Authors: Annette Blair
Justin had already travelled a long, dark road from death, to claim her once; surely he could find her now, among the living.
Brian’s whimpers progressed to a disenchanted wail.
Vincent’s steel gray eyes impaled her. “Feed him. I want to watch.”
Faith was unable to check her shudder. “He’s not hungry.”
His smile profane, Vincent’s laugh iced her heart. “I would have liked to watch, too, while you took your pleasure of a dying man to conceive his son. Too bad my brother was too ill to…ah…participate. Was it your ride killed him?” His obscenity incited him to raucous laughter. He laughed so long that for the first time in her life, Faith considered, nay wanted—despite her healing instincts and with full cognizance of the sin—to do murder.
As Brian’s fussing duelled with Vincent’s mirth, she began to suspect that she might conquer Vincent’s power if she denied it. And since starving her son would be like affirming it, she attempted to feed him under cover of her cape.
Vincent caught her movement, his sudden silence and hot eyes sending prickles through her. “Take off your cloak,” he ordered.
The prickles froze in her veins and expanded painfully.
Vincent leaned forward, and the instant Faith lowered her eyes to conceal her terror, he snatched her son from her arms. Her involuntary scream startled Brian, making him cry in earnest. But when she reached for him, Vincent pretended to drop him.
The more Faith begged, the hotter Vincent’s look.
When she lunged for Brian, Vincent’s boot to her stomach cut her breath.
With a foul grin, barely holding Brian under his little arms, Vincent raised her son, until his head touched the carriage roof.
Brian not only stopped crying, he wiggled and cooed, enjoying the ride. That seemed to startle and unsettle Vincent, and as if he couldn’t bear such joy, he silenced it by releasing one of Brian’s arms, dangling and frightening him.
Faith screamed and screamed.
“Bare your breast!” he shouted. “Bare it and prepare to feed him, else I drop him. Do it now!”
Faith scrabbled to untie her cloak, her hands shaking so hard, she could barely unbutton her bodice. When it was undone, her face aflame, Faith lowered the fabric to expose herself. She would do anything—Anything!—to protect her child.
The icy air on her breast became her enemy—if she did not know by the feel of it, she would know by the look in Vincent’s eyes exactly when her nipple budded, and she shuddered.
Seeming calmed by the sight, Vincent lowered and cradled her son, smoothing a slanted brow, fingering a dark, baby curl, before giving him back.
Once she had him, for a wild, crazy second, Faith considered throwing open the coach door and jumping. But Brian sought her breast so fast, she forced herself to allow the physical connection to wash over and calm her, closing her eyes to thank God for Brian safe in her arms again.
He suckled greedily as always. How could she have thought to do this quietly, even under cover of her cloak? He made such lusty little sounds when he nursed.
“If I had not been certain of Justin’s miraculous resurrection before seeing your child, I am now.” Vincent’s words opened her eyes and pulled her attention to himself once again. “However did you manage it?” he asked reaching toward her—to touch her breast, she feared. And she prayed for the strength to do what must be done for her son. “Your plan was brilliant,” she said in a rush.
As she’d hoped, her words stopped him.
“How was I brilliant?” He sat back against his seat in anticipation of her answer.
“The poison,” she said. “Disguised as medicine, and someone to administer it while you were in France. Very clever.”
Vincent’s smile turned to a scowl. “Then why didn’t it work?”
“Because every time I was late giving Justin his medicine—”
“Miss Wickham!” he shouted, sitting forward. “I told you my brother’s health would be in jeopardy, his very life at risk, should you dose him even a few minutes late.” He shook his head with what appeared to be genuine sorrow and deep disappointment. “I believed I could trust you. How late were you?”
“As much as half an hour, but—”
“Young lady, were I mean spirited, I should turn you off without a recommendation for such irresponsible care. My brother’s welfare is uppermost in my mind.”
Vincent’s rebuke frightened Faith more than his shouting, and her heart tripped in her breast. Had the man played the grieving brother so long that he was lost in the pretence?
“I…I apologize, your Grace,” she said, playing servant to his master. “I assure you it will not happen again.”
He folded his arms and sat back. “See that it does not!”
Faith’s doubt was gone. Vincent no longer straddled the edge of sanity, but had left it far behind.
Brian fell asleep pressed to her breast, her milk running freely, soaking her dress. She wanted to move him but feared any motion or sound, a whimper even, might shift the delicate balance of Vincent’s mind. Instead, she sat unmoving, watching the unpredictable man who held them in his power.
When Vincent finally slept, his mouth hung open and spittle collected in droplets at the corners.
Faith thought again about jumping. She wondered if the coachman was aware of the abduction, if he might be of help, but she doubted it.
She gazed about the velvet-cushioned cab of the well-appointed vehicle. Nothing sharp to do for a blade, nothing ropelike for choking. Faith shuddered at her mind’s gruesome turn.
Keep Brian safe, her good sense said. Keep yourself safe, too, it reminded her, so she could care for him. Be sensible. Take no chances.
Justin will come. He will come.
When Vincent’s snores filled the cab, Faith shifted Brian and closed her bodice. She brought the hem of her cloak up, folded it and placed it, like padding, between her wet dress and him.
She remained awake and on guard.
It was full evening when they stopped. She shifted Brian and he took to whimpering again.
Her captor woke confused, disoriented. Faith wondered if his sanity had shifted again. The coachman opened the door and Vincent stepped out. “Ah. We are here,” he said as he raised his hand to help her alight.
She ignored it, stepped down and away from him.
His scowl told her he was the hate-filled Vincent once more.
Mrs. Tucker opened the door, and despite the circumstances, Faith felt a sense of homecoming. As if to prove it, the housekeeper enfolded her in a hug. Then with genuine surprise, she noticed Brian, examined his face, and began to cry.
“Yes,” Faith said. “He’s Justin’s, Mrs. Tucker. I was carrying him when we left.”
Vincent’s ashen face contorted with rage. “Enough! Where is my wife?”
“In her bed, I expect,” Mrs. Tucker said with a disdainful sniff.
“Gather your things. You’re dismissed. Be gone within the quarter hour or your family will be turned off their farm.”
The housekeeper’s face lost colour. “But, your Grace, my mother is ill, and we’ve been Killashandra tenants for generations.”
“Squander many more minutes and you’ll not be tomorrow.”
The woman left in tears, and with her, Faith’s hope for an ally in the house.
Vincent took Faith’s arm in a bruising grip, propelled her upstairs, and barged into Justin’s father’s bedroom, where a gilded, silk-canopied bed on a raised dais centred the room. A set of steps led up to it, and two naked…“Hemsted!”
As Vincent charged the bed, Faith slipped from his grasp and backed slowly toward the door.
“Slut!” Vincent roared as he backhanded the woman across her garish, rouge-pot face.
Like a spitting cat, she hurled insults, her French flawless and rapid. A dispute escalated, drawing Vincent’s full attention.
Faith hugged Brian and stepped closer to the door and freedom.
Hemsted jumped from the bed and came to her. “Are you all right? Did he hurt you? Where’s Justin?”
Justin. Faith fought despair. If Vincent had his way, Justin would die.
Hemsted’s expression said he understood and cared, and that nearly undid her. Nevertheless, she swallowed her urge to confide in him. She couldn’t trust him, or anyone, anymore.
“You’re not safe, I think. Come,” he said, and as Vincent had done, he grasped her arm to haul her along. But she’d had enough of being dragged like yesterday’s trash, and she stood her ground. He was Vincent’s man, Justin had often reminded her, and it was time to remember that. “Don’t be a fool,” Hemsted hissed below his breath, checking his ire. “I’m your only chance.”
“You told him I’d borne a child,” she accused.
He looked as if she’d struck him. “Faith, I never meant to—”
“Miss Wickham,” Vincent called. “Is the blighter accosting you too?”
Hemsted sighed, seeming to understand he’d lost, and despite his unclothed state, he bowed with ludicrous formality and kissed her hand. Then he unhooked her cloak, removed it from her shoulders, and threw it over his own, fastening it to cover himself. “A friend in need,” he said, self-mockingly, his face a study in regret. And he left the room.
The furious Frenchwoman marched up to Faith and raked her with disdain. “What did he say to you?” she demanded with suspicion.
“He…he begged my pardon for the embarrassment.” The painted features softened. “Always the gentleman, my Max,” she said with an indulgent smile.
Vincent approached. “Miss Wickham—or did you marry my brother? No matter. You shall be free of him soon enough. May I introduce my wife, Aline. She will spread her legs for anything with a lance.” He gazed with disgust at his wife and indicated Faith with a nod of his head. “Lock her up with her brat till I decide what to do with her.”
“Braying ass. Why should I?”
“Money, my dear, money. Ah, yes. I see that does indeed make a difference. With you, it’s greed, followed closely by vengeance and lust. Or does lust head the list, my pet?”
Vincent mocked the hatred on his wife’s visage with a laugh. “I bid you good day, Faith. I may call you that, may I not? After all, we will soon become very well acquainted.”
He smiled. “As soon as I eliminate my brother, that is.”
When Justin and Marcus arrived at Killashandra, a stable boy told them the master had arrived with a woman and a babe. Heart hammering for knowing Faith was near, yet far from safety, Justin entered the empty kitchen, Marcus behind him, to take the back stairs.
As they reached the foyer, Hemsted came running downstairs—naked, but for Faith’s billowing pistachio cape. “Justin. Thank God you’re here. I just left Faith in the gold bedroom; she refused to—” Hemsted hit the floor with a thud.
Satisfaction filled Justin as he flexed his hand and examined the unconscious form. “Truss him up and lock him in the linen cupboard,” Justin said. “Top of the stairs to the left. Key’s on a hook inside. Take the cape and let the bastard freeze.”
Marcus grinned and dragged him by his feet, Hemsted’s head hitting each step, until Justin stopped him. “By his shoulders, Marc.” And Marcus reluctantly obeyed.
“See if Faith is upstairs, but let me deal with Vincent. Keep Faith and Brian safe for me, will you, one way or another? Beth too. There aren’t many people I’d trust with that.”
Marcus nodded soberly as he dragged the man of affairs away.
Justin went to the library, Vincent’s favourite haunt and as expected, Vincent was there. As they faced each other, for the first time since the cliff in Bognor, Justin’s fury was savage, and dangerous, for it nearly robbed him of caution.
From his seat behind the desk, Vincent smiled and raised a pistol—a 17th century, multi-shot German cavalry pistol that Justin had purchased in France. “Odd how one’s past returns to take a bite of one’s backside,” Justin said. Then he remembered his father’s matched pair of smoothbore duelling pistols, loaded and waiting in a drawer on the balcony above.