“Gordan, we –” Ewan began.
“I mean, I knew you when you were younger, you’re too young to recall that, Brianna, but I did, and I knew it couldn’t be as he said. I said to myself, I remember that wretched little runt who used to run amok all over my land!”
“Actually,” I began.
“And then I said, Lord Douglas, why would I want to marry into your little family anyway, when I’ve got all I need here already and you’ve got nothing to offer but your daughter, and quite frankly I figured I could do better. But he told me, oh no, she’s grown into a poised young woman, and where else are you going to find one with connections to me, he asks?”
“Gordan!” Ewan snapped.
“And I got to thinking, after all, I do like ‘em feisty, and if she’s anything like her mother was, she’ll be perfect in my bed. Inn’t that right, Lord Galbraith?”
“Excuse me?!” I demanded, looking back and forth between both men.
Ewan wouldn’t make eye contact with me, but Gordan did. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough if my gamble truly paid off, won’t we?” With that, he reached out a chubby hand and rubbed my cheek with what he probably thought was finesse, but all I felt was clammy hatred. “Getting mightily late, but we’ll just have to let you have a bath, Lady Douglas. I don’t want you going to my bed smelling of horse and sweat!” He snapped his fingers at a servant who, I noticed only now, seemed to be hiding behind a column toward the back of the room. “Sarah! Take this lovely lady to the blue wing, and see to it that she has a bath. Give her whatever she wishes, but see to it that she is in my bed in an hour!”
“Yes, sir,” Sarah said. “M’lady?” Apologetically she took my wrist in her hand and led me away. I gave some thought to fighting back, but immediately concluded that there was nowhere to go and no chance of my escaping. I looked back just in time to see Ewan being restrained by two servants while Gordan continued to mouth off at him.
“What are they doing to him?” I asked Sarah. “It does not look like they’re going to escort him to guest quarters!”
“I am so very sorry for this, m’lady!” Sarah said as she prodded me up the stairs. “Believe me, I know what a miserable excuse for a human being my lord is – and yes, I know he’s no lord, but he insists upon us calling him that! I don’t know just where they’re taking Lord Galbraith; but you’re right, it won’t be to the guest quarters. Probably locking him in a vacant servant’s room if I had to guess!”
I was in a fog as we climbed the stairs, but I did have the presence of mind to not let on all I knew of Gordan just yet. “But all the way here, Ewan told me again and again how Gordan was an honest, decent man…”
“He would, from what I’ve heard of him. Undoubtedly just trying to do right by you, m’lady.”
I stopped on the next landing and turned to stare at Sarah. She was clearly quite intimidated, and I intended to use that to my full advantage. “Just what have you heard of Ewan, then?” I demanded.
Sarah looked around at the doors off the landing. “I shall tell you everything I know,” she whispered, “But not here. Too much risk others might hear. We’ll have the bath chamber to ourselves and that shall be much safer.” With that she took my arm in her hand again and guided me up another flight of stairs, down a short hallway and into the most opulent bed chamber I had ever seen, garish touches in every corner and a huge bed along the far wall. I did not need to be told what would be expected of me in that bed! Sarah lit a lamp and bade me sit in a nearby chair while she prepared the bath, and I was left with my own hateful thoughts for several minutes.
At last, she called me into the bath. “I can step out of the room while you undress if you wish,” she said.
“No need,” I reassured her. “I have nothing to be ashamed of except how filthy this dress is.” I made fast work of it, and soon stood naked before her as I had so many times before Penny and, less to my liking, Alva. I stepped into the bath and sank down into the warm, soapy water, enjoying it immensely in spite of myself. If I was to be a prisoner, at least it would be an opulent prison. “Now then, Sarah,” I reminded her. “What do you know about Ewan?”
“Only what m’lord had to say about him in his latest drunken stupor several days ago,” Sarah began. “He does get most boastful with his friends toward the end of an evening like that. I was in the room awaiting instructions, but we servants are invisible to his kind, particularly when they’ve been drinking. I’ve seen it in every home I’ve worked in. As for Lord Galbraith, as you might have guessed, nothing he said about him was in the least way positive; but knowing m’lord, that meant he must be a decent man, that much I was able to determine. He said Lord Galbraith was a useful idiot, I’m afraid, that he – m’lord, that is – and your father could be sure of his doing their bidding, and he went into absolutely nauseating detail as to why.”
“I’m afraid that is quite true,” I said. “Ewan told me of those very details on our journey here, and they are more nauseating than you could hope to imagine! Ewan is no idiot, though, that I can tell you. He’s a decent, loving man whom your lord forced into a miserable situation, and he has been making the best of it for twenty-five years now.”
“M’lady, I didn’t mean to…” Sarah looked horrified.
I reached out and took her hand in my hot soapy one. “I know, my dear! I’m sorry. I only meant to reassure you that while your lord likely considers Ewan a useful idiot, he is no idiot. I am afraid he is quite useful to Gordan, although it is through no desire or fault of his own.”
“For twenty-five years, you say?” Sarah said, now looking mollified as I withdrew my hand and went on scrubbing myself. “May I ask just what he has done to keep Lord Galbraith in such bondage for so long? He gave his friends every indication that it was a most juicy secret, but naturally he kept the best parts of that secret to himself! He always does.”
“Always,” I repeated, deep in thought. “Yes, there are no doubt others like Ewan. I am ashamed to admit I never thought of that.”
“No need to be ashamed, m’lady. It is quite impossible to appreciate just what a brute m’lord is until you have lived with him some time. I fear you are going to learn, though.”
“And speaking of learning, Sarah,” I replied. “Yes, I would like you to know his secret regarding Ewan. I think anyone with the misfortune to be at his bidding night and day has a right to know just what sort of vile creature we are living with.” On that note, I set the cake of soap aside and got as comfortable as I could in the water, and recounted all that Ewan had told me the night before. Sarah looked sad and angry and outraged and disgusted at all the appropriate turns in the story. When I revealed that the young lady at the centre of it all was my mother, the poor dear looked ready to cry. It was all I could do not to leap out of the water and take her in my arms to reassure her it wasn’t worth weeping about now; naturally I did not think Sarah would appreciate my making her all wet in addition to her consternation over the tale.
“So taking you away from Ewan is the final twist of the knife, I suppose,” Sarah said when I was done.
“Well, I don’t suppose either he or Father could have known Ewan and I would fall in love,” I said. “But had they known, I have little doubt they would have sent me here even sooner! It does seem all too fitting that such a thing would happen too late for poor Ewan or myself to do anything about it. I have no doubt we’d have found a way had we realized our feelings sooner. He’d have taken some convincing, but I’m sure he’d have risen to the challenge. As it is, I’ll tell you very frankly, Sarah, I do not intend to remain Gordan’s prisoner for very long.”
“If there were anything I could do to help you along with that, m’lady, I would,” Sarah told me. “I know all too well what a miserable excuse for a man his lordship is.”
I thought of Ewan and last night, and the prospect of even one day with Gordan, likely as not with Ewan held prisoner somewhere he would hear the effects of all that Gordan was likely to do to me
in bed, and the spirit of the Boy Avenger arose in me once again. That irresistible pull I had always felt that enabled me to put aside my fear for my safety and the risk of getting caught and the trouble of breathing in my disguise…it was all bubbling up to the surface, and I had no doubt I had found an ally in Sarah. I turned to her with fire in my eyes and gripped the edges of the tub. “Do you fancy doing something about it?” I asked.
“I’d love to, m’lady, but…what can we do?” she asked. “And what chance of success have we?”
“I don’t know our chances,” I admitted. “But I’m willing to take any chance to defeat that monster. If you join me, and if Ewan and I escape, we’ll bring you along. We can all start again somewhere, Ewan has enough money to ensure that’s a possibility. And I don’t need to tell you how loyal he is!”
Sarah glanced back at the door into the bedchamber, in which Gordan was probably due any minute now, and she looked ready to burst into tears. “Heavens, how I want to. That man is such a monster. But what can we do?”
“Once you wash my hair,” I directed her, “Have a look at my knapsack on the floor in there. There’s a pair of shackles. If he’s drunk enough when he gets in here…”
“He will be,” Sarah acknowledged. “He always is this time of the night.”
“Great! We restrain him with those, you and I together ought to overcome him, and once we’ve got him tied up, we can walk out of here at our leisure.”
“I think you’re missing a few steps there, m’lady, but I like it! I know where there’s some rope to be had, down the hallway.”
“Why don’t you go get it and let me finish my bath, then, and notify Gordan that his gift is ready?” We made some further impromptu plans, and she was off, the plan all set for when the bastard was on his way. Once she was gone, I hastily scrubbed myself off and rinsed my hair out, and stepped out of the tub. As I was patting myself dry, it occurred to me that I didn’t know where Ewan was, and I was not about to leave without him! But I had a feeling there would be other servants ready to turn their coats for us if necessary. Somehow I just knew we were going to win!
Once I was dry, I went out into the bedroom and settled myself on the bed to bait the monster. I was not at all happy about the prospect of him seeing me naked, but it was absolutely necessary. I put on a smile that was only partially forced, knowing as sure as the day I was born that I would be back in Ewan’s arms shortly. Soon enough I heard that unmistakeable tromp upon the stairs, and Sarah came rushing back through the bedroom, the shackles at the ready in her hands, to hide in the bath chamber.
The room was big enough that I couldn’t smell the corpulent beast before he entered; but I could certainly sense his impending presence. The very air seemed to grow tense with his approach. He looked smug as ever when he arrived and slammed the door, and loosened his belt buckle. “Why, you’re an eager young lady, aren’t you?” he asked upon seeing me.
“So I’m told,” I said. “But why shouldn’t I be eager with a man like you at the ready?”
“Heh heh heh, you’re sounding just as feisty as your mother was. I trust your father did not tell you just what sort of trickery he used to take her from me. He’s much too crafty to share that sort of thing with his daughter, isn’t he?”
“My father never told me anything of your story with him, or with my mother” I said, amused to reflect that it was absolutely true.
Gordan yanked his pants down and then kicked them off halfway across the floor. His belly hung down far enough to nearly hide his short, fat cock – but not quite far enough. Smiling through my disgust, I pretended to admire him. “Such a virile gentleman!” I cooed.
“Yes, and I’ve waited twenty-five years for this,” he said, tearing his shirt off. “Your father may have stolen your mother away from me, but he couldn’t keep me at bay forever! So, my girl, just how does a lovely lass like you like it?”
“Well now,” I said, “I like to start with a nice backrub. For you, I mean. I like my men relaxed first; it loosens up their inhibitions.”
“You assume I have inhibitions to begin with, my girl,” he corrected. “But I do like the way you think. Scoot aside and I shall lie down and let you rub my back to your heart’s content.”
“Wonderful,” I said, standing up to let him plop down in the middle of the bed, which he promptly did. I climbed atop the sweaty beast, and did my best to imagine I was anywhere else as I went to work on his hairy back. “We’ll have you nice and loose in no time,” I assured him. “You’ll be so relaxed you’ll be able to set my world on fire like never before.”
“Fire” was the password – I couldn’t resist, knowing the connotation it would surely bring to mind when it came to my parents and Ewan – and once the word was out of my mouth, Sarah was out of the bath chamber and tiptoeing over to the bed. I rubbed both his arms playfully, and he didn’t resist at all as I picked them up and drew them close together behind him. With his head turned to the left, he didn’t see Sarah appear on his right and slip the shackles on. The clink of cold metal upon itself as they snapped shut was manna to my ears in that long moment.
“What’s this, then?” he said, not looking up just yet. “I see you like it very rough, then? Nothing like either of your parents, but I like that!”
“I’m sure you do,” I said, still straddling him while Sarah walked around behind the bed and set about tying his legs up.
“Oh no you don’t!” he said, splaying his legs and twisting around. “Not on our first night anyway!” He turned hard enough to cause me to lose my balance and slide off him. I quickly rolled off the bed and out of his reach before I recalled that his hands were bound and he couldn’t reach for me anyway. In that instant several things happened at once: he saw Sarah, realized we were in cahoots, began bellowing and struggled to his feet to rush at her. I sprang to my feet and looked around for something heavy to swing at his head. Finding a vase on the dresser, I chased after him and arrived just a bit too late to stop him from kicking Sarah into the wall. He had just enough time to admire her crumpling up against the wall before I clocked him with the vase, which didn’t break but did knock him over. Sarah, recovering quickly, jumped atop him to pin him to the floor while he was still dazed from my dead-on hit.
He was screaming bloody murder, but Sarah clamped her hands over his mouth and managed to keep her balance atop him like I hadn’t been able to a moment before. I retrieved the rope, jumped atop his legs and forced them together, and in a matter of moments we had his legs tied together and the rope strung through the chains on his hands, so he was splayed bent backwards on the rug. He’d bitten into Sarah’s fingers a time or two, but she still managed to keep her hands over his mouth. As a final touch, I retrieved my girdle from the bath chamber, wadded the sweaty, filthy thing into a ball, and stuffed it into his mouth.
“Careful with that,” Sarah pointed out. “He might actually like it.”
“I hope he does,” I said. “Because he’s stuck with it for now, isn’t he? I do hope his screams didn’t alert anyone.”
“I doubt it,” Sarah called from the bath chamber, where she was rinsing the blood off her hands and tending to his bites. “We’re all used to him bellowing like that whenever there’s a woman in here!”
“Now, are there any clean clothes I could use?” I asked.
Sarah directed me to a wardrobe by the door, which was stocked with frocks, some of them in my size. “He wasn’t sure of your size these days, so he ordered a wide assortment,” she explained. I opted for a pale blue one that flattered my figure quite well, and decided not to bother with underclothes for the moment. We wouldn’t be leaving right away, after all.
With Gordan secure on the floor, Sarah led me off to the servants’ wing. “I’m not sure just where they’ll be keeping him,” she explained. “But odds are we’ll be able to find him somewhere here.”
A male servant stepped out of a room on our left. “What the devil are the pair of you doing in the men’s quart
ers?” he demanded.
“We’re looking for the hostage,” Sarah told him.
“Will his lordship want you setting him free?”
“His lordship doesn’t get a vote on this,” Sarah said.
“What on earth are you on about?”
“He’s met his match,” Sarah said, gesturing to me.
“Good heavens, what have you done?!” The young man did not look unhappy at the news.
“We’ll explain it if you’ll bring us to Ewan and set him free,” I told him. “If you don’t do as you’re told, though, I’ll remind you that I’m set to be the lady of the house. If you do, I can make it worthwhile for you.”
“You can trust her, James,” she reassured him. “And believe me, you do not want to miss what we’ve done to Gordan.”
“I…” He turned to me. “I know Sarah, and I believe that. Come this way.”
He led us down the hall to a tiny, spare room where Ewan was lying awake on a four –poster bed, tied to each post at his wrists and ankles. “Am I ever glad to see you!” he told me. “But how?”
“Sarah here gets most of the credit,” I told him as the three of us set about untying his ropes.
“Nonsense, Lord Galbraith,” Sarah said. “Brianna here is the hero of all this, I assure you!”
“I hope I am not long in learning just what has happened…” Ewan said in obvious disbelief as he stood up, newly freed and rubbing at his wrists.
“You won’t be, I assure you,” I told him. “For now, here’s what you should know: forgive me, but I have told Sarah everything about your past with Gordan and Father – and Mother, too. Of course she was more than happy to help once all that was known.”
“I –“
“Not now, Ewan! There will be time aplenty for you to reprimand me for that if you wish. Right now, we’ve got other business to attend to.”
“Just what other business is that, anyway?” Sarah asked me. “I’m with you, whatever it is, but…”
“You and James will have to wait out in the hall, I’m afraid,” I explained. “You’ll be our guards for the time being, if that’s okay.”
To Catch a Highlander: A Highland Erotic Romance Page 7
