Chapter 5
Lizzie hid in her bath as midnight chimed.
She studied the turquoise walls and gilt-edged rococo plasterwork.
To her distress, the roundels illustrated Greek myths, all of them of naked women subject to violent men. Everywhere she looked women suffered men’s brutality. Felmont’s father had commissioned the decoration of this suite of rooms to satisfy his depraved taste, though he had never lived there. She had consented to stay at the Folly only if he kept to the Priory.
If she survived the night, she meant to have the rooms redone. It helped to calm her, to think of restoring the walls to the Folly’s golden stone.
The great house grew quiet.
The family must have settled early in their rooms this night. How she was to face them at breakfast the next day, if Felmont recovered enough to ravish her, was beyond her incoherent thoughts. She could not depend on his promise not to touch her. Felmonts always lied.
The minutes ticked by. He had insisted her bed must not be slept in this night lest his reputation be ruined. Safety from his Felmont appetite was guaranteed only by his injuries, his weariness and his distaste for her.
The wedding breakfast had begun at noon. Her introduction to the viscount’s friends had been enlightening. If he had searched London for the infamous, he could not have found a pack of more debauched, licentious noblemen. Their antics filled the newspapers with scandal.
No doubt they still continued their revelry, but not in Felmont’s Folly. The great house was full. The Beast’s friends had departed to the next county, to one of the Duke of Saint Sirin’s residences.
The bath water cooled uncomfortably.
“Lady Felmont.” The sharp rap on the door startled her. “Lady Felmont! His lordship says he is ready to retire. Now, my lady, if you would be so kind as to join him.”
It was Molly, James’s sister. A widow left to make her way in the world on the death of her soldier husband.
Lizzie’s companion and her dresser were waiting for her in Bath, sent on ahead to rescue what was to have been her new home from the chaos of trunks and boxes. Using Molly as her maid had been James’s suggestion.
“I’ll be out in a moment.” Lizzie swished the water as if she was still busy bathing.
“You said that fifteen minutes ago, my lady.”
A great pounding began on the wall by her head. Felmont’s bedroom adjoined her dressing room.
He called through the wall, “You have five minutes to get in here or I am coming in there to fetch you, dearest wife. I have not slept in two nights, let us not make it three.”
Lizzie got out of her bath and hurriedly dried herself. The thought that he might break in to find her naked, frightened her more than the idea of facing him clothed.
She dried her thin body, glad there was nothing about it to incite his lust. The maid had laid out the lightest muslin nightrail Lizzie possessed. She fastened every pearl button on the bodice, it was too late to call for another. A wisp of matching dressing gown and slippers did not make her feel any less naked. She pulled on a pair of long, pale kid gloves. They made her feel safer, she did not want to touch him accidentally.
She opened the door of her dressing room quietly. Molly hurried over to her. The maid had partially covered the Thwaite curly brown hair with a starched white cap. A bright-eyed confident woman, she was not many years older than her brother James.
Molly said in a rush, “It does no good to get him in a state, my lady. Just let him get it over with, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
Lizzie could not find the words to answer this gross impertinence. She had seen Molly twice before—once when she was interviewed for the position of housemaid, and once in the under-steward’s office, when Lizzie had fled there to consult James.
The trouble with allowing house servants to replace trained personal maids was that they really didn’t know the difference between the appropriate things to say and the distinctly inappropriate.
Molly rattled on, “You just go in there like you own the place, my lady, as you do. Don’t let him walk all over you. Start off as you mean to go on. Open that door and walk in like the lady you are. Flinching from him only makes him worse.”
Lizzie was tugged by her arm to the door of the adjoining bedroom. She had never been manhandled by a maid before.
“Just take a deep breath and go on in, my lady. Show him you aren’t afraid of him.”
Lizzie did just that. She took a deep breath, grasped the handle of the door and pushed it open with as much force as she could muster and followed it through into the bedroom.
He was standing on the other side of the door, clad in a long white nightshirt. The edge of the door hit him on the shoulder, his injured shoulder. His long satanic face loomed over her, his white teeth snarled in a grimace of pain.
The Beast let out a howl like a mad dog. His eyes rolled back in his head as he fell against her. The door slammed shut with her inside.
Her night attire, caught in his grasping hands, ripped open. The pearl buttons flew in an arc. The material tore down the front with a hiss, pulled from her naked body as he fell clutching it.
Lizzie screamed. She screamed and fled, avoiding his flailing arms, leaping out of the circle of skirts, which were all that remained of her clothes. Wearing only her gloves, she ran naked away from him, giving high shrill shrieks with each breath out of her tortured lungs.
Her slippers flew off. She stumbled over them. They hindered her efforts to reach the Beast’s dressing room. Her screams robbed her of breath, her legs grew leaden. She moved as if in a nightmare, struggling, straining to reach safety.
The Beast was going to kill her. She’d never survive his retaliation. Never!
His dressing room door gaped before her. With one last scream, Lizzie tripped over her own feet to sprawl naked on its cool tiled floor. She scrambled to her knees to glimpse him writhing in agony on the floor, clutching her night attire to his face.
Lizzie slammed the door shut and fumbled with the lock. Why wouldn’t it lock? Why?
Sobs began, which did not help her task. Any moment now the Beast’s fury might overwhelm his pain and he’d crash the door open to revenge himself on her nude and trembling body. If only he’d die from the pain! If only she wasn’t naked!
Lizzie heard the lock click home. But surely it was too flimsy a lock to keep out the Beast. He could kick doors open. Men could do that, she’d seen his father do it—splintering wood with powerful blows. She looked around frantically for a weapon to kill him with. There was nothing, only a bar of soap from the Priory and a comb.
A gentle tapping on the door evoked a great shudder amid her sobs.
“Lady Felmont, it’s James. Molly is here with something for you to put on. If you’d open the door, she will enter to help you dress.”
“Where is he?” She managed to get out the words only because James always made her feel safer.
“The viscount has fainted again. We can’t get him off the floor. He asked for laudanum, my lady, when he came round for a moment.”
The Beast was unconscious. If he was helpless on the floor, he could not touch her. Her spirits rose for an instant then were dashed to pieces at the thought of his vengeance.
Lizzie unlocked the door. The gloom of the dressing room hid the worst of her shakes from the maid.
Molly helped her into a long winter nightdress. “Never you mind, my lady. His lordship only got what he deserved. Lud! Standing by the door after shouting for you to come to him. If he’d waited in bed like a civilized man, he’d have been enjoying your company instead of lying on the carpet moaning.”
Lizzie fiddled with her gloves, trying to pull them higher than her elbows.
Her sobs finally stopped. She avoided deep breaths to keep the shuddering in her lungs controlled.
Venturing out took a little longer.
“Is he still on the floor, Molly? Go and see.”
Moans and curses floated through the half-opened d
oor when Molly poked her head out to look.
“Yes, my lady, he’s sitting on the carpet, resting his back on the door to your bedroom. I think his nose has stopped bleeding now. He must have landed on it. Lud, what a mess. Not that it looks any worse than before.” The maid gave a merry laugh. “Don’t you worry, I wager the viscount is more scared of you than you are of him right now.”
Lizzie edged out to see for herself. The Beast was seated, as Molly had said, leaning against her door. He dabbed at his nose with the remains of her nightdress, into which he had bled copiously. His nightshirt showed scarlet stains about the shoulder, where he’d rubbed it with gory fingers.
When he saw her, he lifted a hand and gestured to her to approach him. “Come and see what you have done to me, dearest wife, light of my life. One of us may as well get some pleasure out of this night. It promises to be an endless nightmare. After torturing me like this, you will never mention me throwing you in the lake again. We are even.”
Loud knocks on the bedroom door disturbed the Beast’s soliloquy.
Uncle Tempest shouted, “What is going on in there? Do you think you’ll see a penny of her money if you use my niece ill? If she begs to go with us in the morning, I’ll see you ruined, so help me! Bloody nobility! The bloody French had the right bloody idea!”
The Beast rose to his feet. His nightshirt covered him to mid-calf. He groped his way to the door, wiped his nose one last time on her clothing, and held it tucked in his hand. He opened the door and blocked the view into the room with his body.
Her uncle gave a gasp of horror. “Bloody hell! What is that? Give it to me at once!”
The Beast’s arm jerked as her nightdress was pulled from his hand.
“You bloody bastard!” cried Uncle Tempest. “How dare you mistreat my niece? I wish you’d died over there!”
“Keep it as a souvenir, Tempest. You jump to conclusions that do not flatter me,” the viscount said in a voice icy with fury.
“I’ll see you hanged for this!” Uncle Tempest choked on his spleen.
The sound of Bertram Felmont’s cane tapped closer.
“Ah, Cousin Bertram,” the Beast drawled, “You disturb your rest to see how we fare? How kind.”
“Not at all, sweet boy. My, my, they say reluctant virgins always bleed the most. What a relief it must be to have it over with.” Bertram Felmont’s scathing tone was not muted by the soiled nightdress thrown at the viscount’s feet.
The Beast kicked it out into the hallway.
“Go to hell, both of you!” he shouted, goaded beyond control. “Get out of my house. Lizzie is mine now!” He slammed the door closed. It was by great effort he stood upright.
Uncle Tempest roared through the door, “I’ll give my niece the power to beggar you! She’ll beggar you! So help me God!”
Lizzie Tempest Ruins A Viscount (Felmont Brides Series Book 1) Page 5
