Properly discussed rather than the ham-fisted hash he had made of it this morning. God only knew what she had to be thinking. She had looked positively wretched and on the cusp of tears when he had left her so abruptly. He could not make her his, and potentially create a child in the process, without being honest. Although in bringing her home with him, he had ruined her anyway, so the poor girl was very likely stuck with him whether she wanted to be or not. Yet how did one begin such a dreadful conversation?
With heavier feet than usual, Jamie limped back into the house. It couldn’t be put off any longer. He found Cassie in the drawing room with Letty and Jack, looking withdrawn and more than a little alarmed at his arrival.
‘There you are!’ His brother was annoyed and rightly so. He had brought Cassie home here last night and then disappeared as if she wasn’t his responsibility, when she so clearly was. ‘I was about to send out a search party. Where have you been?’
‘Riding.’ He did not need Jack to make him feel any worse when his mood was already trawling the depths of despondency. ‘Cassie, might I have a word?’
‘Can it wait?’ Her voice was shaky and her eyes were darting every which way except at him.
‘Not really.’
‘Oh, for pity’s sake, Jamie, leave the poor girl alone!’ Even Letty sounded irritated with him and who could blame her? ‘Cassie has been through a dreadful ordeal, not helped by your silly disappearance this morning, and besides I have ordered tea, which the three of us are going to enjoy. You can join us, if you can bear to grace us with your presence, or you can scurry off again and hide. I dare say it will make no difference to any of us regardless.’ Her attention went back to her sewing, but by the way she was jabbing the needle in the fabric, Jamie could tell his sister-in-law was imagining it was his thick head. He was tempted to offer her his actual head in the hope it might make both of them feel better. ‘What were you saying, Jack? Before your idiot brother came in and interrupted us.’
Just like that they closed ranks around Cassie and Jamie was forced to sit ignored, in painful isolation, feeling like the worst sort of cad. The object of his misery said little, although once or twice he caught her looking at him before she blushed furiously and resolutely stared at her hands. All Jamie could do to pass the time was stare angrily at her bruises and castigate himself for his part in her misery.
Chivers appeared silently out of nowhere and addressed his brother. ‘My lord, the Reverend Reeves is at the gates, demanding to be let in. He is accusing Mr James of kidnapping his daughter and holding her hostage. How would you like me to proceed?’
Jamie surged to his feet. ‘I will deal with him!’ And deal with him he would. Once and for all. Without Cassie there to see, he was going to beat her father into a pulp, one which would need to be scraped off the driveway with a shovel by the time he was finished. His fists were clenched in preparation as he started towards the door.
‘Wait!’ Jack grabbed him forcibly by the arm. ‘Whilst I completely appreciate your anger and whilst I would like nothing better than to see that man get his comeuppance, this is not your decision to make or mine. It’s Cassie’s.’
Yes, it was. Damn it. ‘Marriage has made you soft, Brother. A few months ago and you would have been the first one out of the door.’ Jamie’s irritation at being thwarted disappeared when he saw Cassie’s reaction to the situation. All colour drained from her face, eyes wide and clearly terrified. Without thinking he went to her and pulled her close. ‘I won’t let him harm you. You’re safe here. I promise.’
‘Jamie is right.’ Jack came to stand loyally beside him. ‘You are under our protection now and out of your father’s jurisdiction. Do you want me to have him sent away or should I send for the constable? Or would you prefer Jamie to deal with him?’ The brothers exchanged a look of understanding. Jack knew that it was not his place to step in and Jamie was grateful his brother acknowledged it.
‘I would like to speak to him.’ Her voice came out so small. She stepped stiffly out of his unwelcomed embrace and stood proudly. ‘I want to tell him I am never coming back. I want him to see that he hasn’t beaten me.’
* * *
They let him in. Cassie could tell Jamie wasn’t happy with the decision, but he abided by it and stood next to her like a ferocious tiger ready to pounce as her father was led into the drawing room, flanked by the Earl on one side and a particularly burly footman on the other. Their presence reassured her, but did nothing to stop the nervousness and sense of vulnerability at seeing him again less than twenty-four hours after he had almost killed her. Despite that, her father showed not an ounce of remorse, although she had not really expected him to.
‘These thugs of yours do not frighten me, Cassandra. We are leaving.’
‘No.’ In all her twenty-one years she had never said that tiny word to him. Even with the Warriners and their servants at her side, saying it still took every ounce of courage she possessed.
‘I said we are leaving. I have had my fill of Retford and the patronising bishop. When we get home we shall pack.’
‘And I said no. I am staying, Father.’ The word Papa was too familiar and affectionate to use ever again. ‘I granted you this audience because I wanted you to know I am never coming back to live with you again.’
‘Under God’s holy law, you must obey me.’
Cassie shook her head. ‘I am of age. In the eyes of the law I can do as I please.’
‘No law supersedes the word of our Lord! Honour thy father, Cassandra!’
She was done with being bullied. Done with all the punishments she did not deserve. Done with being a disappointment because of wayward character traits she could not suppress. ‘Yesterday, by your own admission, you had no daughter. Only a harlot.’ Her voice wavered on those terrible names because she suspected they were close to the truth. If only Jamie had not seen her completely naked and consumed with wanton lust. Though it made no difference to her decision concerning her father. ‘You beat me.’ Her fingers lightly touched the raised bruise on her cheek, yet her father’s eyes did not appear horrified to see the evidence of his brutality. ‘You tied me up. You put your hands around my neck and choked me until I passed out. I might have died. I will not live with the threat of such violence again.’
‘You have duties to attend to.’
‘Nor will I skivvy for you. I will find a job and earn money for my labours instead. That money you found, the money you accused me of prostituting myself for, it was my running-away fund. As soon as I had saved enough I was going to leave anyway. Your actions only served to expedite the process.’
His temper began to fray; she could see it in his eyes because she had never openly disobeyed him before. All her rebellions had been secret, but there were no secrets now. Her father had found everything and cruelly destroyed it. The only piece of her writing not torn to pieces was The Great Apple Debacle, and that was with a publisher and safe from his petty controls. And they were petty, she realised, because the paper he had ripped up so cruelly before her eyes was only that. Paper. The stories were still there in her head and they could easily be written down again.
‘I am going to live my own life, exactly as I want to.’
‘“Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised!”’
His hand lurched out and grabbed her roughly by the arm, only to have it yanked away by Jamie with twice as much force. He glared down at her father, still holding the offending arm in a vice-like grip, and practically snarled as he spoke.
‘How convenient, Reverend, that you should be sparing with that particular verse of Proverbs. I suppose the rest of the verse doesn’t suit your particular needs. Do you remember it? Because I do. Word for word. “Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.” In other words—and do correct me if I am wrong�
�God demands you treat your women well, Reverend. Respect them. It says nothing about beating them, restraining them, imprisoning them like criminals, and it certainly does not tell you to try to strangle the life out of them!’
‘You have turned my daughter against me and dragged her to this den of iniquity!’
‘If you speak another vile word about Cassie, you will have me to answer to!’
Her father’s lip curled scornfully. ‘And who are you to usurp the word of her father?’
‘I will be her husband and you can rot in hell, or a lunatic asylum where you belong! And make no bones about it, Reverend, I shall drag you there with my bare hands and make sure they throw away the key!’
Cassie stood frozen for several seconds, reeling.
Husband.
Where had that come from?
This morning he had left her naked because her wantonness was so abhorrent. She had seen the disgust and horror written plainly on his face. Almost the same sort of disappointment she received daily from her hateful father. A marriage on those terms did not bode well. All she would be doing was swapping one miserable existence for another, lesser one, doomed to disappoint another man with her wayward tendencies and break her own heart in the process. Because a bad marriage to Jamie, when he meant the world to her, would be a living hell.
‘Over my dead body!’ Her father managed to wriggle out of Jamie’s hold to lunge at her again. Quick as a flash, Jamie caught him and twisted an arm painfully behind her father’s back, effectively anchoring him in place.
‘That can be arranged. Touch her again and I will kill you this time!’
‘Oh, stop it!’ Cassie felt bitter tears sting her eyes. This was all so awful. ‘You need to leave, Father. I have made my decision and I am never coming back.’ She turned, not to Jamie but to his brother. ‘Can you show him out, please?’
Jack and the burly footman took an arm each and dragged her father from the room, all the while he spouted the scriptures and glared at her menacingly. Perhaps Jamie was right and he was a lunatic. Suddenly she felt chilled to the bone and more miserable than she had a scant few minutes ago. And so hopelessly lonely. She had believed Jamie was coming to understand her, like her even, but her exuberant personality had repulsed him, too, because she had let her guard down and allowed him a glimpse of the real her.
As if this morning had not happened, Jamie stepped towards her with his arms open, clearly intent on offering her more comfort, yet the thought of his hands on her again was too painful even though she desperately wanted to rush into them and absorb his strength. She backed up and held her palms up in warning. A warning he ignored. His fingers reached out and lightly brushed her cheek. ‘Cassie...’
The tears fell then, noisily and filled with anger. ‘Just leave me alone!’
‘We need to talk.’
‘No, we don’t. I have nothing to say to you, Captain Warriner. I never want to talk to you again and I am certainly not marrying you!’ Cassie picked up her borrowed skirts and fled from the room.
Chapter Seventeen
‘Can I come in?’
The sound of her sobbing behind the door was breaking his heart.
‘No! Go away!’
He heard something hard bounce off the wood, some missile she had found to hurl at his head no doubt. Ignoring her, he turned the handle. He had a hard head after all and he had procrastinated long enough, and in doing so had upset her further when she had so much to be distraught about already. Cassie had thrown herself on the bed, but raised herself quickly to her knees at his unwelcome intrusion. The murderous look she shot him could have curdled milk. ‘I need to talk to you.’
‘And I have already stated I have nothing to say to you!’ She pouted sulkily and searched the vicinity for something else to throw. Finding nothing of any substance, she turned her back on him.
‘Well, that is fine. I will talk to you and you can listen.’ Stony silence. Jamie approached the bed gingerly and perched his bottom on the edge of the mattress, twisting slightly to address her back. ‘Firstly, as has been loudly, most vociferously and completely unnecessarily pointed out to me by Letty, I should like to apologise for my horrendous proposal—if one could call it that. I did have every intention of asking you properly. I still have every intention of asking you properly. But I need to tell you some things first. Things I have been putting off because I couldn’t find the right words to tell you.’ Words Jamie was still struggling to find. ‘The thing is...this morning I...’
‘I definitely do not want to talk about this morning!’ She practically jumped off the bed and stalked towards the window with her hands fisted against her sides. ‘I would prefer to pretend that debacle never happened.’
‘But I want to explain...’
‘No explanations are necessary. I know perfectly well what I did wrong!’
Obviously he had made a spectacular hash of things if she thought she was to blame for any of this. ‘You did nothing wrong.’ He saw pain wash over her face and felt wretched. ‘Why would you think you did anything wrong? I was the one who panicked.’
‘You panicked? I didn’t... I didn’t disgust you?’
‘Disgust me?’ Where had that come from? ‘Quite the opposite, Cassie. You were perfect.’ Which actually gave him the perfect opening. ‘And I am not. In so many dreadful ways. So I panicked because I did not know how to tell you and fled. I wish with all of my heart I hadn’t if I made you doubt yourself in the process. You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen and the simple, awful truth is I do not deserve you.’
This time when he reached out to touch her she did not recoil. She allowed him to take her hand and tug her to sit on the mattress beside him.
‘I don’t understand.’
Jamie took a deep breath. ‘It’s hard to explain. It might be easier if I showed you.’
The scars.
The guns.
He stood stiffly and tried to steel himself for her reaction to it all. ‘Come. I need to take you to my bedchamber.’
She followed him warily without question, still allowing him to hold her hand. Jamie tried not to hope this was a good sign. Once she knew the truth she might not be so keen to hold it. No matter, she deserved the whole truth. ‘You should probably sit down.’
She did, cautiously, her pretty face awash with questions while Jamie paced nervously to the window and then back again, wondering where the hell to start. ‘When I escaped from that goal, I barely escaped with my life. The alarm had been raised and the whole garrison were searching for me.’ He would tell her why that was later, if this part did not send her screaming down the landing. ‘I was shot. Four times. The damage was substantial.’ At a loss at how to explain the full extent of his injuries, He shrugged out of his jacket and began to undo his waistcoat.
Cassie sat watching him, alarmed. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I thought it might be prudent to show you what those musket balls did. It’s more than just a limp, Cassie.’
Briskly he tugged his shirt over his head and tugged the waistband of his breeches down enough to see the raised pair of scars which sat like bookends on either side of his left hip. They were the least offensive marks and if she balked at them then there would be no point showing her the others. ‘One bullet entered here and came out the other side.’
To her credit, she did not balk. Instead she bent her head to get a closer look and then surprised him by running the tip of her index finger over the mark at the front. ‘That must have been agony.’
‘Compared to the others, it was insignificant. It hurt like the devil at the time, but it was a reasonably clean shot and hit nothing important.’
‘What did the others do?’
‘They have left me deformed.’ Jamie felt sick. ‘Hideously deformed. This morning I was embarrassed. I
didn’t want to disappoint or disgust you and I blame myself for letting things between us go as far as they did...especially when you were probably expecting a whole man rather than what is left of me.’ Her eyes widened and he fought the urge to flee again. Damn and blast, he had never been so humiliated or felt so useless.
Come on, Jamie. Be matter-of-fact about it. Show her. She deserves to know why you left her unsatisfied this morning. ‘It’s not pretty. Are you sure you want to see it?’ Because if she did not, he would probably be relieved. And then truly miserable, because this was his only chance of any sort of future with Cassie. He wouldn’t marry her without brutal honesty.
She nodded, but he could see her trepidation. He briskly undid the buttons on his falls and watched her eyes stare intently at the area of his hips as he began to inch the fabric down. ‘There’s nothing to be done about it and I can only apologise for inflicting this on you...’ Revealing it inch by inch was pathetic and only served to prolong his agony and her horror. Better simply to do it quickly, let her see, then cover up the mess and promise never to sully her eyes with it again. He would suffer the dark to make love to her if she would have him. Which she probably wouldn’t when she saw the state of him. Utterly degraded and mortified, he yanked the breeches down far enough to expose all of the vile damage and squeezed his eyes closed so he did not have to witness her initial reaction. As the silence dragged, he couldn’t bring himself to open them.
After an eternity she huffed out a breath. ‘But it is still there. Does it no longer work?’
‘You know it works—you’ve seen it work—but it will always limp.’
A Warriner to Rescue Her Page 21
