“But—” She couldn’t speak. It was inconceivable that Roxbury had just shot her footman. It was a dream, an illusion. She shook her head and tried to clear it.
Roxbury advanced on her, his dark greatcoat billowing out behind him, his hands in his black leather gloves opening and closing at his sides. Roxbury’s pale blue eyes were like ice—cold and sharp—as they pierced hers, and she knew this was no dream. She took a step back and tried to swallow her horror.
“I have to go to my footman,” she stammered, taking another step back. “He’s hurt.” She needed to help Daniel, to take them both away from Roxbury as quickly as possible.
“No.” Roxbury’s eyes were hard. “I like him where he is. I wanted you alone. All to myself.”
His words made no sense to her. He might as well have been speaking Dutch, but she didn’t have time to piece it all together. Her ears were ringing with alarm. She had to escape him. Now.
She whirled away from Roxbury and began to run, darting toward the house. She’d rouse the estate’s staff and come back for Daniel, but she’d taken no more than two steps before she was yanked back, Roxbury’s gloved hand like a vise on her arm.
She gasped as she was jerked back against him. “Where do you think you are going?” he rasped.
Her stomach rolled. There was something familiar about this, about the feel of his hand on her arm, the sound of his voice.
No.
She caught a glimpse of his face out of the corner of her eye and noted the red scar on his cheek, just to the side of his nose. It had an odd shape, but one she’d seen before. A dog bite.
It had been him at Tanglewilde.
Oh God. No.
She pulled away from him, and he clamped the other hand on her arm as well. “Let go!” She struggled, kicking and twisting. “I have to help Daniel!”
Roxbury tightened his grip and hauled her up against him. “With any luck, he’s already dead.” He turned her forcibly to face him, and his hand closed on her throat. “Right now, I have other plans. Plans that donotinvolve your footman.”
Francesca stared into his glacier-blue eyes. They were clouded with rage and lust.
“That’s right, Francesca. Look at me. This time you’ll know it’s me making you scream.”
“No,” she said, reacting instinctively to the chilling smile he gave her. “No!”
“You dare tell me no?” He backhanded her savagely, and she skidded to the ground at his feet. She tried to roll away, but he kicked her with one of his boots.
Coughing, she curled into a ball, trying to protect herself from further blows.
She’d barely caught her breath when she heard the snickering. Inching away, Francesca peered tentatively into his face. Head thrown back, he stood over her, laughing with utter abandonment. He saw her watching him and narrowed his eyes, all traces of humor gone in an instant.
“This is where I like you, whore.” He jabbed at her with his boot. “At my feet, underneath my boot.”
With a vicious tug, he grasped her by the hair and dragged her toward the crumbling keep.
She gasped. “Benedict!” She tried to concentrate through the searing pain of his hand in her hair and the throbbing ache in her abdomen where he’d kicked her. “Please. I’ll do whatever you want. But we have to help Daniel. He’s bleeding, Benedict. Please—”
“Shut up!” They’d reached the ruins and he threw her aside, her head narrowly avoiding cracking against one of the stones that had fallen from the castle a century ago. They were behind one of the few remaining walls, and she realized with mounting fear that she couldn’t see Winterbourne Hall from where she lay. She shifted her eyes to the sky and noticed how dark it had grown. Evening was fast approaching and with it the storm.
Roxbury must have followed the trail of her thoughts because he laughed. “No one from the house can see or hear you this far away. When they do search for you, they won’t think to look for you here.” His grin was malevolent. “Until it’s too late.”
Francesca fought to contain her fear. For the first time, she didn’t feel powerless in the face of Roxbury’s rage. For the first time, she knew her own worth, her own power. She had to escape him—she had done it before, and could do it again.
Only, she couldn’t seem to concentrate. Her entire body ached, and her thoughts kept returning to Daniel, lying sprawled and bleeding a few yards away. Then another fear gripped her.
Ralph.
The Ingletons’ servant coming with a message and Roxbury waiting for her here was too coincidental.
“Please tell me you didn’t hurt the Ingletons, Benedict.”
