The Rakehell Regency Romance Series Boxed Set 1

by Sorcha MacMurrough

  But where on earth had the man got to?

  She rose and tugged on one of the nightgowns now hanging in his wardrobe, before picking up his heavy brocade dressing gown and hugging the lapels close around her neck.

  She headed to her own chamber and stepped in through her door. She sensed a movement behind her, but assumed it was the maid coming into their suite.

  "Hello, Mary. How are you today? You've brought breakfast for me? Thank you so much."

  She picked up a piece of toast off the plate, bit into it, and turned away towards her desk. She wondered why Mary did not respond, until she heard a small squeak betokening fear behind her.

  "Let's go, you little whore. We're leaving," Herbert said, his voice rough with too much drink.

  She whirled around and gasped. Her eyes widened at the sight of Paxton, armed to the teeth, in her very own room.

  "Y-y-you're m-m-mad," she stammered, before swallowing hard to get her voice under control. "I couldn't possibly leave with you."

  "You agreed to elope with me once," he said with an evil leer. "Much as I'd love to futter you right here and now, time is passing and I have places to be. So move." He waved the barrel of the pistol in the direction of the door.

  "Thomas will stop you," she threatened. "You'll never get away with abducting me."

  He sneered. "It won't look like abduction if you're seen leaving with me of your own free will. Your Aunt Margaret and Agnes will tell everyone you couldn't help yourself. Your darling husband will believe it. After all, what could have happened to make you change your mind about me?"

  "My falling in love with him, perhaps?" she said coolly.

  He scowled, his florid face a livid mask. "If I thought that, by God, I would shoot you here and now."

  Charlotte stepped back, looking for a means of escape, but found none. With a pistol pointed at her maid's head, and another aimed directly at her heart, she did not have many options.

  "Thomas will come for me. He'll tear your heart out. After what you did to him during the war, and what you did to his sister..."

  "I don't give a damn about any of that," he rasped. "All I want is money, and to make him suffer."

  Charlotte could well believe it.

  "You've had plenty of money. Maybe if you didn't gamble it all away, you might be able to live a better life. Unless of course you enjoy being a criminal. Preying upon the innocent, ruining lives whenever you get the chance. I'm just one of your many victims. Who will it be next? Agnes? Jonathan Deveril's sister Sarah? None of us are safe, are we?"

  "It won't be your concern. You won't be around to see it," he growled.

  Her eyes narrowed. "So you are going to use me and abandon me the way you did Jane?"

  "I'm going to keep you alive as long as it suits me to torment your husband. But make no mistake. He'll never find you. He'll pay me to keep you alive, but one way or the other, you'll never see each other again."

  His words chilled her to the bone, but she was determined not ti give the cowardly bully the upper hand in any way. "In that case, why would he keep on paying? If he thinks that you and I have eloped, he won't care. He'll be glad to be rid of me."

  "Don't worry, Missy, I'll make sure he pays. A gent like him, he'll do anything to avoid scandal. Now get your boots on, and let's get going."

  "I'll need a dress as well."

  "Hurry up about it."

  She ran to the wardrobe and took out a loose gown in charcoal gray merino wool, and got her best pair of walking boots and some sturdy stockings. She turned her back on him and opened the robe, before yanking the dress around her one sleeve at a time and fastening it. She tried not to think of the disgusting man leering at her rear through the filmy negligee. She left the discarded robe on the floor, and tried to think of what clues she could leave that would show she had not gone willingly. She stepped on the sleeve as she bent to tug her dress down, and pulled hard as she rose, nearly tearing the sleeve in half.

  She reached for her hair brush and pulled the old hairs out of it and onto the floor. As she twisted her hair up into a bun, she yanked several more out, and while she fixed it with several pins, she scattered several of them as well.

  She grabbed another handful, and then put her cloak on. She reached for her most precious reticule, and wondered what was in it she could use to show that she had been taken by force.

  Then she reached for her cloak. "I'm ready," she said at last.

  "Not quite. Grab your jewel box, and let's go."

  She hurried over, opened it briefly, and scooped out some ear bobs as she shut it again. It wouldn't exactly be a trail of breadcrumbs, but between the hairpins and earrings, and the fact that she was normally so tidy and careful with her possessions, she felt sure her astute husband would know she had been taken against her will and rouse the district to search for her.

  Herbert would not be able to take her far. She only prayed that her husband would not put himself in danger in order to save her, or do anything foolish once he caught up with the vile Paxton.

  He pointed to the door with his pistol. "Move."

  Charlotte was terribly concerned as to where Thomas had got to. She tried to tell herself that his plan to get money from her husband would not work if Thomas were injured or dead. All the same, she had a dreadful sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. As she walked down the stairs, with Mary being dragged along behind whimpering, she wondered at the servants not being around the house as usual.

  When she got outside and was heading toward the waiting carriage, however, she noticed a black plume of smoke rising over to the left of the house, in the direction of the village.

  That was how he had got everyone out of the way!

  "Very clever. Distract everyone with a fire. But if Thomas is killed, you won't get a penny."

  He leered evilly. "Maybe not. But Jane is the heir, and my daughter after her. And barring either of them, there's always his baby sister Elizabeth. Quite a tasty little piece, that, and I like them young and tiny and firm."

  He groped Mary again for emphasis, squeezing her breast so hard she whitened with pain and almost passed out.

  Charlotte stiffened, aware for the first time of the full extent of the danger they all faced at the hands of this monster. "You won't get away with this."

  "Who's going to stop me?"

  She lifted her chin proudly. "I am. You mark my words."

  He slammed the pistol into her stomach, knocking the air from her lungs and doubling her over with pain.

  "Fine brave words, Missy. By the time I finish with you, you'll be on your knees begging me for mercy. Assuming you can still talk, of course."

  She flung her jewel box hard at him, slamming him in the gut and scattering the contents to every corner of the foyer.

  "Damn you. No, don't run. I'll shoot to wound, and make sure both of you suffer. Now get in the carriage." He kicked the box out of the way furiously, not daring to stoop to pick up the expensive contents.

  Charlotte had stiffened at his words, and she reluctantly did as she was told.

  It was a battered looking old hired coach which had certainly seen better days.

  She and her maid got in, and sat with their backs to the driver. Charlotte knew they had to escape, had to try to get help. Surely Thomas would not believe that she was going away with Herbert willingly. Would never believe a word that Agnes or her aunt said. Not after all they had shared the past few days. Or last night.

  The question was, what on earth would he do when he found out that she had been taken? Or that Herbert had been responsible for burning the cottages?

  The other question was, where were they headed? As the carriage progressed ever westward, over more and more terrible roads, she began to wonder exactly what madness Paxton had in mind. She did her best to try to drop a hairpin or ear bob out of either one of her hands as the coach jostled them back and forth on the warm summer's day. But soon she would run out, and then what....

  "There are
some old smuggler's caves on the Welsh coast. We can lay low for a day of two, and take ship to Ireland. I have friends there who hate the English, and would do anything to help Bonaparte win. I can help them, and in exchange, they can assist me. And they will certainly be delighted to be entertained by a fancy piece like you. And this fresh little thing here."

  He made a grab for Mary's breast. The girl shrank back in fear and anticipation of still more pain. Charlotte soothed her, and seeing the girl shivering uncontrollably, she took off her cloak and tied it around Mary's bony shoulders.

  "Leave her alone, Paxton!"

  He pawed at the girl again, enjoying making her squirm.

  "Stop that! You're an animal," Charlotte hissed, slapping his hand away. "I can't imagine how you ever persuaded me that you were anything other than something that climbed out of a tree. I'm going to see you hang, do you hear me?"

  He took a swig from his pocket flask, and sneered at her."They'll have to catch me first. And so far as I know, eloping ain't a hanging offence."

  He tried to reach for Charlotte's breast now but she shifted away from him into the far corner of the seat and glared.

  "Bigamy is against the law. And how do you explain dragging my maid along against her will? It will be our word against yours."

  "I'll just say you're a loose pair of whores who both took a fancy to me. By the time they ever catch up with us, I'll know every inch of both your bodies, so it will be me who sounds the more credible."

  "What, with both of us full of bruises and broken bones? Because that's how we'll look. We're not just going to submit to you meekly."

  He laughed and grinned evilly. "If you ain't afraid for yourself, you will be for each other. You don't behave yourself, I'll torment her. You don't behave yourself, little Mary, your mistress here is going to suffer my anger, and it won't be pretty."

  The maid began to whimper piteously again.

  Charlotte's temper snapped. "Oh for God's sake, Mary. There are two of us, and only one of him. Where are your guts? We can fight him!"

  Herbert jeered again, but Charlotte looked at the terrified maid so desperately that the girl took heart. When the coach lurched over a pothole, flinging Herbert off balance, they both hurled themselves forward upon him, each grabbing an arm and pushing it wide.

  One gun discharged into the side of the coach above Mary's head, while the other ended up in Charlotte's hand. She quickly rammed it under his chin.

  "Don't move! I'll use this, and gladly, if you so much as twitch. Mary, your stockings, please. Tie him up, tightly."

  But Mary's response was to scream and begin moving to the opposite side of the coach, far away from the cliffs below on her right.

  Charlotte's eyes widened in horror. The shot which had exploded inside the carriage must have injured or killed their driver, for the vehicle was now lurching precariously on the edge of the precipice, and picking up speed as the terrified horses plunged on.

  They were now being bounced about like fish in a rolling barrel.

  Charlotte snatched at the door handle and twisted. Herbert made a grab for the gun. She swung it hard, catching him full on the nose and stunning him for a moment.

  The wheels went over a large rock, tilting the vehicle dangerously, sending her flying upwards. She twisted to her left and landed on her rump on the floor of the coach, her legs half way out the open door.

  "Come on, Mary, follow me!"

  "I can't jump, I can't," she wept.

  "It's going over! Come on, Mary!"

  Charlotte tried to reach for the girl, but she was jolted out of her grasp. She could feel the coach lurching violently downwards. With a hasty prayer, she heaved herself out onto the road with both hands, and rolled.

  Mary tried to follow suit, but it was already too late. She hit a boulder some ways down from the cliff edge, and tumbled about another hundred feet, snapping her neck.

  Herbert shrieked and bellowed as he was tumbled round and round in the carriage, and fell to his death, dashed onto the rocks below.

  Charlotte dragged herself up from the ground, and sat back down again abruptly. Her head was spinning, and the shock of her near-death experience now hit her with full force.

  Poor Mary had panicked and been killed. Paxton's terrified screams echoed in her ears.

  It could have been her. And then she would never have seen her beloved Thomas again...

  Charlotte doubled over and was violently ill. She sat retching weakly until she was sure she would turn inside out with the spasmodic heaves.

  At last she heard another sound other than that of her own wrenching sobs. It was the sound of a cart approaching from the opposite direction.

  "Please, please help me, there's been a terrible accident!" she called to the old man coming down the road.

  He could see the wreckage below, and the young girl struggling to get to her feet on legs limp as windswept wheat stalks.

  "Oh my God, those poor souls. Come up here, Miss. I'll take you into the nearest village to fetch help."

  "Thank you." She accepted his offer of a hand up. Together they managed to get her trembling body into the back. She stretched out on the straw as she struggled for breath. She sent up a prayer to Heaven for having spared her, and begged the Lord to look out for Thomas, wherever he was.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  At Eltham, Thomas had been fighting the blaze at the village for some time when a grim sense of foreboding overtook him. The conflagration had been no accident. Someone had set fire to the cottages. For what reason?

  He caught sight of Charlotte's aunt, avidly watching the disaster, almost licking her lips in delight.

  Oh my God.

  To get him away from his wife, of course!

  He ran to his mount, tethered some distance away under a tree, and raced back to the house as fast as the stallion could go. Once he arrived at the Castle, he made a frenzied search from room to room. But there was no escaping the grim fact. Charlotte was gone.

  Thomas snatched his warmest coat and cloak out of the wardrobe, pausing just long enough to stare at the bed he had shared with Charlotte only the night before. He noticed that the maid had not been in to tidy the rooms. The covers had been thrown back, but there was no sign of violence, anything having been disturbed. He went back into her room. A breakfast tray lay untouched. His dressing gown was there too. Nothing appeared damaged.

  Then he spotted the tear, the tugged out hair, the scattered hairpins. Damn it, the bastard had taken his wife!

  He prayed again for God to keep her safe. His poor love. So young, so beautiful. She did love him. Last night had proven that.

  So if she was not here, where was she? She would never have gone willingly. The fire must have been deliberate. That bastard had taken her, and he was going to pay.

  But where could they have gone?

  He knew time was of the essence. He had to find Charlotte at once. God only knew what would happen if he didn't.

  He leapt onto his horse, and rode back into the village. "My wife, she's gone," he panted to the men gathered around the burning cottages. "She's been abducted. Leave the fire. It's not important, not compared to her. Or any other life here. Anyone who can ride, follow me back to the house."

  As he rode back to wait, he tried to reason out what Herbert's next move would be. It would be easy enough to head to London, but he could be sure that Thomas would not leave any house unsearched in his bid to find his wife. She would fight and do her best to come home to him. Far better to take her to a place which would be much more difficult to escape from. More isolated so that she would not be able to summon help...

  Thomas looked at the map on his desk, and then at his tenants' concerned faces. "I think he's heading into Wales, possibly on his way to Ireland. We need to go west. We'll send for my friends Jonathan and Clifford at Millcote as well. Let's head out."

  The mounted men were all ready to leave in a trice, and Thomas led the group of thirty men as they thundered o
ut of the gates. At Brimley Market Cross they split up, covering the four compass points to find some clue as to where Paxton had taken her.

  Thomas looked around for a moment, and then headed west.

  He sent a man up the lane to Clifford's. He came at once, outraged and eager to help. Luck was on their side, for the road in front of Stone Court was well traveled, and an old carter had seen the rented coach trundle through not that long before.