The Devil Rogue (2 page)

5

Villarreal / The Devil Rogue
                                     

Chapter 2

ANGELA ENTERED HER bedchamber, only to be accosted by her maid.
“Oh, mi
ss
!
What has he done to you this time?
I know what the master is about
.
He wants you to
. . .
to
have relations with that stranger
in order
to pay off his debts.”

“
Well,
I’m about to do more than ‘have relations’ with that stranger
, so calm yourself, Rosemary,
” Angela said, and then announced, “
I’ve agreed to become his mis
tress for the next three months.
”

The maid’s dark eyes widened
.
“
God
’s teeth
, you can’t be serious!”

“I’m quite serious and I’ll be twenty thousand pounds richer at the end of it.”

“Bloody hell!” Rosemary
whist
led
at the amount
.

“He gave me fifteen minutes to ready myself to leave
.
Here, tear a piece of that old sheet off and help me
bind
this cut on my arm
.
I need to at least stop the bleeding.”

“But, miss
!
You’re to leave immediately, without your belongings
?
Why,
he’s nothing but a lowly
beast!”

“It’s all right, Rosemary, I don’t have much to take, anyway.”

Angela Hopkins looked around her sparse
bed
room with an unfeeling detachment
while Rosemary tended to her injuries
.
Her gaze swept the bed, with its lumpy mattress and threadbare
,
patchwork coverlet
.
The
few
small rugs
covering
the wood floor were, likewise, thin and worn.

There were several
colorful ball
gowns hanging in the bureau, none of which she had any desire to bring with her
.
They were props for her father’s deception, an illusion created to present to the world an image of wealth and prosperity
.
The dresses had belonged to her mother, who died of a lung illness when Angela was
only
nine years old.

When Angela came of age, ready to enter society, her father ha
d tossed the gowns onto her bed
and told her to make them presentable
.
They
’d been re-worked many times
through the years
.
Angela and Rosemary
had
often pl
ied
needle and thread into the early morning hours
.
The results were always spectacular, between Rosemary’s sewing skill and Angela’s talent for design.

“What will I do, miss, with you gone
?
”
Rosemary
asked softly, the threat of tears in her voice
.
“
Without you to protect me,
the master will
force himself
o
n me the first chance he gets.”

“
Y
ou’re coming with me
.
My fath
er won’t be touching you
.”

“I don’t think He will
allow it
, mi
ss
.”

“I don’t care what He has to
say about the matter, Rosemary
,”
Angela declared angrily.
“
Y
ou’re coming with me
whether
H
e likes it or not
.
I’ll not leave you to that wolf
I call father
.
”

Rosemary had been w
ith he
r since they were both thirteen.
Angela
considered her more of a friend
than a servant
.
S
he was not about to leave
Rosemary
behind.

Rosemary dabbed gently at Angela’s eye with a cloth dipped in cool water
.
“’Tis rare for him to mark your face, love,” she murmured, and then shifted her attention to the small cut on
Angela’s
lip
.
“He must have been in a high dudgeon this time.”

“Yes, and I was prepared to meet my maker
. B
ut then he began to cry
.
As much as I hate the man, he’s still my father
.
I did love him once.”

“Aye, but that was too long ago for you to hold on to such an endearment for the likes of him,” Rosemary
spat
.

Angela had taken more than one beating from her father as a result of protecting Rosemary from his advances
.
She felt a duty to protect her
friend
, as well as the rest of the household staff from his cruel temper
.
He had always been a cold and distant man, but when her mother
had
died, and no longer served as a buffer, his rages ran unchecked
.
Angela knew he had loved her mother in his own fashion,
even
mourned her passing
, but once she was gone he treated Angela like a possession, a
piece of property
.

He often drank heavily, drowning whatever sorrows he might believe he
suffered from
in an excess of strong liquor
.
D
uring his drunken stupors was when he usually tried to accost Rosemary, or spitefully reprimanded another servant for some imagined misconduct.
Those were the times when Angela needed to be on guard
.
Unfortunately,
Angela usually found herself on the
receiving end of his anger.

But he’d always taken care not to beat her too viciously
. He couldn’t sell off damaged goods, after all. I
t had been
h
er father’s
a
mbition to secure a profitable match by marrying her to a wealthy gentleman
, placing all his hopes on the possibility that
her beauty would out shadow the lack of an impressive dowry.

As the years went by without any offers,
however,
he had
obviously
resorted to selling her favors to the highest bidder
.
Now
,
here she was, about to become some man’s mistress
. A
man
who was
a complete stranger.

Stopping in front of the full-length mirror that had once belonged to her mother, Angela studied her reflection
.
She hardly recognized herself
.
One sleeve of her gown was torn at the shoulder, the other stained with blood
.
Several strands of golden, blonde hair had escaped from the otherwise neatly coiled chignon
.
A
purplish bruise had appeared around the outside
of her eye
, extending to her temple
, and t
here was a tiny cut in the middle of her bottom lip, no doubt from when her father had backhanded her.

“We don’t have much time left, so you’ll have to come with me now
,”
Angela said
, still staring at herself in the mirror
.
“
Perhaps He will allow you to s
end for your belongings later.”

“I don’t care about my things, love
.
I only want to go with you
.
”

“I look like I’ve been dragged behind a vegetable cart
,”
Angela said
dryly
.
“
If He gets a
good
look at me in this condition,
He
will
no doubt
change his mind.”
Dark blue eyes
surrounded by thick
,
dusky lashes
stared back a
t her
.
Her lips were soft and full, enough to entice a man with sensual promises
.

Angela saw nothing extraordinary in her image
, though,
to
explain why people thought she was
so
beautiful
.
To her, she had a face like so many others, with eyes, a nose,
and
a mouth
.
If anyone were to ask her, she would say her eyes were too far apart, her waist was too small, and her breasts too large.

What was
really
so different about her face that made her more appealing than the next woman
?
She bared her teeth, moving her lips around, making silly shapes
.
They were just ordinary teeth, straight and white
.
She supposed she was fortunate that none were missing.

She was not a very tall woman, appearing almost delicate, but she was by no means
weak
.
She was stronger than she looked, making up for her lack of physical strength with a
n indomitable spirit
.

“Nonsense,
M
i
ss Angela
, you
’re a raging beauty
,”
Rosemary said
with feeling,
and
then turned her lips up wryly.
“
You would be gorgeous covered in mud
.
Now, let us get down to your man.”

“What
!
My man
?
”
Rosemary’s words made
Angela laugh
aloud
.
It served to ease some of her anxiety.
“I haven’t even consummated the bonds of ‘mistress-ship’
yet,
and you’re already calling him ‘my man
.
’”
The fact that she could joke about something like this was a good sign – or maybe it was
one of
the first stages of madness.

“Wait until you get a good look at him, love, and I mean a
really
good look at him
,
under the sheets
,
before you go making
any hasty judgments
,”
Rosemary teased.
“
You never know – you might want to keep h
im for longer than three months.
”

“
I can
assure
you
that will never happen
.
I intend to use that twenty thousand to become an independent woman
.
Maybe I’ll even do some traveling.”

“And you deserve it, love
.
I just hope that this
unorthodox way of getting what you want doesn’t turn around and bite you
i
n the a
—”

“I’ll just make sure that it doesn’t
.
But, right now, we’d better go.”

Angela smiled.
One of the things she loved about Rosemary was her colorful use of the English language, especially
the
profanity
.
It
hadn’
t take
n
long for Angela’s repertoire of cuss words to increase from her close association with her maid
.

They were both the same age and
had
bec
o
me friends right from the start
.
Where Angela was blonde and blue-eyed, Rosemary had
shiny
black hair and dark
,
exotic eyes
.
They made a striking pair, their opposite coloring often causing heads to turn. And e
ven though they were separated by class distinctions, Angela always treated Rosemary with
affection and
respect
, and
Rosemary, in turn, would do anything for her mistress.