Chapter 40
Chapter Forty
The earth beneath Eliza swayed back and forth.
Light flickered over her closed eyelids.
Unintelligible bickering washed over her.
Inexplicable tears seeped down her cheeks.
Every so often a shiver overtook her, but the fabric of her gown clung to her sweaty legs. And her head threatened to pound right out of her skull.
Eventually, the pain faded enough that she drifted back to sleep.
Benedict pulled her tighter to his bare chest. His long fingers trailed through her loose curls, smoothing them back with an amused smile on his lips.
“What?”
“They look no different,” he teased. “I’ve raked my fingers through every curl, and they are precisely as wild as they were when I let them down. No more, no less.”
She lifted a hand to smooth them down, but Benedict intercepted it. He brought it to his lips and pressed a kiss on her wrist that made her heart flutter and her stomach tighten.
His eyes narrowed, noting her reaction with a pleased smirk.
Ignoring the implications of that smile, she settled her cheek back onto the flat planes of his chest and listened to his heart thump, thump, thump away.
“Eliza, my little violet… I know I’ll never deserve you. But I understand now—I am capable of love—as long as it’s you. There’s nothing I won’t do to earn your love.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I think I’ve always known it was real. Even when my head told me it was a lie, my heart knew better.”
“You’re the truest thing I’ve ever known. Stay here a little longer. Dream with me. And I’ll keep you safe.”
“But there’s danger out there.”
“I know. But you’re safe here. When you must go back, you can take me with you. In your heart.”
She pressed up against his chest with one hand, leaning over to catch his lips with hers. Benedict broke away and trailed hot kisses down her throat. She sighed. “A few more minutes,” she said as she pulled him closer.
Eliza woke only long enough to roll to one side before she retched all over the edge of whatever she was lying on.
Masculine complaints responded. Sobs punctuated each heave of her stomach.
The effort made her already dizzy head throb, and she wondered if it might burst as she fell back into darkness.
The next time she woke, she had more clarity. And a pressing need.
Desperately, she tried to cling to the comfort of her dreams, of Benedict’s arms. Her body ached, the way it had after she’d had a fever once and shivered the entire night through.
Unfortunately, none of the warmth and safety that her delirious brain conjured remained.
No, she was cold, sticky, nauseated, and sore. And Benedict was not there to tuck her hair back or kiss away her fears.
“Bint’s finally awake,” a man muttered with a note of bitterness.
Determining that sleep had abandoned her, Eliza pressed herself to sit up. Her hip and shoulder protested with disuse, but she was relieved that her only ailments could be blamed on stagnation and whatever they’d added to her drink, not anything more nefarious.
She’d been curled up along the crushed red velvet of a carriage seat.
It had been luxurious when it was purchased two, perhaps three decades before.
No effort had gone into its maintenance.
The window nearest her had a crack along the glass, and the wind fought through with a grating whistling sound.
The seat beneath her was worn through in places, and half-faded from where the evening sun streamed through on journeys.
And it was several years overdue for re-springing.
The entire assembly shifted threateningly with the slightest rut.
None of this improved the state of her stomach.
Before her sat two men. One came from at least moderate wealth: His coat and vest were fine, though travel-rumpled.
Light brown hair swept across his clammy brow in foppish curls.
A thin white scar slashed his right cheek—long healed.
His slate-grey eyes held no warmth, no kindness, and no hope.
She couldn’t be certain—she’d been half drugged when she first set eyes on him—but she thought this was the man who had accosted Bella.
Bella! Eliza’s heart skipped as she remembered the other girl, bleeding on the stones. She hoped Bella was in a better state than she was at present.
The other man was different—a laborer of some sort.
He wore a ragged brown coat and vest—both cut too short.
The mismatched buttons on his dingy vest threatened to burst, and those of the coat hung limply, stretched from a fruitless fight to keep the too-small fabric together.
In the last several years, he must have gained at least two stone.
Gathering every bit of courage she possessed, all of Sophie’s audacity, and every one of her mother’s manners, she said simply, “Gentlemen.” Her voice was hoarse with disuse, but she thought she’d done a credible job of seeming unaffected otherwise.
“Miss Wayland,” the wealthier man said. “I trust you slept well.” His hand flexed strangely beside him.
“Yes, nothing like an exceptional cordial to facilitate a good night’s sleep.”
“You’re not fixing to cast up on me boots again?” the other man asked.
“Oh, was that you?”
“Aye,” he grumbled.
“Ever so sorry. The next time I’m drugged and abducted, I’ll try to be more considerate when I cast up my accounts.”
“So you understand the situation,” the wealthier one said.
She glanced around the carriage as though searching for an explanation before feigning understanding. “Oh, was the drugging and abduction intended to be subtle?”
He chuckled with false amusement. At his side, his fingers splayed and tightened.
“You know, Blackwood agreed to accept either of Wayland’s girls.
And I’ll admit, the prettier one was a temptation.
But the bonus he offered for the girl his son failed to seduce was too significant to ignore.
And now I find myself rather pleased with this outcome.
You’re an insolent little thing. I will enjoy breaking you of that. ”
There was no doubt in Eliza’s mind as to how, precisely, the man meant to break her. The fear that had been knocking on the door of her heart—kept at bay by drugs and false audacity—burst in, setting the muscle racing.
“Ah, that’s more like it.” He leaned forward with a lecherous look in his eyes. So different from the adoring warmth of Benedict’s in their more intimate moments. Even when they’d been lost to lust, his gaze filled with heat, she’d felt cherished. This man left her feeling exposed and apprehensive.
Benedict. He’d warned her, more than once. And the man had just confirmed—this was all orchestrated by his father.
Eliza would need every one of her wits about her to escape. But her thoughts still moved too slow, thicker and duller from whatever they’d dosed her with.
Finally, an idea caught.
Infusing her tone with the one Rose’s wretched grandmother always employed, she said, “I do hope you don’t believe my father will pay if you’ve ruined me. I’m expected to make a good match. A titled match. Which would be impossible if I’m made impure.”
“Wayland’ll pay,” the rich man asserted.
The other man hesitated. “What if she’s on to something? There’ll be hell to pay if Blackwood don’t get what he’s due.”
“Wayland will pay.”
“You seem pretty fixed on that, Draycott.”
“I am.”
“But we don’t want to go borrowing trouble. Mayhap you just… wait. Once we’re at the grange, you can have her cunt, her arse, and any other hole you can name.”
Eliza’s jaw ground together, and she fought with everything she had to keep her expression neutral and unphased.
Still, her knees trembled as she pressed them tighter together underneath her rumpled skirt.
She couldn’t help but be grateful for the many layers of silk petals that comprised the gown—more barriers between them, no matter how flimsy.
“It’s unnecessary.”
This was the most surreal moment of her life—two men debating whether it was more prudent to rape her now or later. And still more ludicrous, she needed a chamber pot.
“You ain’t seen what Blackwood did to his own boy. Whipped the flesh clean off his back. Think he won’t do that to you? Or worse?”
Eliza’s stomach threatened to rebel again. Benedict had been whipped—that explained the scars she had seen. Were those old wounds, or did this explain his cry when she touched him in the orangery that night?
“Blackwood has no power over me,” the gentleman—Draycott, the other man had called him—insisted.
“Power ain’t worth horseshit after thirty strokes of the lash. I was fair surprised to see the lad alive tonight.”
Benedict was injured recently… Eliza swallowed the bile pooling in her mouth.
“Enough!”
Startled by the volume, Eliza jerked her hand to her chest.
Draycott continued, “This is not a democracy, Stark. I thought we were clear on that. If he doesn’t pay in pounds, he’ll pay in flesh.” He turned to her, another sneer on his lips. “Relax, sweetheart, I enjoy all manner of depravity, but an audience of this clump isn’t one of them.”
That notion did not comfort her. But she decided to remain within arm’s reach of this Stark.
On the seat, Draycott’s hand clenched again.
The fingers stretched back out slowly, struggling.
The flesh had an odd, mottled shading—somehow too red and too pale.
Near where the palm met the wrist was a haphazard strip of linen—a makeshift bandage.
Was that the hand Bella had bitten? Had that moment been a creation of her own dazed mind?
Draycott tried to tighten his hand into a fist, but two of the fingers refused to cooperate.
No, Bella had bitten him. And someone else, perhaps another woman, had caused that scar across his face. Eliza felt an odd surge of pride at their courage. She fought to summon the same sort of brazen savvy.