Page 16 of I’ve Grown Accustomed to My Scot

He contemplated her revelations while she stayed quiet beside him, apart from her uneven breathing. Was she crying, or trying not to? He couldn’t blame her—it was even worse than he had first thought. Grace was ruined because she had been discovered with her lover, and no one would believe she was still a virgin. Not that it would have mattered anyway. The mere fact of her being with a man in such a situation meant her reputation was in tatters, and after that the earl couldn’t wait to be rid of her. Probably her ruination had been just the opportunity he had been waiting for so he could cast her off and concentrate on the two daughters he had sired.

Grace shivered, and realizing she was cold, Rory made an impatient sound and reached to pull the covers over her. He found her nakedness distracting. She flinched when he moved, but he ignored her as he drew the quilt up and over her naked body and, while she stared at him wide-eyed like one of Callum’s injured forest creatures, he tucked her in. And then he leaned over her and looked down into her face as she stared back.

“Now, listen to me,” he said sternly. “I am not going to abandon you or—or toss you aside, no matter what Ormsby says. I have given you my word and I mean to keep it. I will protect you, but we will lead separate lives. You will go your way and I will go mine. That was the bargain we agreed on, and that is what we will do.”

She shook her head and tears filled her dark eyes. She gave a half sob. “You say that now, but you will fall in love with someone else and then you will want me gone. And then I will be worse than ruined and my father will never let me see my sisters again.” Her voice rose on the last word and she pulled the quilt over her head.

Rory felt a ridiculous desire to laugh. “I promise you I willna fall in love. I am no’ the type to fall in love. Everyone knows that.”

Her voice was muffled. “You might say that now but love has a way of creeping up and—and pouncing.”

“Oh, for God’s sake . . .” He pulled down the coverings, causing her to gasp, and then rested his hands on either side of her head, pinning her there. He leaned in close, and for a moment all he could think was how luscious her lips were and how much he wanted to kiss them.

He cleared his throat and told himself sternly to behave. “’Tis very late, Grace, and we are both tired, and you are being overly dramatic. Let’s wait until tomorrow. We can talk about your future then, and what I can do to help you make it what you want it to be. I didna marry you lightly. I want to see you are safe and happy in your new life.”

“Then why not consummate our marriage?” she asked him sulkily, pouting those tempting lips. “Then I will know you truly mean what you say, and that you cannot rid yourself of me on a—a whim.” She shot him a glance from beneath her long dark lashes, and he remembered he was naked too. “I can tell you want to lie with me,” she said slyly. “And sometimes I ache with the need to have a man inside me.”

Rory wasn’t sure whether to kiss her or shout at her. He felt both infuriated and frustrated. He was trying to do the right thing! He was trying to be a good man, and she was goading him into being the exact opposite. Did she really trust him so little? But he supposed she had little reason to trust any man. And then there was the tempting thought that she was aching for him . . .

“I will not discuss this tonight,” he said through gritted teeth. “If you will not leave my bed then I must.”

But Grace shook her head and, with a sob, began to fumble with the covers he had just tucked around her. She slid out from the bed, and he saw her body in the moonlight as she hurried to the door, the soft curves of her breasts and hips, the peach of her bottom, and then she was gone.

He sat and stared after her, feeling confused and very aroused, and yet stubborn in his determination to stand by his word. Rory had given her all that it was in his power to give her to keep her safe, and he refused to give her more. Because that would mean . . . He wasn’t sure what it might mean, only that he suspected that once he made her his wife in truth, nothing would ever be the same again.

Chapter Nine

Grace threw herself onto her bed and sobbed into her pillow, waking the cat and sending it fleeing. She felt humiliated and embarrassed that after all her efforts he had still rejected her, but more than that, her body thrummed with thwarted desire. She had wanted his mouth on her, his hands, his hard body pressing into hers. That he had stopped at the crucial moment . . . The man was infuriating. Anyone else would have been more than happy to accept what she was offering! Bolton had been happy to take her into his arms and into bed, although it felt wrong to use him as an example. She had thought he cared for her, and despite the way he had tormented her, she had believed he would still marry her when they were discovered. She had certainly been willing to marry him, although now she thought about it, it might have been like jumping from the frying pan into the fire. Bolton could be nasty, although he hid his nastiness in sweet words, but she had never felt completely safe with him. She had certainly never felt as if she was in control.

Rory wasn’t Bolton. He was the opposite. In Grace’s opinion, he was playing the part of a martyr, denying himself the wife he had just married because he had made some silly promise to himself. Even when she had told him she did not care about his promise and she was ready and willing, he had stubbornly refused to consummate their union. How could he be so irritating? Why was she surrounded by men who refused to behave as she wished them to?

She screamed into her pillow and, when that didn’t help, pounded her fists against it. Eventually she calmed enough to think more clearly.

If Rory had meant what he had said, that he was prepared to support her in her quest to make a new life, then that was all very well. But trusting him was difficult for her. And surely if he was sincere in his desire to help her, he must also understand her need to be his wife in fact as well as on paper? Refusing to agree to her wishes still suggested to her that he was going to abandon her eventually, even if he denied it now. Couldn’t he understand how unmoored that made her feel? If she was his wife and yet not his wife? Couldn’t he see how shaky the ground under her feet felt, as if at any moment it might crack wide open and send her tumbling down into nothingness?

As much as she hated the earl, in this instance she knew he had been right. She needed to ensure she was legally married to Rory, but how was she to do that when the stubborn Scot refused to let her into his bed?

With a sigh, she lifted her head. The cat was sitting a short distance away from her, those yellow eyes staring into hers. It looked sympathetic. She reached out and stroked the soft fur, and it made a chirrup sound and began to knead its large white paws on the cover.

Grace had never had a pet and this felt nice. Perhaps she could take the cat with her when she left for wherever she went to next? Her sisters would love it. Assuming they would be allowed to visit her and, as she dearly hoped, one day live with her.

Everything she had dreamed of for her future now felt uncertain because it was in the hands of that stubborn Scotsman who seemed to think the consummation of their marriage was some sort of test of his resolve. She had thought herself free at last, but she wasn’t. She had only been transferred from one prison to another. Although she accepted—with a pang of conscience—that was rather unfair. The Countess of Strathmore’s home did not feel like a prison.

Downstairs, the longcase clock struck the hour. Soon it would be time to rise, and she had had hardly any sleep, after first lying here waiting and listening for Rory to come home, and then creeping into his room only to be rejected.

The remembered humiliation made her cringe inside and want to avoid him for as long as possible. Not that that would solve anything. Instead she told herself she must be sensible and aloof, prepared to listen to whatever he was going to suggest to her for her future. Perhaps he would change his mind and welcome her into his bed after all? But she did not think so. He had been so adamant. So pigheaded. No, she did not think Lord Rory MacKenzie was going to change his mind.

*

After Grace had been dressed by the maid in one of her depressing dresses—this one was grey with a line above the hem where it had been let down to accommodate her growth over the past years—she found the countess at her breakfast. Jennie smiled and wished her a cheery good morning, and if her gaze took note of Grace’s shabby attire, it did not linger. On the sideboard there was toast as well as the more substantial eggs and bacon and sausage, far more than she was usually presented with for breakfast. Grace helped herself to the toast and spread it thickly with marmalade, before pouring herself a cup of coffee with the daring addition of cream and sugar. That was a luxury she had not had, and she took her first sip with a great deal of pleasure.

Whatever she might think of Rory’s lack of understanding and his infuriating decisions, living in the countess’s house was a definite improvement. Although she reminded herself that once she moved into some place more suited to her budget, she would need to drastically economize. Rory would remove himself from her presence, and although he might tell her he was going to protect and look after her, it would be from a distance. She suspected that as time passed, he would be farther and farther away from her, until eventually he would forget about her altogether.

The countess was frowning. She looked under the table as if she had lost something. She was a pretty woman, with grey eyes and fair hair, and her smooth, scarcely lined skin belied her maturity. There was something of Rory in her smile, and Grace wondered what the rest of his family looked like. Were they also cheerful and attractive? But then she reminded herself that she would never have the chance to be introduced to them so she would never find out.

“Have you seen Bothwell?” Jennie’s question interrupted her drab thoughts. When Grace turned to her, she found the other woman was still frowning. “I have not seen him since yesterday. He usually likes to sit here while I breakfast in case there are titbits. And last night he did not come to my bed. It is so unlike him, and I am worried one of the servants might have let him out of the door and he is lost.”

Grace stared, shocked, trying to understand what this meant. Did the countess have a lover who came to her bed? “Bothwell?” she asked cautiously. “What does he look like?”