A
God-fearing man kept his base instincts under control, if he valued his pride—and Richard Lynsted was very, very proud. Even still, the blood coursing through his veins was male and right now, it wasn’t listening to brain or reason.

She
was
the most beautiful woman he’d laid eyes on.

For once, the extravagant praise heaped on an actress was accurate. If anything, what they said about the “Scottish Songbird” Grace MacEachin might even have been subdued.

The male population of the crowd filling the theater had grown antsy during the long
Macbeth
. At one point an argument had started between one of the actors on the stage and a heckler who’d summed up the crowd’s feelings by announcing they had come to see “Gracie.” The only way Shakespeare could have held their interest is if Macbeth had grown “ripe, plump breasts and shining black curls.”

And now, at last,
she
was on the stage, making her entrance in the light farce
The Quaker
. She played a small role—the tempting sister of some character or other such nonsense, the part that didn’t wear drab brown but a rosy pink with a very low-cut bodice. At some point she would sing, presumably after the Quaker had chased her around the scenery. Richard wasn’t a fan of farce…although he didn’t mind ogling Miss MacEachin’s ample breasts.

He wasn’t alone. The audience stomped and clapped its welcome, necks craning for a better look. What women who had stayed for her performance became equally animated. Fans flipped open and started fluttering as lips hid behind them to express to compatriots what they
really
thought of her looks.

Miss MacEachin started to speak her part—

“I lovvve you, Gracie,” a male voice from the overcrowded two-shilling gallery interrupted.

“Yes, we looovvve you,” the fashionable young bucks on the front row mimicked.

Happy laughter agreed and then everyone began repeating her name. “Gra-cie, Gra-cie, Gra-cie.” The syllables came out faster and faster as they clapped the beat, effectively cutting off anything the actress had to say.

Richard stood in the shadows of the private box, his arms crossed, sizing her up.

Miss MacEachin had that deceptive quality called presence that made her seem both at ease and in control. She held up her hand, begging for a silence her admirers were not ready to give.

The other actors and actresses on stage were not so patient. One actor began shouting his lines.

“Sing
,” someone in the boxes opposite Richard’s yelled out and the demand easily swept the audience, who began chanting, “Sing, sing, sing.”

The actor again tried his line and ended up with a head of cabbage being thrown at him. He dodged it but then began a new game—chasing the actors off the stage with a new barrage of vegetables or whatever else was close at hand.

The actors and actress scrambled to the safety of the wings, including Miss MacEachin. Only a few months before, this same theater had been the scene of riots over a hike in the price of tickets. They respected what a London crowd could do.

“Gra-cie, Gra-cie, Gra-cie.” The chant went up again, the sound growing louder, more insistent—

Miss MacEachin came stumbling onto the stage, obviously pushed there by one of her colleagues. Her audience roared their approval.

She quickly recovered her poise, tugging up her bodice to keep herself intact. Richard wondered if she could feel every male in the crowd undressing her with his eyes.

Then again, she must like it. Why else would a woman stoop so low as to become an actress?

Miss MacEachin’s gaze went directly to his box in search of her good friend Fiona, the Duchess of Holburn. The box belonged to her husband, who was also Richard’s cousin. The lovely Fiona, a woman Richard didn’t know well because his side of the family didn’t mix with Holburn’s, was both countrywoman and friend to Miss MacEachin. Clearly she had been expecting to see Fiona in the box this evening.

Fiona
had
been there. In one of those happenstances of fate, Richard’s path had crossed his cousin’s. Fiona had insisted Richard join their party, which had included their Spanish friend, the
barón de Valencia
.

Holburn and Richard rarely appeared anywhere together, especially in public. They were of the same age and had attended the same schools, but while the duke was well liked, Richard was not. He knew that. He lived with it.

However, marriage had obviously made Holburn mellow because he had seconded the invitation—and what choice had Richard save to accept it?

Of course, he’d been concerned. How was he to confront Miss MacEachin and speak his mind with Fiona close at hand? Then, to his surprise, the duke, duchess, and the Spaniard had left the box abruptly after the
Macbeth
.

Richard had assumed they would return for Miss MacEachin’s performance. However, the curtain rose and there had been no sign of them.

A polite knock on the door interrupted his thoughts. A porter handed Richard a note. It was from Holburn. There had been an emergency and it was imperative they leave with Andres, the Spaniard. Fiona had added a postscript prettily begging Richard to personally deliver an apology for her absence to Miss MacEachin and her promise to call on her friend as soon as she was able.

Meanwhile, on the stage, Miss MacEachin was saying a few words to the conductor, who nodded and passed the word on to the musicians. His baton went up and they played opening strains to a lovely ballad, “Barbara Allen.”

Miss MacEachin sang, her voice clear and pure.

However, the crowd was not satisfied. They had not come for sweetly sung music and their thoughts were summed up by an obviously inebriated wigged gent who stood up in his chair on the front row and yelled, “Here now, something lively. Didn’t come here for ballads. I want to watch your titties bounce.”

His comment startled the crowd, who quickly recovered and burst into laughter.

The bucks down the row from the gent began shouting, “Titties!” And a new chant was born.

Blushing furiously, Miss MacEachin tried to go on with the song but found she couldn’t. She looked offstage as if for help, and discovered none was forthcoming. With one man’s crudity, she’d become fair game. It was the way of the world. People turned mean.

Any other woman would have cried quarter and run off the stage. Not Miss MacEachin. To Richard’s fascination, her whole manner changed. Her back straightened. Her chin lifted in pride and her eyes took on the unholy light of battle.

She marched to the edge of the stage where the wigged man stood in his seat, waving his arm and encouraging his cheer. He was a pudgy thing, dressed in white knee breeches and a cerulean blue coat that was a size too small for him. His lips were small and pouty and his nose the size of a pig’s snout.

The cheering crowd went silent in eager anticipation of what Miss MacEachin was about to do.

The gent didn’t immediately realize he was shouting alone. He glanced around and only then noticed Miss MacEachin on the stage above him. She tapped an impatient foot, her hands on her hips. This was the sort of woman Richard had suspected her to be. Bold, unabashed.

Her wigged admirer smiled. “Love you, Gracie,” he slurred with a happy hiccup.

“Then come up here,” she suggested. “You can’t watch my titties bounce from that seat.” She had a magical accent. Some Scots sounded guttural or too flat in their tone. Hers had the lilt of music.

The audience loved her suggestion. They catcalled and urged the man to go up onstage.

He was only too eager to comply. He looked for steps, walking in first one direction and then in another.

“I’m waiting,” Miss MacEachin chastised.

“Where’s the stairs?” her gent begged.

“Who needs stairs?” was her reply. “Climb up on the stage right here.”

The gent eyed the climb, a bit daunted.

Miss MacEachin bent down, giving an eyeful of her ample cleavage. “Hurry. Everyone is waiting,” she said. “
I’m
waiting.”

Voices from those around him chimed in now, telling him to climb upon the stage and placing his pride on the line. He made his first attempt to hoist himself up onto the stage and failed. He failed a second and third time, too. By now the audience was enjoying itself at his expense. Their laughter grew louder alongside his frustration.

And then, with the help of a push to his fanny from one of the bucks sitting beside him, he made his way up onto the stage. He balanced there at the edge on his knees, waving his arms and encouraging the crowd to clap for him.

Miss MacEachin brought an end to his antics by waiting for him to start to climb to his feet and giving his rump a good swift kick with her foot. The man went flying into the front row, his wig sailing off into the second.

The theater went wild with laughter.

“
That
is for not having the sense to listen to me when I sing,” Miss MacEachin informed him. “And for the rest of you, I have this song to share.”

She didn’t wait for music but launched into a defiant, lusty little song about how a woman should always put a man in his place. The chorus was, “Hi diddle, hi diddle, hey!” By the time she was finished singing, her audience, including her disgraced admirer, was lustily singing it with her.

Miss MacEachin didn’t linger. She made a quick curtsey, waved to the two-shilling seats and the boxes and ran offstage.

Now Richard understood why all the men had gathered here. She was as beautiful as she was bold…but she also had talent. There was far more to her than creamy skin and ebony curls.

The theater’s pillars and crystal chandeliers shook with applause. Flowers flew through the air to land on the stage. “One
more
song, Gracie,” became the refrain. “
One
more.”

But Miss MacEachin was not accommodating. The bouquet-covered stage remained empty.

Many men, including the fancy bucks on the front row, rose from their seats and headed for the nearest exits. Richard knew what they were about. The frenzy of entries in London’s betting books over which man would be the first to bed her had become the stuff of legend. From what Richard had heard, well over two hundred vied for the honor. The race was on. Every buck, every beau, every Corinthian schemed to lavish her with jewels, money, and promises to claim her for his lover.

But as Richard left the box to join the stream of men queuing up outside the stage door, he knew there was a difference between them.

He wasn’t there to bed Miss MacEachin.

He was there to destroy her.

BOOK: The Marriage Ring

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