s hogs.”

  “Ha. Jefferson’s a coward. He’s not going to do a thing. I could always make him do what I wanted.”

  “Jeff couldn’t do anything, not with you holding Jenny and as good as blackmailing him.”

  “I never did. Jeff and I were going to be business partners, and I was going to be married to you. We had it all planned out. Your whole family wanted that at one time. I could have had the respect and standing in this city that I deserve—”

  “But you do have that.” The suspense of wondering when Neville would jump had Victoria on edge. There was no way she could call the dog off—and no way the dog could know that his jumping on his old enemy could get Edward, and maybe her and Spencer, killed.

  “I don’t have standing in Savannah,” Loyal cried. “You know that. In this city, if your family didn’t come over from England with Oglethorpe, you’re a newcomer. An outsider. I was tolerated, but I was never accepted, not in the ways that mattered.”

  Though she knew he was right—Savannah was endearingly, maddeningly that way—she still asked, just stalling for time: “What ways are those, Loyal?”

  “In the men’s societies and the social circles and in the finest homes—”

  “But you had access to all of those.”

  “Only because of your family’s influence and insistence on my inclusion. But then you ruined everything when you wouldn’t have me. And now I’m an outcast. The invitations don’t come anymore. And I’m going to lose everything. Because of you.”

  “No, Loyal. You’re going to lose everything because of you. Because of your own crookedness and weakness and illegal business deals. And the scandal you caused regarding me. The good people of Savannah will see you now for what you really are—a scoundrel. None of this is my fault. It’s all yours.”

  Loyal had been getting more and more upset. Spittle flecked the corners of his mouth, and his eyes were wild with insanity … but then he calmed and stared at Victoria, his expression showing he’d suffered a revelation. “Yes it is. It is your fault. I should have thought of that. You’re the one I should kill.”

  * * *

  “You’d make a big mistake in killing her, Mr. Atherton,” Spencer said, his voice a low growl of warning as he drew the man’s attention his way.

  “Brave words coming from an unarmed man,” Loyal Atherton taunted, laughing crazily and shoving Edward forward a step as if to prove he knew he had the advantage.

  “Not so unarmed as you’d think.” Spencer pulled Victoria to him and backed up several steps. He needed space and distance … for accuracy. As he did, he reached behind him with his other hand, freed the pistol Victoria had stuck in his waistband—and pointed it at her head. Her gasp of shock accompanied Edward’s and even Loyal Atherton’s.

  “Spencer, what are you doing!” she cried.

  “My God, man!” Edward blurted, looking horrified. “Have you taken leave of your senses?”

  Spencer ignored the cries of protest. He kept his attention riveted on Loyal Atherton, even as he cocked the pistol he held to his wife’s head. Not even her shaking body and her whimpers of fear could distract him. “Release my cousin, Mr. Atherton, and I mean right now. I’m willing to trade Victoria for his life. You let him go, I’ll give her over to you—”

  “No, Spencer. Oh, God, no,” Victoria cried. “What are you saying? Why are you doing this? I love you!”

  “Shut up, Victoria.” Spencer said it savagely and then continued his conversation with Loyal Atherton. “Once my cousin is free and you allow us to leave, Mr. Atherton, what happens thereafter—right here, between you and Jefferson Redmond or Mr. Redmond, or all of Savannah, for that matter—will be none of my concern.”

  “Spencer, what has got into you?” Edward’s mouth pulled down with abject disappointment. “I would rather die at this man’s hand than be any part of your heinous scheme. Have you no honor?”

  “I’m trying to save your life, Edward. I’d think you’d be grateful.”

  “Grateful? If this man does turn me lo
ose, I’ll kill you myself. I swear I will.”

  Spencer’s expression never changed. “You can try.” He turned his attention back to Loyal Atherton.

  The color had bled from the man’s face, and his gaze darted from Victoria’s ineffectually wriggling body in Spencer’s grasp to Spencer himself. “You’re bluffing. You wouldn’t shoot her.”

  “I might. And where would that leave you? You still need her for your plan to work. I, however, no longer need her. I have her dowry. And I’m certain Mr. Redmond would be willing to settle another sizable one on her. If she marries you, Mr. Redmond is likely to cover your debts and hush a scandal up, if only for his daughter’s sake. After all, he did just that for me.”

  Victoria wrenched ineffectually in his grasp. Her voice choked with tears. “My father never would! He’d kill you first, Loyal Atherton. I’ll tell him the truth of what you did to me and how it really happened. And I promise you he’ll come after you—”

  “Shut up, Victoria.” Spencer flexed the arm he had around her middle, effectively whooshing her air out and quieting her. She went limp, her feet stumbling over his. Spencer relaxed his grip but still held on to her tightly.

  “Victoria’s right,” Loyal Atherton said, not loosening his grip on Edward. “And how could I marry her, if she’s married to you?”

  Spencer felt a thrill race through him. The crazy bastard was listening to him. This just might work. In only moments, Edward could be freed, and this awful business concluded. “I will have our marriage annulled.”

  “Why would you do that? How could you?”

  “Simple. You see—and this is why I’ll be pleased to bargain her life for my cousin’s—the baby she carries is yours, not mine.” Spencer watched as Loyal Atherton’s and Edward’s mouths became perfect O’s. He felt Victoria freeze in his grip. “She knew it when she married me. That makes our marriage a sham, so an annulment will be easy. And you forget … I am a duke, which means the matter can be expedited.”

  “If this is true, why did you accost me the other day? Why were you so jealous? You act now as if you don’t care about her, but you certainly did that day.”