A gentleman, his russet hair glinting copper, stood in the amber glow of torchlight. His long riding coat dripped with rain and he inclined his head slightly.
She didn’t return the gesture. A deep foreboding slid through her. She turned back to the inn and increased her pace. His steps matched hers. Fear gripped her heart in its brutal fist.
Mary slipped her fingers around the ivory knife hilt at her waist.
“You didn’t truly think you could run, did you?” the voice called behind her.
Anger . . . Anger so intense she could barely see wrapped her up and spun her around.
His eyes flared in surprise.
“I’m not running,” she hissed.
“That will make this so much easier,” he said nonchalantly. With one gloved hand, he slid a folded white handkerchief from his pocket.
Mary sucked in a slow breath, commanding herself to wait for him to draw closer. “Hardgrave?”
He inclined his head again. “You and I were always going to meet, Mary.”
“Yes.” She would keep still. She would not bolt or act too soon.
“Now come with me.” Hardgrave smiled, a private joke in his own twisted head. “And all will be well.”
“Well?” she mocked, shifting slightly, moving her weight to the balls of her toes. “Have you ever lived in an asylum?”
“I lived in St. Giles. Not much difference, I should think.” Without warning, Hardgrave darted toward her, the handkerchief fluttering in his hand.
Mary countered his movement as she yanked out the knife Powers had given her. She didn’t allow herself to think of anything but freedom as she took a balanced step and arced the knife up across his open chest. As she brought the knife back in the swinging figure eight pattern, she changed the balance of her feet, moving away from him with the ease of water pouring over stone.
Hardgrave winced and recoiled. He gaped at the twice-sliced material across his chest, his face broad with dismay. His head snapped back up and rain droplets sprayed into the air.
Panting now, Mary feinted right, then struck, intent on gutting the man who’d come for her.
Now aware of the skills of his opponent, Hardgrave slid back fast, then dropped to one knee and barreled his fist with an abrupt swing to the small of her back.
A scream tore from her throat as pain erupted in her kidneys. The blow knocked her facedown. As she flew toward the floor, she thrust the knife out so she wouldn’t fall on it. Her knees slammed into the rush-covered stones. Her bones seemed to crack as her teeth clattered together. The world swung on its hideous axis as vomit teased the back of her throat.
“Mary?!” Powers’s shout thundered through the passage.
She tried to twist around, but her skirts were caught about her ankles. “Kill him!” she screamed.
A shot cracked through the small space, accompanied by the acrid scent of gunpowder. Horror raked her with its merciless talons. Who had fired that shot? Disoriented, her blood pounding so hard she couldn’t hear anything but its wild rush, Mary scrambled to get up. Her knees wobbled and she staggered as she stepped on the hem of her gown.
Before she could establish her footing, a gloved hand padded with a handkerchief slammed down over her mouth and nose. Another arm wrapped around her middle, dragging her back against a broad chest.
She struggled against the hold, arching wildly away. But that hand held down tighter over her face, and as she gasped for air, the strangest scent filled her nostrils. She gasped it in, her mind whirring with light and shadow as she tried to recoil and see Powers.
Tears stung her eyes as the flickering torchlight guttered away.
Where was Powers?
Her vision dimmed in rapid degrees. She struck out slowly, futilely. Her body moved with the aptitude of one swimming through seaweed-strewn waters. Even the panic that had so wholly gripped her faded away and her body relaxed. She began to float. A sensation she knew all too well.
She was being drugged.
Hardgrave picked her up off her feet as he fought for control. As he shunted her, she spotted Powers. His white-blond hair glowed golden against the dull rushes and his black riding coat lay flung about him like a broken angel’s wings. There was no movement to his massive body.
She refused to let it register. That he was dead. Instead, even though her fingers were numb around the knife, she turned it in her palm, aiming the blade back. With one solid jab, she drove it into Hardgrave’s flesh.
A grunt echoed behind her and then her wrist was in his grip. Her pale hand flew forward. She watched as it crashed against the wall, her fingers opening and releasing the knife. She didn’t feel the pain of mashing flesh or grinding bone. She didn’t feel anything except . . . at last, regret. She’d killed Powers and she would never see Edward again.
“M
y dearest Mary, we are so relieved to have you back in our keeping.”
Mary longed to cower against the dripping stone walls of her cell and lose herself in the shadowy light of the windowless room. It was what she would have done when she’d been a prisoner here weeks before. But she was no longer the girl Mrs. Palmer had tried to destroy.
It didn’t matter that they’d left her in isolation for almost a week with no company but the contemplation of what Mrs. Palmer was planning for her. And thoughts of the loss of Edward. She’d learned to pretend that she had never had a rending conversation with Edward. The illusion gave her a solace that allowed her to control her fear, honing it to a sharp steel edge. So now she squared her chin and replied, “Not as relieved as I.”
Mrs. Palmer’s brows rose slightly, creasing her usually implacable brow. “Indeed?”
Mary slid her bare foot across the damp stones, taking the step with a sort of swaggering confidence only the deadliest creatures displayed. “For now I need not travel to kill you.”
A laugh rippled from Mrs. Palmer’s throat. “Your delusions were always most amusing.” She glanced back over her shoulder, the folds of her simple skirts swaying. “Matthew?” she called.
Sick little fingers wound their way into Mary’s heart and she froze, relentlessly still in her thin, scratchy shift. He was dead. She’d killed the keeper. She’d plunged the rusty metal into his corpulent flesh. He’d fallen at her feet.
Mrs. Palmer cocked her head to the side as she folded her slim fingers before her, ladylike as ever. “You do recall Matthew?”
The wood door swung open on its creaking black iron hinges and Matthew lumbered through. With his size and girth, a slow lumber was all the lout could manage. The hate in his dim eyes promised retribution.
Mary found herself swaying backward as if she could somehow escape him, but all that was behind her was a stone wall at least two feet thick. And if she took a step back, it would be the first of many steps back to that broken girl she’d been before. She would never do that.
She dug her toes into the frigid stone floor, willing herself not to give away any of her hard-won self. But ’twas not easy as the stench of animal fat and unwashed flesh wafted toward her.
Matthew had not altered in the last weeks, nor had he likely bathed. His dirty brown hair lay in greasy tracks over his thick forehead and his dull brown eyes glared down at her with promise. A promise to exact revenge for her temerity in wounding him.
Mary gave a wry, mocking bob of a curtsy. “Matthew. It would seem the devil didn’t want you quite yet.”
The flesh under Matthew’s eye twitched and he took a menacing step toward her, his black boot clomping. “Nah, Mary. He wanted me to fuck you for him.”
Mary squared her shoulders, then slowly lifted her hand and summoned Matthew farther forward with a determined wave. “Come on, then. Let’s see you make the attempt.”
His animal eyes sparked with surprise. His wards normally trembled in his presence. They never challenged him. His confused gaze shifted to Mrs. Palmer. Something about Mary had changed. Even he, beast that he was, could see that.
“Mary, now that you’ve had time to contemplate your position”—Mrs. Palmer reached into the deep pocket of her skirts and pulled out a small tubular device—“we have a gift for you.”
Mary shifted on her feet and focused on the little thing. “A
gift
?”
“Mmm.” As Mrs. Palmer lifted the device, she flicked her finger against the tube, then pushed against a small handle at its base. “It is something new. Something that will help you accept your place in this world.”
“I know my place,” she snapped, her body pulsing with growing fury. “It isn’t here.”
A burst of liquid bubbled from the needlelike top. “Of course it is here. And we shall help you recall that. Very slowly.”
Mrs. Palmer stroked the cylinder. “You’ve embarrassed me, Mary.”
“You’ll understand if I don’t apologize,” Mary mocked in a tone that resembled Powers at his most cutting.
Mrs. Palmer’s nostrils flared slightly. “You’ve gained an impertinence in your time away from us. A pity, then, that you shall be spending the rest of your miserable life—short though it may be—in this little room.”
Even though the walls seemed to close in around her, Mary cocked her chin up and refused to utter another word.
“I’ve written to your father, making him aware of your untimely death. This news no doubt cheers him and it frees me to make you an example to the other girls at my own leisure.”
Mary eyed the “gift” wondering how it would be used to make her such an “example.”
“What is that?” she asked.
“It is the newest invention in medicine. Perfect for someone of your temperament. It is a syringe. You see, it delivers the most remarkable of medicines. Morphine.” Mrs. Palmer advanced slowly. “Far better than laudanum.”
“Better?” Mary hissed. She wished she could lay the woman down and force-feed her laudanum until she choked.
“Let me simply say”—Mrs. Palmer gave an ingratiating smile—“that once I inject you with this, Matthew here could ride you like a May Day pony and you’d not complain.”
Rising images of Matthew’s merciless degradation of her body spun in her head. In the past, she’d have slipped away into terror, but now those sickening thoughts gave weight to her spine and determination to her desire to thwart them.
But there was something else. Something very serious. If this new medicine was related to laudanum, and they put that poison into her, she would never be free of the demon that screamed and clawed for escape. No one—not even Edward—would be able to help her then.
“I don’t want it!” Mary roared. She had rid herself of that deviltry and never again would she touch it . . . even though, as if laughing at her proclamation, that torturous creature within her howled for it.
Take it
, it screamed.
Before you suffer through every moment of this.
Drawing on the strength Edward had forged within her, Mary balled her hands into fists and shouted with all her might, “No! I will not!”
“It is not a matter of what you want but of what you need,” Mrs. Palmer stated with a hint of satisfaction. “And mad girls need their morphine.”
Mary’s nails dug into the soft flesh of her palms until she felt the skin give way. “
I
. . .
am
. . .
not
. . .
mad.
”
“Ah. But you are, Mary. And we cannot have you making our lives difficult. Indeed, Matthew must be sure that you are . . . submissive to his will.”
“Too afraid to fight me on even footing?” Mary challenged.
Matthew bellowed with laughter, the mirth causing his thick middle to shake. “I loves a good fight, darlin’. But I get that from the other girls. You—” His eyes narrowed from their piggish rounds to the narrow slits of a snake. “I want you half dead. To remind you of your place—beneath me.”
Mrs. Palmer shrugged, as if there was nothing more to be said, then gave her a sympathetic frown. “You know how this shall end if you struggle. Make it less painful. Simply extend your arm for me and you will forget.”
Mary lifted her arms and folded them tightly over her chest. “Go to the devil.”
Mrs. Palmer let out a sigh as she closed the distance between them. As soon as she was but a few inches away, she called, “Matthew, hold her for me.”
Mary swung her gaze to Matthew as he strode forward, assessing what she must do. Mrs. Palmer didn’t fear her, or she wouldn’t have come so close. She was still accustomed to the frightened prisoner. Mary’s thoughts came in fast succession and, before she could doubt herself, she cracked her hand against Mrs. Palmer’s wrist.
The woman let out a sharp cry and Mary grasped the syringe from her.
Matthew reached to grab her, but as he did she swung forward and plunged the syringe into his arm. She eyed the little handle and instinctively pressed it down.
Matthew’s eyes widened and he bellowed with pain. With his free arm, he grabbed on to her, latching her to his broad, fleshy chest.
His hairy forearm squeezed across her middle. She cried out as her ribs pressed inward, nearly buckling at the pressure. But even as he gripped her, she did not stop and forced her fingers to fumble for the club he kept hanging from his trousers.
As her fingers brushed the weapon, his hold began to lessen.
Mrs. Palmer stood gaping, her hands still outstretched, not quite believing what was happening.
At last Mary yanked the club free from his belt. Just as she did, Matthew’s arm slipped free from her and he slumped to the floor. His big body thundered as it hit the stones. Mary lifted the club, ready to bring it down on his head, but before she did, she glanced at Mrs. Palmer.
Panic creased the woman’s face. “Mary. Do not. Do not—”
“Destroy you? As you would have me?”
“I will help you.”
Mary smiled. “Yes, you will.”
She was truly free of her fear. She might be alone, but she was not afraid. Nothing was going to stop her now. Not Matthew. Not Mrs. Palmer. And most certainly not herself.
Mrs. Palmer’s skin turned a sickly blue white. “You need me to escape.”
Mary glanced from her captor to the bolted door. Matthew was sprawled, comatose, upon the floor, but there were other armed keepers downstairs. It was an impossible situation. It was not fear now that crept into her heart but the realization that escape mightn’t be imminent.