Page 2 of I’ve Grown Accustomed to My Scot

“I still don’t understand,” he muttered. “What has any of this to do with me?”

Kilsyth climbed aboard the coach and gestured for Rory to follow him. “How long have you been in London, MacKenzie?”

“A month.”

“What have you been doing all this time?”

Rory didn’t like to admit he had been drinking and carousing, but that was what he had been doing. “Enjoying myself,” he said.

“Obviously you have not been listening to the gossip.”

The coach began to move, and Rory wanted nothing more than to close his eyes and pretend this wasn’t happening, but he knew he needed to pay attention.

“What gossip?”

“By now everyone knows the story—apart from you, MacKenzie. Grace is not Ormsby’s daughter. She is the result of an affair his wife had with a most disreputable man. Ormsby dislikes the girl for that reason alone, but now that she is ruined and appears to be turning out like her mother, he is on the hunt for a husband to take her off his hands. He chose Ramsgate, but now that gentleman cannot fulfill his role because of you . . .” He shrugged. “I would be very careful, MacKenzie. Ormsby is known as a bully, and he usually gets what he wants.”

Poor Grace. But it was just a passing thought. Rory did not expect that her troubles would affect him, and nor did he believe Ormsby could possibly force him to marry against his will. The duel was over, he had won, and now he would go about his business. Which up to this point seemed to consist of drinking and frequenting brothels and gambling hells.

He closed his eyes. “Drop me off at the Countess of Strathmore’s place, would you, Kilsyth?” he said, already drifting into sleep.

Chapter Two

Grace woke with a start. There were voices downstairs, and the sound of Ormsby’s sharp, cold tones made her skin prickle. Something had displeased him, and that usually meant he would take out his foul temper on her.

He wasn’t really her father. If one wanted to be correct, he was her stepfather, the man who had married her mother when Grace was already a fait accompli. It had been a package deal, and her mother had been desperate and Ormsby had seemed like the best option.

He wasn’t, but Grace did not blame her mother for that. And things hadn’t been quite so bad while her mother was alive, but when she died two years ago, matters had deteriorated and Ormsby’s true feelings had been unleashed upon her.

“Grace?”

Harriett’s soft voice came from the door, and Grace sat up. Her sister hurried across the room and into her arms, burying her face in Grace’s shoulder.

“Father is angry,” she said. “Can you hear?”

“Perhaps his breakfast toast was burned,” Grace said, and her young sister giggled.

Harriett was barely fourteen, still a child, and when their mother died, Grace had stepped into the void. She was happy to do so. She loved her two young sisters and often took the blame whenever Ormsby found fault with them.

“It is something about Lord Ramsgate.” Prudence, her other sister was at the door now. She was sixteen and looking more like their mother every day, with her caramel-colored hair and bright-blue eyes. Grace worried for her, knowing she was getting to an age when Ormsby would be considering finding her a suitable husband, and their father’s idea of “suitable” was unlikely to be Prudence’s.

“What about Lord Ramsgate?” Grace asked reluctantly. “Has he fled the country?”

Prudence and Harriett laughed awkwardly. “Grace, you shouldn’t joke!” Harriett said. “Even if I wish he had fled,” she added honestly. “Or perhaps you liked him and wanted him for your husband?”

Harriett was an innocent if she thought “liking” had anything to do with marriage.

“You know how I feel about marrying someone I barely know,” Grace said carefully. “Then I hope he has run away!” Prudence said fiercely. She stood up to Ormsby rather more than Grace liked, and she feared for the girl. At the moment, their father found it amusing, but there would come a time when she crossed him once too often and he would crush her. She must learn to be silent and hide in plain sight, as Grace did. Apart from when she stood up for her sisters, of course.

“But what if he finds someone worse?” Harriett whispered. She had dark hair like Grace, but her eyes, wide now with worry, were the same blue as her sister’s. Neither of them had eyes the cold grey of Ormsby, and it was as if their mother had diluted his bloodline. That, in Grace’s opinion, could only be a good thing.

“I will just have to frighten him off then,” Grace said boldly, knowing it wasn’t true. Ramsgate had been persuaded to agree to marry her because Ormsby had some hold over him. She wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but the one time she had been in the same room with them both, Ramsgate had looked petrified of the other man, and utterly miserable. Not exactly a match made in heaven.

Her sisters said nothing, and Grace picked up the storybook she had been reading to them. It was really too childish for them now, but it reminded them of their mother, and they enjoyed cozying up to Grace while she read.

They had just reached the part where the prince was rescuing the princess when there was a knock on the door. Grace set down the book and, with a glance at her sisters, went to answer it.

A maid stood there, eyes wide and a little pitying. “Lady Grace, your father asks that you attend him in his study.”