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Caleb, however, was a soldier, not an actor. He chose not to follow the script.

Instead, he shrugged.

“That’s fine, then. Grace, let’s go.”

He extended his hand to his wife.

This was the one moment when Caleb did not feel calm and in control. He didn’t know what he would do if Grace refused him, if she chose to stay at this awful dinner instead of going with him.

But she didn’t even hesitate. She stood, pausing only to dab politely at her mouth with her napkin, then crossed to him, head held high. When she slipped her fingers in his, he felt as though he could fight any foe.

Graham could not have looked more shocked if Caleb and Grace had sprouted second heads and started singing in Portuguese. Evan, meanwhile, looked absolutely delighted.

“Do you know what, brother?” he said, and Caleb only felt the slightest pang at the term. “I think that’s a fine idea. Frances, let’s go.”

The redhead’s eyes were as wide as saucers, but she, too, quickly stood and took her husband’s hand in hers.

“Good evening,” Caleb said tightly to the gaping duke and the shrinking duchess.

And then he, his wife, her brother, and her friend, marched right out the front door of Graham House.

They did not, alas, go any further than directly out the front door. Leaving a dinner party hours earlier than might otherwise have been expected meant, of course, that the horses werenot hitched and their carriages were not ready. The Duke and Duchess of Montgomery and the Marquess and Marchioness of Oackley, therefore, were obliged to stand patiently on the London sidewalk while servants hurried to prepare their vehicles.

They had only done so for about half a minute before Lady Oackley began to giggle. She tried to stifle the sound with her hand, but it was no use, especially not when, seeing her friend’s mirth, Grace joined in. Even Evan was biting his lip to hold in a smile.

“Oh my goodness,” Lady Oackley gasped, her head bent toward Grace’s conspiratorially. “Did you see hisface?”

“Christ, it was magnificent,” Oackley agreed.

Caleb did not necessarily wish to limit their ebullience—he knew the relieved laughter of someone who had made a narrow escape—but he could not share it. He was still burning with anger. Thisbotheredhim. It wasn’t just that the duke was a bully, either, it was?—

A tug on his arm distracted him from his thoughts.

Grace was looking up at him, stars in her eyes.

“Thank you,” she said, voice quiet, “for standing up for me.”

The soft gratitude there broke his heart, just a little. Grace was a marvel; she shouldn’tneeddefending, because nobody should ever cast so much as an unflattering look in her direction. But the world was full of idiots and derelicts, alas. If Grace needed protecting from the world, he would be the one standing there to do it. Perhaps his shoulders were so broad for a reason, after all. Maybe it wasn’t just that he was a brute. Maybe it was so he could serve as her shield, no matter what came.

He felt his gaze soften as he looked down at her.

“Aye, leannan,” he said. “Always.”

CHAPTER 21

“You want,” she said flatly, wondering if this was not actually her husband but instead some very convincing lookalike—a changeling, perhaps, if changelings came as massive Scotsmen, “to go to a garden party?”

“Well,” her husband said reasonably—which was another point in her changeling theory, as Caleb was many things, but reasonable was not one of them, “I wouldnae say Iwantto go, no. But we came to London to find the identity of the man who is selling the mill if we sit around here all day, will we now?” He gestured with the knife he’d been using to spread butter on a piece of toast.

This was all annoyingly logical, but when Grace tried to picture her big, broad, wicked husband at a demure London garden party…

She simply couldn’t do it. She simply couldnotdo it.

“I could go by myself,” she ventured, putting some truly divine orange marmalade on her own toast. The Montgomery townhouse might have been where good taste had gone to die—even after the several days’ worth of good effort that Mrs. O’Mailey had put in to clearing the most frequently used rooms—but it had a well-stocked larder.

She glanced up to see Caleb scowling at her, which, frankly, was a relief. Perhaps he wasn’t a changeling, then.

“No,” he said firmly.