Patricia Rice (48 page)

Dora had brought herself to her feet. She clung now to the door frame, holding her jaw as the two women advanced on Gareth, driving him backwards, stumbling, out the door. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to crow with relief. She wanted to hug them both for discovering there was strength in numbers and that nothing justified abuse. But her jaw hurt too much to do more than watch with approval as they slammed and bolted the door in Gareth's face.

Josephine swung around and dropped the sword as she regarded Dora's swelling jaw. She burst into tears and leaned against the door for support, leaving Harriet in the awkward position of choosing which daughter-in-law to comfort first.

"It's all right. Mother Nicholls," Dora said, using Josie's name for her for the first time. "It's just a bruise. I'll see if there's any ice left in the icehouse."

"He could have broken your neck!" Josie wept. "I thought he was a gentleman!"

"You thought Charlie was a gentleman," Harriet snorted ungently. "You don't think too well, girl. You'd better come upstairs and lie down a spell." She glared at Dora. "And you too. I don't believe in heroics. You're a damned fool, and you'd be a sight better off without my son. Get yourself rested and throw him out if he comes crawling back here."

Josie straightened and rubbed hastily at her eyes. "Pace! He's over at the courthouse now. They're having a big trial. He's suing Joe Mitchell over some illegal deeds or something. I heard Lord Doran and his solicitor talking. They've made some kind of deal with Pace and my father. I don't understand all of it, but Pace will give up his claim to the farm and let my father claim it in my name. Then he's supposed to turn around and sell it back to Pace for a dollar or something once you return to England. I don't know what one has to do with the other, but—"

She halted as Dora brushed past them all, pulling herself up the stairs, stumbling and running, holding her jaw and her skirts and the railing in some frantic race to the top. Josie and Harriet exchanged glances, then took off after her.

Chapter 37

I am one, my liege,

Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world

Have so incens'd, that I am reckless what I do

To spite the world.

~ Shakespeare,
Macbeth

"You're out of your mind," Josie protested as Dora pulled the yards of gray silk skirt, embroidered petticoats, and crinolines into the carriage and settled them around her. With a little more experience at managing the bulk of her attire, Josie hurried to climb in beside her. "What can you possibly accomplish?"

"I don't know." Dora sat back and gave Jackson a nod when he turned his head questioningly. She didn't have to explain herself to Jackson. He'd come running when she'd called and took up the reins of the carriage as if born to them. Dora had a feeling that he'd argued with Pace all along, and that he was on her side. She just hoped she knew what her side was.

"You're going to walk into that courthouse and make a spectacle of yourself and you don't even know what you'll do when you get there?" Josie exclaimed in horror. "Dora Nicholls, you're insane!"

"Yes, I think I am. It's better than being dead, however. I won't be a ghost everyone ignores any longer. I will not let Pace throw everything away like that. I won't."

"But he won't be throwing it away!" Josie protested. "Daddy will sell it back to him."

Dora gave her a disgusted look, then turned to watch the passing scenery. Jackson let the horses have their heads. They'd no doubt bounce through the roof of the carriage before they reached the courthouse.

She tried to think, tried to plan what she meant to do, but her brain had quit working. Her jaw and head ached unmercifully from Gareth's blow, but that pain was as nothing to the pain in her heart.

Pace was throwing her away. He had gone into that courthouse to tell the judge and everyone who cared to listen that they hadn't been married when she signed that deed, and then he meant to let Gareth's fancy lawyer prove their marriage wasn't valid because she'd not used her proper name. She knew it. She'd known it all along.

He would let her go out of some stupid sense of duty, believing himself inadequate and an unfit husband for a wealthy Lady Alexandra. She'd curse Pace if it weren't for the fact that she knew his father had done this to him, stripped him of his confidence and self-esteem so that he couldn't see his own worth, as her own father had tried to do to her. She'd been luckier than Pace. The Smythes had rescued her. Now she would rescue Pace.

Somehow, she would show Pace that he was a better man than any man in this county, maybe the entire state, maybe the whole world for all she knew. He was better than foolish titles or earthly coin. Even if he couldn't love her, she would fare better with him than left alone. And she would spend her life showing him that she was better for him than any other woman alive.

The horses couldn't go fast enough. Even as bouncing through a rut caused her to slam into the side of the carriage and nearly fall from the seat, Dora mentally urged Jackson to hurry. The case could be over already. She didn't have any idea how long these things took. She couldn't bear the thought that she would arrive too late. Surely God wouldn't do that to her, not after bringing her all this way.

Josie had given up protesting and grimly clung to the hand grip. She looked as if she might throw up, but Dora was grateful to have her by her side. Remembering Josie waving a sword in Gareth's face gave her great pleasure. Had it not been for her Quaker teaching, she would regret that Josie hadn't taken the bastard's nose off. She supposed the earl's violent influences in her were stronger than Papa John's reasoning.

Jackson didn't even attempt looking for a place to park the carriage when they reached the courthouse. Wagons and buggies and carriages filled the street, along with bustling crowds of people. He merely drove the horse through the center of the mob and stopped when he reached the front of the courthouse, holding on to the horse while Josie and Dora let themselves out.

Dora turned to thank him, but Jackson waved her away.

"Get yourself in there, Miz Dora, and do it quick before Pace makes an ass of hisself."

His words confirmed her fears. Dora nodded, lifted her skirts, and ran for the courthouse steps. Men dodged sideways to avoid the swinging wire of her crinoline. Josie followed in her path, keeping up a mumbled tirade on what ladies should and should not do.

Dora's shoes clattered down the wooden hall. The stale cigar stench soaked into the walls made her gag, and she tried not to identify the odors of unemptied spittoons and urine rising from the stairwell to the basement. The courthouse was a man's world. Even the stink told her that.

She heard the loud and angry voices bouncing from the room on the far right. She would find Pace where the argument roared loudest. She was glad he had found a way of channeling his love for argument and controversy into constructive arenas, but she would wring his neck for dragging her into it. He could tear Joe Mitchell into little pieces all he wanted, but she wouldn't let him sacrifice her in the process.

Dora didn't attempt to be quiet as she threw open the huge double doors of the courtroom. The doors slammed against the walls and every head in the room turned to stare at her. All her life she'd hid from the eyes of the public, but she had no intention of remaining invisible any longer.

Pace stopped in mid-speech as his modest little Quaker wife strode up the aisle, her gray silk skirt swinging in a wide arc revealing the exquisitely embroidered pink stitching of the petticoat beneath. She wore a hat with pink roses and a swaying gray feather that swooped over her cornsilk curls in back. She was corseted so tight she looked as if she might snap in two, but she kept her bosom primly covered beneath a line of jet buttons that revealed every damned curve. He would throttle her just for appearing in public like that. That thought came before he saw the hideous blue-black bruise spreading across her delicate white jaw.

Rage roared through him. Fury clenched his fists into battering rams. His gaze swept the room, searching for the fancified English solicitor who had observed the proceedings. As he'd thought, the man was whispering furiously to Dora's bulky brother. The latter had arrived late, but Pace had ignored him until now.

Memories of Dora's childhood nightmares returned with a rush. He remembered her every flinch, every hint of fear. How blind could one man be?

Throwing down the law book he held in his hand, Pace glared at Dora. "Gareth?" he demanded, without needing to expand the question.

"And what do you care?" she retaliated. "You're about to tell all these men that we're not married. Do you think that hurts any less?"

Pace rocked to a halt as if stopped by a physical blow. He stared at her angelic face, marred by a brutish hand until swollen nearly beyond recognition. A blow like that could have killed the dainty woman standing defiantly in front of staring strangers. And she was telling him what he did hurt even more.

He stared at her, feeling the fury drain out of him at the enormity of what she said. He didn't think she could mean it. He offered her freedom and wealth. She didn't have to go with her ignoble brother. She could go anywhere she wanted. She could go back to the Quakers if she so desired. She didn't have to saddle herself with a miserable failure like himself. She just hadn't thought this through clearly.

But staring into the incredible blue of Dora's fearless gaze, Pace knew he was the one who hadn't thought clearly. He'd seen an opportunity to right old wrongs and grabbed it. He had thought he would give his angel her wings back, but instead he was ripping them off and throwing them away. Why could he see that now and not before?

It didn't matter. Flashing a fierce grin at her, Pace turned and strode across the courtroom before Gareth and his solicitor could escape. Rob McCoy and a few of his friends moved into the side aisle, blocking that exit. Without a care to the judge pounding his gavel and calling for order, Pace grabbed Gareth's coat front, rammed the larger man up against the wall, and slammed his fist into his brother-in-law's soft gut.

Gareth didn't even offer a fight. He slid down the wall and landed on the floor with a loud "oomph," followed by an ominous gagging noise. Pace turned around and walked away as several men grabbed the English lord and dragged him from the room. His solicitor remained behind, watching Pace with interest as he returned to the front of the courtroom.

Someone had offered Dora a front-row seat. She sat beside Josie now, gripping Josie's hand with a fierceness Pace didn't wish to interpret. He'd never thought of Josie and Dora as friends, but that wasn't his concern of the moment. Turning to face the furious judge, Pace spoke reasonably.

"I apologize for the disturbance, Your Honor. There are some things a man just has to do, and one of them is showing mighty English lords that they can't backhand our women."

Pace let the roar of approval from his audience drown the room while he turned to locate Joe Mitchell. His grin this time was malevolent. "And another one of those things men have to do is show would-be tyrants that this is a country of free men who won't kneel to wealth and position, who won't let their families be trampled for greed and ambition. I'm here to tell you right now, Judge, that our esteemed mayor, Joseph Mitchell, has put his wealth and greed in the way of free men for too long now, and I'm here to prove it."

With the crowd's roar of approval, Pace returned to the case he'd been presenting. He'd stacked the audience in his favor by spreading the word to all the landowners Joe had tricked and misled over the years. They were out for blood and hanging on his every word.

He didn't need their support to win this case, but he would prove something to Joe and Ethan Andrews and any of the other men who thought they could steal from the weak and trample the helpless.

As he presented his evidence and worked through his witnesses, Pace remained aware of Dora's intent gaze at his back. Everything he said and did, he presented for her approval. Admittedly, he'd resorted to violence with Gareth, but he couldn't help that. He would always act first and think later when it came to Dora. But he wanted to show her he'd learned a more effective means of handling his disputes than violence. If he could give her nothing else, he could give her a husband she didn't have to fear.

When Joe's attorney brought up the forged deed to the Nichollses' farm, Pace was ready for him. He hadn't meant to argue this one. He'd meant to surrender it and the next point that Mitchell's defense would present, thanks to Gareth and his solicitor. He'd thought he would help Dora in doing so. But he would fight now. He hoped she was ready for the result.

Pace gave the other attorney a look from beneath uplifted eyebrows at the man's declaration that Pace and Dora hadn't been married at the time she'd signed his name to the deed. Then with calm insouciance, Pace removed a sheet of paper from the stack on his table and presented it to the judge.

"My wife signed that deed in January of this year, Your Honor. We have a child born in April. A man is justified in calling out anyone who would suggest that we were not married while she carried my child. But I'm a reasonable man, Your Honor. I'll present our marriage certificate as evidence of our legal status. Ask any man in here and he'll tell you that Dora and I have always been childhood sweethearts. I just waited until she was of an age to know her own mind before making her my own."