The Marriage Ring (13 page)

Richard changed his plans. The gun was old but at these close quarters it could do damage. An older woman with a kerchief around her head placed a wooden tray on the ground. A cloth covered the food.

“I gave you hard cider,” the woman said. “It’s potent.” There was compassion in her eyes. Richard was tempted to plead his case.

“Come along, Beth,” the man with the gun said. “We’d best go home. We can retrieve our plates and fork on the morrow.”

The woman ducked her head and left. The gunman followed and the guard locked the door.

“Well, so much for that escape attempt,” Richard muttered. He knelt down and lifted the covers off the food, suspecting what it was by the smell of it. Sure enough, the plate was piled with the same fish the magistrate had been eating for his lunch.

Richard’s stomach rebelled. It had been well over twenty-four hours since he’d tossed aside Grace’s roasted rabbit. He needed his strength but he didn’t think he could eat this.

And then he could imagine Grace arguing he must eat, he would need the nourishment, and so he forced the meal down.

A part of him refused to believe he would hang. There had to be an escape. Or perhaps that fool Sir John would come to his senses or have an attack of conscience.

And yet as the hours dragged on, he began to fear this might be the last night of his life. Not even the potent hard cider eased his tension.

Darkness fell. His guards changed. The new guard was a strapping lad with a shock of carrot red hair and a face full of freckles. He had to be all of nineteen and very proud to be serving his term as guard.

Richard sat on the floor of his cell. The only light came from the rush torch outside the door. It spread across the floor in rectangular lines though the barred window.

Even the moon and stars had disappeared, blanketed by clouds.

Going to the window, Richard asked the redhead for paper and pen.

“What for?” the lad asked.

“Last testament.” What he really wanted to do was document what had happened. His father needed to know his twin’s treachery.

“You don’t have anything,” the lad answered with a smirk.

Richard refused to give up. For a space of time, he used the spoon to carve his story in the serving tray. However, the letters appeared as nothing more than scratches.

Now Richard understood why condemned men made their marks in the stones of their prisons. It was their last attempt to let someone know they were there.

He turned his mind to what he would say on the morrow. He needed words that would convince them to spare him. He was not going to die.
He wouldn’t.
Not on what had started off as a great adventure, as his way of proving to his father he was more than a clerk, and to prove to himself he was a man.

Perhaps everyone had been right about him. Perhaps he was nothing more than a great ox of a man who had intelligence but no wit, no daring, no bloody common sense.

Grace had tried to warn him. And he’d wanted to prove her wrong because he wanted to be the protector. After all, what danger could lurk in such a small Scottish village?

He laughed bitterly. God, he was a fool.

And he prayed she was safe. He hoped she’d run as far from here as possible. There was the possibility she’d gone for help. He hoped not. He did not want her involved in this whole sordid business.

He also wished he’d taken a moment to tell her what he really thought about her. He’d tell her she was beautiful—but then she’d heard that from a hundred other men.

So Richard amended his thoughts. He decided, if he could speak to Grace one last time, he’d tell her how resourceful she was, and wise. And that he admired her intelligence and even her bluntness that could set his teeth on edge.

He’d tell her…he’d tell her he was in
love
with her.

The thought filled his mind.

Common sense told him he was being foolish. What was love? He wouldn’t know.

And yet, the very air around him vibrated with the truth of that one thought. He’d fallen in love with Grace MacEachin—a woman who could have a prince or a duke.

She didn’t need an oaf like himself.

And then there was the small problem of his uncle trying to kill her…

None
of it mattered, he loved her all the same. Loved, loved,
loved.

Love was different than he’d expected. It humbled him, filled him with conviction, made him want to jump up and down with joy, made him vulnerable and scared and secretive.

It seeped through his every vein, entering every muscle of his body, erasing pride, expectations.

He loved Grace MacEachin. He’d watched intelligent, powerful men throw over careers, friends, family, and honor in the name of love. At last he understood why. He didn’t care if Grace was an actress or a whore or tart or duchess or Turkish princess.

He loved her.

And maybe that is what he would say on the gallows in the morning. Maybe instead of pleading his case, he’d profess his love, and then he’d die, but everyone who had heard him speak would be deeply touched and tell others, who would tell others, until all the world knew he loved Grace MacEachin.

Someday, somewhere, Grace would hear of his declaration and realize here was a man whose heart was true, a man who professed love with his last breath—

Richard picked up the cider jug and gave it a shake, realizing it was empty, and perhaps far more potent than he’d given it credit for.

Instead of mooning over Grace, he should be planning the words he’d use to dissuade the hangman—

“James Cannon?”
Grace.
He recognized her voice immediately.

Richard jumped to his feet and went to the window. All was dark beyond the torchlight.

His guard answered with a gruff, “Aye, I’m Cannon. Who goes there?”

“You don’t know me,” Grace said, stepping into the torchlight. “I’m Josie McGlynn from Dundee who is visiting her uncle Douglas.” She wore her hair loose and curling around her shoulders. Instead of the blue traveling dress she had been wearing, she now wore a simple dark skirt and a white blouse with a neckline so low it exposed the round curve of her breasts. Her
petticoat
. She’d removed the bodice from her dress and was prancing around in the night in her petticoat. Her breasts rose like two high mounds above her neckline. Her nipples pressed against the thin cotton, beacons, as if there ever were ones, for any man.

“Douglas the miller?” James asked.

“Aye,” Grace answered.

“I’ve not known he had kin visiting,” James said, suspicious, as any guard should be.

“I arrived today,” Grace said. “The village has been a bit busy.”

“Aye, just a bit,” James replied. “Come closer.”

Grace stepped forward. She gave James a shy smile.

“What are you doing here?” he asked. “It’s the middle of the night.”

“I couldn’t sleep,” she said.

“And why not?”

A sly smile came to her lips. “I saw you today. I wanted to meet you.”

What was she doing?
Richard wanted to warn her back but feared tipping off James that they knew each other. He glared at Grace through the bars, ordering her away with his eyes.

She ignored him.

“Meet me?” James said.

“Aye. I like the look of you,” Grace assured him. “I knew you would have the most important watch. My uncle says you are the only one he trusts.”

James liked the sound of that. He straightened his shoulders, adding two inches to his height.

“May have a look at the prisoner?” Grace asked.

“Why would you want to do that?” James demanded.

Richard wanted to bang his head against the bars. What was she thinking? To use her dirk and slash both of their ways to freedom? Love and all charitable thoughts vanished from his mind in the face of Grace’s foolishness.

“I’ve never seen a man who is about to die,” Grace answered. “I’d like just a peek.” She took a step toward the door, but James blocked her way and Richard’s view.

“A peek?” James said. “I could give you a peek, but you can’t have something for nothing, Josie lass. It’s not the way of the world. Especially for lasses who like to wander around at night.”

“What do you want?” Grace asked, a saucy note in her voice.

“There’s a lot I want,” James said, his meaning clear.

“I might be willing to trade you,” Grace answered. “It would be good bargain with a handsome lad like you. They told me you are the one everyone wants in the village. I think I might like to have you, too.”

“Oh, you could have me, lass,” James assured her.

“A peek,” Grace whispered.

“First something for me,” James insisted.

“
Don’t
,” Richard barked harshly, curling his fingers around the bars and pulling them with all his strength as if he could break them free. He ached to use her name. To give a full command to his voice and tell her to run, but feared giving away her involvement with himself.

His outburst pleased James. “Here now,” he said, taking the torchlight from its holder and waving at the window so that the flame burned Richard’s fingers until he released the bars. Richard stepped back into the darkness.

“You stay back and keep your eyes to yourself,” James ordered. He looked to Grace. “He’s a tough one. As dangerous as they come. I have to watch him all the time. He didn’t give the man he killed a chance.”

“I can’t believe you are so brave,” she said. “I’d be frightened myself.”

“Yes, well, perhaps it is best we don’t dally this night. However, tomorrow after the hanging, I’d like to come calling.”

Grace giggled in an uncharacteristic manner. “But I won’t be able to have a peek at him if we wait. What say, I’ll give you a peek of me and what you’ll be seeing on the morrow if you let me have a peek at the murderer?”

The suggestion was arousing. Richard sensed James’s interest.

He returned to the door, grabbed the wooden bars. She couldn’t do this. She must not prostitute herself for him.

James had no such noble ideals. “I’d like a peek,” he answered, his voice husky with lust. “Better yet, give me a squeeze and I’ll help you up a bit so you can see into his cell better.”

Grace hedged.

“
No
,” Richard ordered.

James laughed. “No? You should be saying yes. This is what you need for your last night on earth.” He faced Grace, standing with his back to the cell door. “So how about it. Show what you have both to me and our condemned man. Let him die with a good memory on his mind.”

“All right,” Richard heard Grace say. “One peek, but you must keep your word.”

“Oh, I will, I will,” James promised.

She slid the thin strap of her bodice down over one shoulder, coyly cupping a hand over her breast so James wouldn’t see as much as he wished.

There was a beat of respectful silence before James demanded in a thick voice, “More. Show me more.”

“I want my peek at your prisoner first,” Grace bartered.

“You’ll have naught until I’ve a feel,” James answered. “I’ve never seen such breasts before, lass, especially on someone so comely. Mayhap I have a mind for a taste.”

“You promised I could look at him,” she told him.

He gave a nasty laugh. “You want to see my prisoner very badly, don’t you, lass? I don’t believe you are with Douglas. He’s not the sort of man to let his kinswomen walk around at night. I’d wager this gun that you have more interest in my prisoner than just wanting a peek. But you are in luck, Miss Josie lass, I’ve a mind to have more of what you are offering. Come here. Let me do what I want and then you can give a smooch farewell to your bonnie man.”

Richard lost all sanity.
This man was not going to place his hands on Grace.

With a growl in the back of his throat, he shook the bars with such force, one broke loose.

He reached through the window and before James was aware of anything, grabbed the lad by his red hair and jerked him up against the door. Richard had him now and could squeeze both of his arms through the opening to wrap his hands around James’s neck.

Richard began crushing the life out of the guard.

Chapter Thirteen

G
race had known she was playing a dangerous game. Her original plan had been to either lift the keys from the guard or pass the knife to Mr. Lynsted. Then, if a chance presented itself, he’d have a weapon to free himself.

It was a wild scheme, but the only one she could think of in the short time since his trial.

And now all had gone terribly wrong.

“Mr. Lynsted,
please,
you are going to kill him.”

He didn’t release his hold on the guard.

She reached up, placing her hands on his wrists, trying to pull them away. “Mr. Lynsted.
Richard. Don’t kill him
.”

Her words seemed to sink in. He released his hands as if coming out of a trance. The guard’s body fell to the ground.

With a soft cry, Grace knelt to feel for a pulse.

To her everlasting relief there was one. “He’s not dead,” she murmured. She rose to stand on her tiptoes and look through the window. “Did you hear me? He’s not dead.”

There was no answer. Richard had retreated to the cell’s dark corners.

Grace returned her attention to the guard, looking through his pockets until she found the key to the huge padlock on the door. Her fingers trembled as she placed the key in the lock. The well-oiled lock sprung open with a click.

She had to move the guard’s body in order to open the door. “Mr. Lynsted,” she whispered. “
Come
.”

When he still didn’t respond, she went in after him. He stood quietly in the cell’s shadows. She could make out his form. Reaching out, she grabbed the arm of his greatcoat. “We don’t have time to waste. The guard could come to his senses at any moment.”

His response was to rush past her. He dragged the guard into the cell. “Wait outside,” he ordered.

Grace obeyed. A moment later, Mr. Lynsted came out, stuffing the guard’s socks in the pocket of his greatcoat. “I need these,” he said. He locked the door and picked the gun up off the ground.

“This way,” Grace said. “I have a horse waiting through the woods.”

“How did you come by a horse?”

“I stole it,” she answered, already moving in the direction she wanted him to follow.

“
You what?
They hang people for horse thievery.”

“They were already hanging you, so what does it matter?” Grace answered. “We’ll ride it as far as we can and release it. Horses know how to find their way home.”

But he didn’t follow. He stood by the larder that had served as his cell. “Fine,” she said. “Stay here.
I’m
leaving.”

He started following her. When they reached the surrounding woods, he tossed the blunderbuss into the night. “You don’t think we’ll need that?” Grace asked.

“It’s so old, we’d end up shooting ourselves with it,” he answered.

The horse was waiting where Grace had tied it. “It’s Sir John’s,” she explained.

Mr. Lynsted didn’t respond. In fact, even though it was dark, she knew he hadn’t even looked at her…and she knew why. But now was not the time to discuss the issue.

“My clothes are right here,” she said, retrieving the bodice she’d torn off her dress and wrapped in her cape. She shrugged on her bodice and laced up the back. Her petticoats showed between her bodice and her skirts but there was naught she could do about it without thread and needle. She threw the cape over her shoulders. “I don’t have tack for the horse,” she apologized.

His response was to mount up with little difficulty. He lifted her up to sit in front of him.

Grace’s throat closed in fear. She’d been thrown from a horse as a child and was very leery of being on them, especially ones she didn’t know. “I’m not good at this,” she warned.

“I am. Hold the mane.” He put heels to horse and off they went.

His body cradled hers and Grace could do nothing but trust him—and hold on to the horse’s mane for dear life as they went galloping into the night. They charged down the road leading out of town for a good way before coming to the moors. Mr. Lynsted seemed to know exactly where he wanted to go. He pushed the horse off the road. They covered one large open field then zigzagged toward another.

After what seemed like several terror-filled hours for Grace, Richard brought the horse to a halt. He slid off and then helped her down. Without hesitation, he turned on the animal and waved his arms, scaring it off. The horse went running into the darkness, back the way they’d come.

Richard took a moment to put on the guard’s socks, sighing with relief as he pulled his boots on over them.

She was jealous. Her kid slippers were not doing well. However, when he took her arm and began walking, she offered no complaint, even though she had to skip every third step to keep up with his longer legs.

The moon had finally come out, giving them some much-needed light.

Richard didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. Disapproval radiated from him—

Grace dug in her heels and pulled back with all her body weight. She knew it was nothing against his larger bulk, so she added the force of her indignation, her anger to the weight.

It worked. He was caught up short in mid-step. He turned with a scowl.

“I can’t keep pace with you.” Grace yanked her arm from his grasp. “Go on, if you want to walk like that. Take off by yourself.”

“I’ll do no such thing and you know it.”

“Then you’ll have to walk
with
me, won’t you?” Grace demanded, practically trembling with rage.

His brows grew together. “This isn’t about my walking.”

“No, it
isn’t
,” she agreed.

“So what is it about?”

“It’s about
you
and how
surly
you are.”

“Surly?” He shook his head. “I’m surly?”

“And sanctimonious and judgmental and
mean
.”

“Mean?” He shook his head. She noticed he didn’t take on her other epithets. “I’m trying to save your life.”

“I’ve been trying to save
your
life,” she informed him.

And that is when it all came loose—all the tension, the anger. “I don’t want you to save my life,” he snapped. “Not if it means you must
whore
yourself.”

The word was like a lash in the air between them.

Grace crossed her arms against her, holding her sides beneath her cape. She’d known what had him upset…just as her using her body had upset him by the river.

What she didn’t understand is how much his charge upset her. He didn’t say anything that hadn’t been hurled at her before…except this time, he struck his mark.

Richard Lynsted had penetrated her air of bravado. He forced her to see herself as she really was.

As she didn’t want to be.

“Would you rather have hanged?” she answered, her throat tightening.

He took a step back, his gaze shifting from hers. “You know I wouldn’t. But the price…
damn it all
, Grace, the price was
too
high.”

“It was
nothing
,” she countered. “Nothing that I haven’t offered before. And what do you care?” she demanded, lashing out at him. “You know I’m nothing. All I have is hair, breasts, and what’s between my thighs. That’s
all
I matter to anyone. That’s all I’ve
ever
mattered.”

“
That is so untrue.
Or is it what you want? You blame others, Grace, when you have the power to choose for yourself—”

“You don’t know how it is—”

“Aye, so you tell me. I’m the sanctimonious one, the judgmental, surly one. Tell me, Miss MacEachin, which is the one of us calling names? Which one of us is truly judgmental?”

“I know what you think,” she accused, wanting to defend herself because he was right. It was easier to hurl names at him than to once again face what she’d done, the woman she’d become.

She turned to walk off, needing to be away from him. He saw too clearly and it frightened her.

But Richard pulled her back. He took hold of each of her wrists, leaning so he could look her in the eye. “You know what I think, do you? Then you know I believe you are the most incredible woman I’ve met. You are honest, fearless, intelligent—”

Grace did not want to hear these words. They were not true.

She shook her head, shook her body, willing herself not to listen.

“What is the matter with you?” Richard asked. “Why do you deny what I say?”

“Because you’re lying. You know it isn’t true. You know what I am. I
am
a whore. I am
nothing—
”

He shut her up with a kiss.

Grace was stunned. She started to struggle, to push him away. This was how they all were. It’s all they ever wanted…except his kiss was different.

It wasn’t beastly or demanding or hard, uncompromising, overbearing.

He pressed his lips to hers as if to stop her from saying all the ugliness she found in herself. He kissed her as if begging her to be aware of what was good, what was right.

There was gentleness in this kiss but steel, too. Richard wasn’t going to let her go—not until she let herself listen to him.

The furious shaking that had taken hold of her slowly ebbed. The hard pain in her chest eased and, ever so tentatively, she allowed herself to kiss him back.

She hadn’t been aware that he’d taken hold of her wrists or of how tightly he held them until he released his hold.

He broke the kiss. They stood so close her breasts barely touched his chest. He leaned his chin upon the top of her head, his arms resting on her waist, a pose so endearing that it brought a reluctant, sad smile to her face.

“You don’t know the real me,” she whispered to him.

“I believe I do.”

Those tears she’d struggled to keep in her throat came to her eyes. She shut them, trying to force the tears back and for once in her life, couldn’t. They escaped with a will of their own. They would no longer be denied and she was powerless to stop them.

The story came out of her then, the words tripping over her tongue in their need to finally be spoken aloud.

She told him of Harry Ellis, Sir Nicholas’s son, whom she’d wanted to marry with an unholy passion, of the rape and his cruel words afterward, of the meanness of others once they knew she’d been had and how it was all her fault for being so stupidly naive. She’d confessed all to her mother, who had been planning on Grace’s beauty to free them from living like outcasts, especially after her father had returned home. Her mother had left once Grace told her she was ruined. Grace’s foolishness had destroyed her mother’s love and she hadn’t the courage to tell her father, so she’d left. But the world was a dangerous place for a woman alone, especially one so young, and Grace had learned to survive on her looks and her sex.

And she wanted to go home. She now knew what Harry had done wasn’t her fault but running away had been. She’d hurt people and she just wanted to make things right—with money, with the truth, with anything she could find.

To his credit, all Richard did was listen. He didn’t try to offer advice. He was just there for her to hold on to. A solid rock of a man…a man she could trust.

At last her tears were spent. Everything bottled inside her, all the self-loathing, the humiliation was now there for him to see. Her head throbbed from the emotion. She leaned forward, resting her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat. Her own raced madly as if she’d just run a great distance. Slowly, its beat changed, matching the steadiness of his own.

There it was, no more secrets.

And still he held her. His hold hadn’t changed, not once in all her recitations of her wickedness. Nor did it change now.

Finally, she found the courage to break the silence. “Do you see how horrid I am?”

“I believe you are honest, fearless, intelligent,” he said, repeating the words that had crumbled the shell she’d built around herself—and for once, she let herself believe it was true.

A change was wrought inside her. The tightness in her chest, the bitter anger in her stomach, the tension—all conditions she had assumed to be part of life—vanished. Evaporated. Disappeared…proving they’d been shackles of her own making.

And in their place grew a sense of peace.

“Don’t do it again, Grace. Don’t barter away a bit of your soul for me or for anyone else.”

“There isn’t much soul left.”

“You’re wrong. What’s good inside us never dies. You have a magnificent soul.”

A magnificent soul.
He’d seen the worst in her, and still thought her good.

But he didn’t offer her another kiss.

Instead, they faced each other as awkward strangers—and Grace didn’t know what to do.

Men came to her…slavishly so if they were interested.

Richard wasn’t anywhere close to being her slave.

She took a step away from him. Keeping her voice carefully neutral, she asked, “What do we do now?” She was uncertain of whether she spoke of Inverness or of the two of them.

His answer gave her pause. “We go to Inverness.”

But this time, he didn’t take her hand. He just started walking, albeit at a pace she could enjoy.

And Grace realized she hadn’t given up all her secrets. She’d kept one.

She had not told him that his arms made her feel safe…and that night on the riverbank, the lust hadn’t all been his.

Grace followed obediently. She focused on the shadow of his broad shoulders and back and realized that she’d fallen in love. That’s really why she would have done anything to save him.
Anything
.

He’d come into her life and taken it over. Here, she’d thought she’d known her own mind, had become the woman she’d wanted to be, was complete and independent…and he’d shown her how empty she’d been.

Richard Lynsted was making her believe in love again.

The notion was frightening. She’d learned through Harry that she let down her guard when she was in love. That’s the way he’d reached her. She’d dreamed of babies and a noble man and everything turning out for the best.

Life had taught her those happinesses didn’t exist…but then along came Richard, and Grace didn’t know if she had the courage to believe again.