Chapter Twenty-one

Bloody, bloody hell. Maxwell barely kept himself from cursing aloud. Mr. Bowman was a potential client, and a drawing room brawl would destroy Maxwell’s credibility in Edinburgh. Successfully navigating the evening was proving to be more difficult than he’d anticipated. Although, having the players all in the same room would ratchet up the tension every minute. At some point, the façade would fray and the truth would emerge.

Maxwell retreated a few feet to an unoccupied corner, Bryn at his side. Armstrong stopped two feet short of them. Too close for politeness’s sake or Maxwell’s peace of mind. Armstrong’s gaze lingered along Bryn’s décolletage, and Maxwell fisted his hands to keep from shoving him away. That’s what Armstrong wanted. To stoke a physical confrontation where he could respond and claim to be victim. Maxwell played a different sort of game. One that would win.

“Our marriage contract is valid whether you’re soiled or not, Bryn. I’ll marry you and bed you before the winter’s end. He can’t stop me.” Armstrong raised a hand to touch her, but she batted it away. Armstrong was a kettle ready to boil. “There’s plenty your cripple can’t teach you. I’ll be more than happy to oblige.”

“That’s quite enough, Armstrong.” Maxwell kept a smile on his face but forged iron in his voice.

“You’re not man enough to face me.”

“On the contrary, didn’t your hired lackeys report back to you?”

Ruddy color painted Armstrong’s cheeks, making him appear younger and less sure of himself. “Don’t know what you’re talking about, Drake.”

Maxwell hoped Dugan wasn’t a card player, because he was a poor bluff. “Perhaps. But since it’s been nothing more than a nuisance—”

“Nuisance? You haven’t stepped foot outside your town house all week.” Armstrong’s satisfied expression fell as he realized what he’d given away.

“I’ve been busy with meetings. Apparently, you’ve been busy watching me.”

“Next time I’ll be the one to—” Armstrong snapped his mouth closed. When he spoke again, it was a guttural whisper. “Watch your back, Drake. You might find a hole in it.”

He spun away and was lost to view on the other side of the room.

“He means to kill you and won’t give up no matter what happens. You’ve tweaked his ego.” Bryn’s voice was thin with worry.

“I believe you’re correct.” Maxwell shrugged. “Quite unfortunate.”

“Unfortunate? I’d call it disastrous. How can you act so blithe about the possibility?”

“Armstrong I can handle. He’s impetuous but not terribly bright. I can work the situation to our advantage as soon as we determine what he’s gaining by marrying you. If it’s your inheritance, then I’ll buy him off. The problem arises if it’s something less tangible.”

The call for dinner arrived. Guests milled about, organizing for the procession. The woman Bryn had been conversing with earlier sidled over. “Miss McCann, how exactly are you related to Lady Craddock again?”

Bryn leaned in and whispered sotto voce, “I’m her mad half sister.” The woman’s eyes went wide before she turned and scurried away.

“What was that about?” Maxwell asked.

“The gossip is that I’m queer in the attic for abandoning such a handsome, upstanding man such as Dugan.”

“Regretting your decision?” Dark humor dried his voice.

“I bless the day I found you again, Maxwell.” Sudden raw honesty pulsed between them. Her eyes were warm pools he could drown in. His heart thumped an answering call against his ribs.

Maxwell opened his mouth and then promptly shut it. He’d cursed the morning he’d awakened to find her virgin blood on him. His life had splintered since she’d crashed into it like a cannonball.

But what he’d rebuilt was bigger and fuller than anything he’d imagined. He’d assumed the years that stretched before him would be lonely ones. He’d planned on it. Even gloried in the melancholy. Everything had changed. She’d changed everything.

Sutherland strolled by. “Drake, your place is in the back of the line, if you please. Miss McCann, up at the front with me, my dear.”

It was touch and go whether Maxwell was going to allow her to leave him. Finally out of reach, the massive, gaping hole she’d left was clear.

* * * * *

A local vicar of some standing escorted Bryn into dinner. He was middle-aged, gone to paunch and a distractible sort, but pleasant and jolly.

Once in the dining hall, Sutherland took her elbow in a proprietary grasp. “My dear Miss McCann, I have placed you at my table with your sister and Mr. Armstrong. We’re all agog to hear how you’re amusing yourself in Edinburgh.”

The insinuation wormed through her. Had Sutherland heard about her foray at Molly’s? She recalled Molly’s warning that Sutherland had eyes and ears all over Edinburgh. She was seated next to Craddock and across from Mary and Dugan. The seat to her left was as yet unoccupied.

The earl took his place at Sutherland’s right and next to Mary. He winked and gave her a bracing smile. She had one ally at the table, and Dugan could hardly drag her away in the middle of a dinner party. She could concentrate on avoiding the sinkholes of their questions.

Maxwell, Mr. Masterson, and Mrs. Winslow were seated at the farthest table away. Footmen moved forward to fill wineglasses.

“Miss?” A familiar voice whipped her around. Holding a carafe, Penny stood at her elbow with a raised eyebrow and a barely discernable smile.

She gasped but covered with a clearing of her throat and a mask of indifference. “Yes, please.”

Her stomach rejected even the thought of food. Bryn did her best to not look at Dugan, but his gaze never left her. He hated her. Why hadn’t she been strong enough when Mary had blindsided her with the betrothal announcement and say she did not wish to marry.

Instead, a chain of events she could not have predicted had been put into motion through her cowardice. A measure of remorse was hers to bear. Not for breaking the engagement but for allowing the farce to continue until she’d been so desperate to involve Maxwell against his will.

As the seat to her left was as yet empty, she turned to Craddock. “How did you leave Cragian?”

“Same as always.”

“Has the lambing begun?”

“How the devil should I know?”

“You are responsible for your tenants. You should know everything that happens on your land and to your people,” Bryn said.

As he gestured for the footmen to start serving soup, Sutherland asked mildly, “You care a great deal about the less fortunate among us, do you, Miss McCann?”

“Shouldn’t we all care, Mr. Sutherland?”

“Certainly. But instead of worrying about a tenant or two, the greatest change can be instigated by working within the system.”

Bryn fiddled with her spoon, her appetite nonexistent. “The government, you mean?”

“The House of Commons, Parliament. There are monies available for roads, bridges, and charitable purposes. With the right influence, those monies can be directed where it’s truly needed.”

A sound that might have been a warning came from Mary.

With an undisguised irony, the earl said, “And you’re the man who can justly appropriate the monies and distribute among the needy?”

Sutherland lounged in his chair like a lion lying in wait for its prey. “Scotland has been too long ignored by those in power. We need strong leadership to demand what’s rightfully ours.”

“And one man could accomplish such a feat? That didn’t work out well for your bonny prince, now did it?”

The jab wiped Sutherland’s enigmatic smile away. “Not one man, but many.”

Before the confrontation had a chance to conclude, Lord Albert MacShane made his way to the seat next to her. “So terribly sorry, Sutherland. Mother felt a bit peaked earlier, and I was late getting off.”

“I hope she’s recovered.”

“She is. I rather think those spells are only to keep me close.” His laugh was too high-pitched and grating.

“Well, no matter, you’re here now and haven’t missed the main course. I believe you’re acquainted with most of the table.”

While Sutherland introduced Albert to the earl, Bryn quashed her astonishment so it wouldn’t reflect on her face. All the players were in attendance tonight, but what part would they play? Hero or villain?

“How long have you been in town, my lord?” she asked.

Albert dropped his fork, the clatter drawing eyes. “Only a few days now.”

“I’m sorry to hear of your mother’s sickness.” Bryn channeled her resentment of Lady MacShane into the dissection of the quail on her plate.

“Mother is well enough. She’s an old dragon, but she can still spit fire.” A cynical amusement tinged his voice. Dark circles ringed low under his eyes, and he had lost weight, his face gaunt and his jacket loose.

“Are you quite all right, Lord MacShane?”

Staring dispassionately at the quail lying on his plate, Albert asked, “Are you staying with Mr. Drake?”

“Aye, with Mrs. Winslow as my chaperone.”

“What’s he like? Is he a good man?” It seemed Albert’s appetite matched her own. He skewered the quail, methodically pulled off the meat, and set it neatly in a pile to the side, not taking a single bite.

Was this simple curiosity about his half brother or something more sinister? What would the truth hurt? “He’s remarkable. He overcame a childhood of deprivation and amassed a fortune.”

“I didn’t know who he was when I was a child, you know.”

“If you had, would you have crossed your mother and father to help him?”

He hesitated, moving the food around on his plate. “I don’t know. But I asked for a brother more times than I could count. Mother never told me I already had one. Is he like our father, or is he a kind man?”

A wash of sympathy came over Bryn. Albert had not been deprived of food or shelter as a child, but he’d lacked something Maxwell had been rich with. Love. “Very kind. Funny too in an ironic kind of way. He doesn’t laugh often, but when he does—”

Bryn took a gulp of wine. She’d said too much. If Albert was out to hurt Maxwell, her nattering could put him in danger. The way his smile and laugh could turn her inside out and put her heart on offer was of no consequence to Albert.

Tracing the tip of her knife around the edge of the plate, she continued. “He’s tough from his time in the war. Good with a pistol, knife, or his fists. Ruthless with those who cross him.”

Albert pulled at his collar as if it were strangling him. “Excuse me, Miss McCann.”

Bryn turned to watch him leave, crossing glances with Maxwell. Returning her attention to the pit of vipers that doubled as a dinner table, she found Dugan whispering to Mary, but Mary aiming daggers with her eyes at Bryn.

“What were you and Lord MacShane discussing so intimately, Bryn? Are you already bored with my castoffs?”

“Mind your tongue, Mary,” Craddock said harshly.

The undercurrents of anger and danger and secrets were as complicated as a Jacob’s ladder, tying them all together in a myriad of ways.

Stilted small talk about the weather, politics, and horses accompanied dessert. Albert never returned. Dinner ended, and the after-dinner rituals commenced. She had no time to discuss matters with Maxwell before the men closeted themselves to drink brandy and smoke.

Bryn followed Mary into the drawing room, where the ladies would gossip and drink port. She felt a bit like an insect flying straight into a spider’s web.