Chapter 64
With reluctance, Phoebe left Slade at Hawley’s manor waiting for the constables with three dead men and three men physically restrained.
She slipped her vizard back into its pocket and was just about to guide her horse onto the main road from Bayview Crest when the hoofbeats of another rider caught her attention.
Her grip on the reins tightened when she took note of his red uniform.
Instinct told her the redcoat was heading for Hawley’s manor.
But when she made out the empty blue eyes and fair hair of Faye Ross with a musket pistol hanging off the holster at his waist, she froze in ice cold terror. No. No. No. This couldn’t be.
Her knee-jerk reaction was to flee. This snake had broken her spirit, made her feel unclean, and dragged something nefarious into her soul. But Phoebe inhaled against the tight terror blocking her windpipe. Slade was at Hawley’s manor. She had to delay Ross.
If she hadn’t just thwarted an illegal firearms deal orchestrated by a corrupt lieutenant general and come out unscathed, and if Slade wasn’t still waiting at the manor, she might have run. But then, she was a lot more capable now than she had been seven years ago.
Pure hatred and malevolence emanated from the twisted scowl on Ross’s face as he reined in his white stallion, right next to her black gelding.
“I don’t imagine bumping into you twice in this exact spot is any coincidence, is it?” he asked, his tone tight with suspicion.
Phoebe’s teeth clenched. Her chin lifted. “Your imaginings are none of my concern,” she said.
Something unhinged shone in his expression. A wildness in his eyes that made chills run up her spine. With teeth bared, he reached across and backhanded Phoebe across the face.
“Insolent little bitch.” He hissed.
Phoebe gasped as her entire face screamed in pain. Her eyes stung, and even her nostrils smarted. But no more. Enough of this snake’s intimidation.
Fury roared in her ears and pounded against her ribs. Phoebe pulled out the primed pistol, previously hidden in the pocket of her thick black cloak and pointed it at his head. She pulled the trigger the second he whacked it out of her hand.
The shot went wild, and her horse reared up, emitting a piercing neigh.
Phoebe’s grip on the reins tightened, and her booted feet held fast in the stirrups as her hip and abdominal muscles engaged so she could stay seated.
And she would have remained on her horse, but Ross grabbed the collar of her cloak and viciously yanked her off.
The breath was knocked right out of her as she landed, pain shooting out from her side through the rest of her. Her horse’s hooves kicked out in fear, connecting with Phoebe’s leg. Phoebe screamed at the unholy pain as her horse bolted for the trees.
She lay on her side gasping, her body howling in agony and shock.
Phoebe’s leather-gloved palms pushed against the ground to lift herself up, but she didn’t get very far.
The debilitating pain in her leg wrenched a growl from her, and she dropped back to the ground.
Frustration, anger and hatred burned her belly as Ross sauntered towards her, having dismounted.
His animal, no doubt used to gunfire, stayed calm.
A twisted smirk stretched his pale mouth. “I recall having you on your back seven years ago. Apparently, you liked it so much, you readily got on your back again.”
“The only reason a woman would get on her back for a vile piece of excrement like you is if you paid her,” Phoebe said, her teeth clenched.
His expression turned malicious and he pulled back his booted leg and slammed it into her side.
Phoebe gasped at the sharp pain. Tears stung the backs of her eyes. A trace of his apple scented pomade from his close proximity caused a stomach spasm. She swallowed against the need to retch. Phoebe would fight this serpent with her last breath before she let him hurt her again.
“You are like your parents, thinking you are better than me. They didn’t agree to my proposal seven years ago for your hand, but I had you anyway, didn’t I?” Ross said, contempt lifting the left side of his mouth.
Phoebe blinked at him, shock, and confusion churning in her belly, amidst the pain riveting through her injured leg.
“Wha … what proposal?” she asked, her voice weak.
A mirthless laugh escaped his mouth. “Didn’t they tell you? I asked for your hand seven years ago. And again, three weeks ago. But your parents denied me. We wouldn’t suit, they said.” He scoffed.
Anger flashed in his eyes, similar to seven years ago, and again three weeks ago.
Pieces of a sickening puzzle started to drop into place.
His seething anger that day seven years ago when he’d attacked her.
He wasn’t just angry she’d refused to stop riding when he’d called after her on the moors seven years ago.
He’d been seething because her parents had refused him.
She’d thought it was anger from her slight.
And then again three weeks ago her mother had said she had to marry Slade because they’d been seen kissing.
And because the other options for a husband were not worth mentioning.
At the time the words had struck her as peculiar, but she’d dismissed it in her panicked state.
Phoebe’s eyes bulged. “Why in all that is holy would you want to marry me?”
Hostility and rancor curled his lips into a sneer.
“Because I had been watching you for weeks after Hamish and Broden first told me who you were. Riding the moors seven years ago, without a care in the world. Wild and uncultured like an animal. Animals like you must be controlled, broken in,” he said, coming to stand directly above her, his chin raised sending her an unnatural smile. Its eeriness unsettled her.
“I liked the look of you, I imagined I could take you for my wife, but you needed to be trained, like a man must train a horse or a dog how to take commands and behave when in the presence of their masters,” he continued, his eyes traveling the length of her, making that unclean feeling crash over her like a tidal wave.
His expression had been the subject of her nightmares.
It had made her cry, scream, break out into cold sweats, and shake with terror and fury.
It had left her in dark hopeless moods and made her lock herself up in her room for days on end.
Not only had she distrusted every single man she’d encountered, but she’d hated every single redcoat for the past seven years because of Ross.
He had gotten his wish of control, although not as he might have imagined.
She desperately wanted to grab the pistol he’d wacked out of her hand which lay a few feet away, but the seconds it would take to reload with the extra powder and ball she had in her pocket would cause her dearly, either her life, or much worse like seven years ago.
Then there was the dagger strapped to her thigh, but she would have to lift the hems of her cloak and riding habit to reach it.
He would knock it from her grip before she could strike.
Blast it all to hell!
But then she noticed a blur of movement and a familiar tall figure about twenty paces away jumping down from his moving horses’ saddle without slowing. His animal’s hooves muffled against the earthen ground.
Phoebe turned back to Ross. Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake, Falcon had said. Ross was too busy licking his lips and unbuttoning his breeches to take note of anything else.
“You are making it very easy for me this time, brat.” Ross sneered.
But she must interrupt Ross, for the sake of distracting him from Slade.
“I’ll do whatever you want, I’ll lay with you, just please don’t hurt me again,” she said, lifting the hem of her cloak and then the hem of her riding habit.
Ross’s hands stilled, and his eyes widened staring at her stocking clad thighs. So distracted was he that he didn’t notice her husband lunging for him.