Chapter 31 Derek #2
“Let’s peel back the soiled linens as best we can,” Doctor Jones said brusquely.
“Mr. Drake briefed me on what occurred.” He held Lady Elliot’s gaze.
“If you have any other information that would be helpful, please let me know. I’ll explain everything I’m going to do before I do it, so everyone is completely aware of what is happening.
Feel free to stop and ask me questions at any point.
The first thing I need to do is examine her for physical injuries. ”
Derek helped lift Livy while they rolled back the coverlet. He went to settle her down on the bed, but she latched onto him, hands desperately fisting his hair.
He looked at her then, her face a hairsbreadth away from his, eyes haunted. Something inside him broke, a chasm carving its way through his chest. “I have to let you go, clever girl. This nice physician is going to look you over,” he said gently, running his hands soothingly up and down her back.
She said nothing, her gaze locked on his, her delicate nostrils flaring.
“Livy…” He grabbed her wrists and gently disengaged them from his neck. “I’ll be right here, right beside your aunt.”
Her fists wrapped around his forearms, nails digging into his skin. She opened her mouth, but no words came out, just an incoherent, strangled sound. He ran his thumb softly against the underside of her wrist, helpless to soothe her.
She opened her mouth again, her shattered blue eyes searching his. “Derek.” The slurred word, like she’d had too much drink, had his pulse spiking again. “Need you,” she mumbled.
His eyes slid shut, and he brought her against him, into him.
His body shook once, a violent tremor wracking through him.
He couldn’t begin to understand why. Perhaps the shock of seeing her like this, of thinking about what she’d just been through.
The fear of the what-ifs still swarming his mind.
Or perhaps…it was the cage he’d built around his black heart cracking.
From finally being the person someone needed.
“I’ll stay.” He glanced at Doctor Jones.
The man nodded. “Just have her head in your lap so she’s mostly flat.”
Derek swallowed. “Done.” He met Livy’s cloudy blue gaze again. “Hear that? I can stay right here. You just lie down; rest on me.”
She relaxed, and they lowered her, so she was lying between Derek’s legs, torso lightly propped up in his lap.
Ryker reappeared, pushing a cart with linens, towels, and a steaming bowl of water. Kozington followed hot on his heels. Ryker flashed a grin. “My servant. Figured it’s best we have as few eyes and ears in this room as possible.”
The next hour passed in a blur. The physician, despite his appearance, was professional and thorough.
The worst of Livy’s injuries were on her face, where she’d been hit.
She had some handprints from Pennington’s attempt to restrain her, but otherwise the man hadn’t succeeded in following through with his disgusting plan.
She was to be monitored throughout the night.
They’d changed the bedding, gotten her into a fresh gown, and she’d drunk a small amount of tea—and kept it down—which pleased the physician.
Broth and plain bread had been brought up for later, once she seemed ready to tolerate it.
When Derek had informed the physician of his suspicions she’d been drugged, Ryker had disappeared only to show up later to inform them Bruiser had been able to convince Pennington to admit he’d administered half a teaspoon of laudanum into her claret.
The physician had assured Derek and Lady Elliot that Livy should have no long-term effects from the drug. Just a headache, nausea, the usual side effects of opium. The fact that she’d already awoken and rid most of it from her system was a good sign.
The loss of consciousness after Ryker had saved her was more concerning, but Doctor Jones didn’t find any signs of contusion or injury to Livy’s skull, just the single injury to her cheek. His hypothesis was that she’d fallen unconscious as a combination of shock and lingering effects of laudanum.
Derek ran his fingers through Livy’s blonde tresses, down now so Doctor Jones could examine her head.
They were like spun gold sifting through his fingers.
Their beauty a stark contrast to the harsh ugliness of the night.
She’d fallen asleep long ago, chest rising and falling in a slow, even rhythm.
The most soothing sound Derek had ever heard. Safe. Alive. Well.
“You and your niece can stay as long as you need,” Ryker was saying. “Dunmore, are you ready?”
Derek’s gaze flew to Ryker’s, and his body instantly steeled over. Muscles taut, poised, ready. “Yes,” he said quietly, as to not disturb the woman in his arms.
He carefully disengaged himself from Livy and headed for the door.
“Lord Dunmore. A moment?”
Derek froze and looked back over his shoulder at Lady Elliot.
“I’ll wait outside,” came Ryker’s reply just before the door clicked shut.
Derek turned as Lady Elliot approached him. She studied him, her blue eyes assessing, trying to find something—Derek had no idea what.
Her brows pinched, and he didn’t understand what was glimmering in her eyes. It looked like concern, but he had no idea why she’d be looking at him that way. “Are you well, my lord?”
He blinked dumbly. What was it with this family? Always asking him if he was well. “I…of course. I’m well. I wasn’t the one a-attacked.” He stumbled slightly and hoped she hadn’t caught the slip. “I’m fine.”
She pursed her lips thoughtfully.
He lowered his voice. “I’m fine.”
She winged a brow. “I believe that as much as I believe you haven’t kissed my niece.”
Derek froze.
She deflated with a sigh. “That’s a topic for another time, my lord. As for now, addressing Livy is my only concern. However, tonight was traumatic for all involved. I have no idea what is going on between you and my niece—”
“Nothing is going on between me and Miss Forester. I am simply assisting her in improving her position in society. Nothing more.”
The woman had the nerve to hum. Like she didn’t believe him.
He had no idea why she’d think otherwise.
Derek would have acted as he did tonight if anyone were abducted and harmed by a reprobate like Pennington.
There was nothing Derek hated more in this world than those who abused the power they held.
Derek ran a foundling home that specifically employed women who were victims of what Miss Forester had been subjected to tonight. It was nothing personal.
“If you insist,” she said quietly. “I’ll leave you to it then.”
Derek spun on his heel and strode to the door.
Lady Elliot’s voice rang through the chamber, the hardness halting him in his tracks just as his hand landed on the door handle. “I must request a favor, my lord.”
He glanced over his shoulder, arched a brow.
“Make him suffer.”
Derek nodded. “I will see that it is done.”
Derek followed Ryker down the stairs that led to the cellar of The Devil’s Eye. Ryker paused before the door. Derek walked up next to him, caught Ryker’s green eye.
“Whatever you need, it’s at your disposal,” Ryker said meaningfully.
“I have already laid out…some things you might enjoy playing with.” Excitement reflected back at Derek, Ryker’s pupils blown wide, his words slightly breathless.
That right there was why Ryker was terrifying.
The man had earned his reputation as a devil, as King of the Underworld.
He got off on it. Punishing the parasites of the world.
And in that moment, Derek fully understood the other man’s bloodlust. He pushed through the door and walked into the dim cellar, the scent of mustiness and earth filling his senses, Ryker hot at his heels.
He strode past the organized mess of cases and barrels, toward the flickering light coming from around the corner in the L-shaped room.
Derek turned around the bend and halted. His nostrils flared, every vein freezing over with fury, so black, so fierce it scorched like an icy flame. There he was. The fucking swine.
Pennington was on his knees, arms spread wide where they were tied to ropes that secured him to each of the side walls.
He was hunched forward as much as the bindings would allow, head hanging like a rag doll, back lifting and falling with gasping breaths.
Something dripped from where his face was hidden behind his shaggy hair, falling with soft plops that barely pierced the pounding of blood in Derek’s ears.
Bruiser leaned casually against a side wall, one leg bent at the knee, foot propped up against the wall.
“Dunmore,” he said with an easy smile. It never ceased to shock Derek that this man with his lop-sided smiles and juvenile antics was one of London’s deadliest pugilists.
But that was life, wasn’t it? No one truly knew what hid beneath the surface.
Pennington’s head snapped up at Zavi’s greeting, beady eyes locking on Derek’s. And Derek went blind as rage ripped through him. His feet moved, hand sliding into his boot. Metal glinted. His arm lifted.
“You fucking bastard!”
He slammed his knife down with the full weight of his body into Pennington’s thigh.
The man’s piercing scream rebounded off the stone walls.
Echoed over and over in Derek’s ears. But it wasn’t enough.
Not for what the maggot had done. And would have done if Ryker hadn’t gotten there in time.
Derek’s chest surged as the nightmare came to life behind his eyes.
Of what almost was. He wanted a fate worse than death for this man.
The scum’s body expanded jerkily, whimpers falling between ragged breaths.
“Look at me.” Derek barely recognized his own voice. The lethality that laced it.