When the Laird Claims (Accidental Highland Wives #1)
Chapter 1
Have I always looked like this?
The woman in the mirror was not one that Victoria Bolton recognized, a blank-eyed ghost draped in the pretty shell of a wedding dress, fake rosiness dusted onto her cheeks and lips to give the impression of a blushing bride.
A maid yanked a satin glove up her forearm, bringing a hiss of pain to Victoria’s lips.
“It can’t be helped.” The maid grimaced. “These gloves need to go on, one way or the other.”
It had been over an hour since the maids had untied Victoria from where she was held captive, shackled to the bare floor, so she could not even have the comfort of sleeping on the bed.
She could look at it, long for it, literally ache for that soft mattress, all part of the games her sadistic husband-to-be liked to play.
“Get on with it,” she whispered, closing her tired eyes.
I do not care anymore. At least if I am in pain, it means I am alive.
Her fingers were still partially numb from the tightness of her bonds, the marred skin of her wrists itching ferociously, making it impossible to think about anything else.
That had its benefit too, she supposed, for if she was thinking about her scars, she would not have to dwell on the lifetime of cruelty that she would undoubtedly receive.
“You should have left her hands bound; I told you. If the Earl sees her free like this…” an older maid whispered to the first, tutting under her breath.
They were speaking to one another as if Victoria were not there.
Though with how detached she looked right now, perhaps that was a reasonable mistake to make.
“And how was I supposed to get the gloves on, hmm? It’s hard enough as it is, with all this… weeping skin. Besides, I could not just stand there and dress her while she was tied up like some… dog! It would be inhumane,” the other, younger than the first, replied.
“Yes, but do you know what the Earl will do to us if he finds out that she was untied?”
The younger glared at the older. “He will not find out, so it hardly matters.”
Victoria could just barely make out their expressions from the corner of her vision.
She wanted to thank them for having even the smallest shred of decency, but she could not seem to bring herself to speak again.
Her throat was still raw and uncomfortable from screaming and crying the night before.
If she could have mustered the strength, she would have attempted to reassure them both that she had no intention of ever speaking to the Earl if she could help it, least of all to repay their small kindness with the betrayal of telling on them.
“He will send us away!” the older maid hissed.
“Surely he would not do something like that over something so trivial.”
“You have no idea what that man is capable of.”
“He is an earl, not the bloody king of England!”
“You want to try telling him that?!”
The maids seemed to remember that they were in the middle of readying Victoria, and that they were not actually alone.
Their gazes cut to her reflection in the mirror, and all that Victoria could do as a way of acknowledging them was to blink slowly as she continued to rub at her wrists.
If she did not manage to stop herself soon, the white gloves were going to have red rings showing right through the fabric. Would that not be a sight?
I look as if I am going to my own funeral. Her tall figure stood rigid, her pale face flinching as the two maids continued to flit around her, primping and preening her for the walk down the aisle to a man that she abhorred.
How pitiful it was that she, the eldest daughter of the Marquess of Barrington, Diamond of the season, celebrated by society, had found herself reduced to such a state.
She had always thought her wedding day would be such a pleasant occasion.
Tolerable, at least. She tried to summon the image of her sister to mind—the reason that she was still putting herself through all of this torment.
She would not have ever allowed this mistreatment for any less worthy reason.
A knock at the bedroom door sent the two women attending to her into a tizzy.
“Who is it?” hissed one.
“How should I know?” hissed the other.
Victoria, however, knew who it was before the door opened, and her betrothed invited himself into a space that should have been private, for her use only.
Was that not the very purpose of a bedchamber, to be somewhere one could find the smallest modicum of peace?
But, of course, he could not allow that.
He could not allow the illusion of control to be broken for even the smallest second.
It was getting harder and harder to be defiant.
I will not allow this weasel of a man to break me. I simply will not.
With the last vestiges of dignity that she could muster, she rolled her shoulders back just as the maids around her bowed their heads and removed their meddling hands from her person.
They stood just off to the side as Charles Rowley, the Earl of Ashbrook, walked further into the room, further toward her.
Honestly, it was a travesty that he was considered handsome.
Such an eligible bachelor—that was what everybody in the ton said.
It was a perfect match from the outside, the Diamond of the Season and the most handsome bachelor…
at least that was what all the papers had published about their union.
Little did they know the truth about the vile man, the devil that lurked beneath the attractive mask, which was nothing more than a lure to draw in his next victim.
Slowly, her gaze flitted to him in the mirror’s reflection, for she did not yet want to look at him directly.
His lips were pulled back into a thin, displeased line.
He was going to get as close as possible in an attempt to make her uncomfortable, to make her back down like he always did.
She could not allow it. He was already getting everything else from her; she would not surrender that too.
“To what do I owe this displeasure, my lord?” Victoria said slowly, her voice low and laced with every drop of venom that she possessed for the man she was about to marry. “Do you not know that it is bad luck to see the bride before the wedding?”
“How could I resist seeing your lovely face?” Charles answered as he placed a hand on her waist and pulled her closer to him.
He pressed his cheek against her cheek as she was forced against his chest, though her hips tilted backward to try to steal a sliver of distance from the beast. Her skin was already itching like mad where he had hurt her; she did not need the rest of her skin to be crawling, too.
With the sharp edge of his temple digging into hers to keep her head where he wanted it, he made her stare at their reflection in the long mirror in front of her.
Victoria recognized the woman staring back even less than before: blue eyes dull and bloodshot, framed by dark circles; her long brown hair wrapped around the crown of her head in braids so tight her scalp stung, studded with seed pearls and bits of baby’s breath flowers; and the drab, cream wedding dress that washed her out until her complexion was positively ghoulish.
A smirk twitched on his thin lips. “Are you as excited to be married as I am, my pet?”
It was harder and harder to contain her bile.
Victoria did the only thing there was to do; she smiled a false, saccharine smile. “Of course I am, my lord. So giddy I could die.”
The surest way to get back at him was to do anything that she could to keep from showing him the reactions that he wanted from her. Sickeningly, her despair was as encouraging to him as a fond smile from a woman was to other normal men.
“What a lucky devil I am, to have the Diamond all to myself,” Charles continued as he reached around her shoulders to pinch her chin and cheeks in his hands possessively. It made her feel like a child.
Devil is right. Even Hell itself would not want you back.
When she spoke next, she chose her words carefully. As they had an audience, he could only go so far in his reactions to her. “Of course, my lord. Goodness, I truly cannot wait to be married to you. After all, being your wife means that I will have all the keys to the rooms in my new estate.”
Anger flickered across the Earl’s features at her words, and the grip he had on her face tightened until she had no choice but to flinch. “Have I told you lately that I admire your spirit most of all, Victoria? Yes, you are beautiful, but beautiful is so commonplace, so boring.”
The tension in his voice belied the true meaning of his words; he wanted to break her spirit more than anything.
She had a feeling that it was the chase that he loved, her defiance the only thing that kept him interested in her.
She could not always tell whether that was a blessing or a curse. It depended on the day.
“Now, you would not be foolish enough to try to pull any of the antics that you pulled last week, would you?” he said. Warned, rather.
Ah, that must be the real reason he was here. Could he really fault her for attempting to run away? He was always so “careful” about making sure that she could not go anywhere, and that it was as difficult to escape from him as possible.
She had learned the hard way that there was no escape.
The smile slipped from her face. “I would not dream of it, my lord. I have learned my less–”
Before she could finish, the door to the bedroom burst open once more, an exhausted and out-of-breath footman standing there, gasping for his words. Whatever news he was going to deliver, she knew that it was not going to end well for anybody in the room at present.
“What is the meaning of this intrusion?” the Earl barked at the clearly distraught man.
“My lord, you must come at once–”
“Somebody had better be dying or dead for you to walk in on my bride like this! Avert your greedy eyes!” the Earl hissed again, his voice taking on something of a shrill, nasal desperation.
The footman instantly trained his gaze on the ground, and seemed to have all the more difficulty breathing for the way that his chin was dipped low. “We are under attack, my lord. You must come at once!”
The Earl’s grip on Victoria’s face tightened in his frustration to the point that she had no choice but to wince and attempt to shrink back and out of his hold.
He cast her aside so roughly that she lost her balance, and the two maids made no attempt to prevent her from hitting the ground with a winding thud or help her back to her feet once she was down there.
It is quite all right. I am better off here anyway. Victoria cast the maids a dark look, but they were not focused on her, too invested in the Earl’s response.
“The bloody hell do you mean we are under attack? Who in their right mind would want to attack me?”
Sometimes, Victoria’s tongue worked more quickly than her brain. “I can think of a person or two…” She muttered, just loud enough to be heard.
“What did you–”
The Earl’s words were cut off by the sound of something crashing in the distance. The maids screamed and immediately took off to the semi-hidden servants’ door beside her four-poster bed, forgetting that, like Victoria, they were not meant to do anything without their masters’ say-so.
The door slammed shut, and Victoria knew that the two women must have locked it from the inside, still only concerned about saving their own skins. Meanwhile, she was still left at Charles’ mercy.
“They are wearing Scottish kilts, my lord,” the footman wheezed, “and their leader… I have never seen a warrior like him before.”