And with those words, she knew she absolutely had to fight. He meant her harm. With her very last breath, she could not stop fighting him!
Spots danced before her eyes and the edges of her vision blurred. Realizing how close she inched toward swooning, she bucked against him in one fierce surge of strength.
He cursed. His arms loosened and she broke free for a fraction of a moment before he snatched her by the back of the head, digging his fingers deep into her hair. He spun her around and slapped her soundly in the face.
Her head snapped back. She bit the inside of her cheek, and the copper tang of blood filled her mouth, running over her teeth in a warm, metallic flood.
Stunned from the blow, Grier fell limp, the struggle temporarily gone from her.
Malcolm swung her up in his arms like a limp doll and secured her inside the carriage. She was dimly aware of the door closing and his weight dropping down beside her.
The carriage started to move, swaying her on the squabs, and she panicked, a fist wringing her heart. Seized with the need to act, she jumped upright, fighting the surge of dizziness.
She flung her body at the door, grappling for the latch, her hair a wild tangle around her.
“Oh no you don’t!” Malcolm’s hand grabbed her by the back of the neck and shoved her forward, crashing her head into the carriage door with crushing force.
Her body crumpled, pain vibrating in her skull.
She toppled back onto the carriage floor as though every bone in her body had suddenly dissolved, was nothing more than liquid.
Unable to move, helpless in her own skin, she gazed up at the carriage ceiling as darkness crept over her in a descending fog from which she could never escape. Sev. Her lips moved numbly around his name.
Malcolm’s face filled her hazy vision.
She lifted a hand in a weak attempt to strike him, to claw at his shadowy face, but she never made contact. Her hand fell limply at her side, dead weight.
And then there was nothing.
Evening light trickled through the damask drapes as Sev faced his future father-in-law in his well-appointed library.
“What do you mean you can’t find her?” he demanded. “She’s not a glove to be lost.”
“She’s not here,” Jack repeated, waving his hands. “She took no carriage. All the mounts are accounted for in the stables. She’s gone.”
Cleo cleared her throat from where she sat in shadow near the window. She was elegantly attired in a grand gown fringed with satiny pink rosettes, ostensibly ready for their evening at the theater. It only served to remind him of the evening he would not be sharing with Grier.
He stared pointedly at Cleo. “Did you want to say something? Do you know where Grier is?”
“I didn’t want to say anything sooner, but as you’re here now . . . clearly something has gone amiss.”
“You know something of Grier’s whereabouts?” Jack snapped. “We’ve been looking for her for hours now and you haven’t uttered a word,”
Cleo ignored Jack, training her gaze on Sev. “She received a letter this afternoon . . . from you. I assumed you were together all this time.”
His heart stuttered in his chest before it picked up speed and began racing. “I didn’t send her any note.”
“She rushed from the room as soon as it was delivered. She didn’t say, but I suspected that the two of you planned to rendezvous.”
“Who delivered it?” His gaze yanked to Jack. “Assemble all the servants at once.”
With a quick nod, Jack marched from the room, bellowing for his butler.
In moments, Sev stood on the bottom steps of the grand staircase, overlooking two dozen liveried servants. Their upturned faces watched him warily. A few whispered among themselves—until Cleo quickly pointed out the girl who had delivered the note to Grier that morning, and a hush fell as all eyes swung to her.
“There she is. Marie.” At Cleo’s announcement, the whispering began anew.
Sev stepped down one more step and addressed her in an even voice, trying to hide his anxiousness lest she become even more agitated. “Marie, did you deliver a note today to Miss Grier?”
She muttered something softly beneath her breath, her wide eyes fearful. Sev cocked his head in an effort to better hear her and resisted the urge to storm across the foyer and grab her by the arms and give her the shake his tightly stretched nerves urged him to do. He’d have nothing out of her if she was too frightened to speak.
“Speak up, girl. Answer him!” Jack growled, making her jump.
Sev flicked him an annoyed look and moved into the mass of servants to stand before the cowering maid. Ducking his head, he connected with her fearful gaze. Using a gentle voice, he asked, “Who gave you the note to give to Miss Hadley?”
“He was out back. Just a driver. He asked me to deliver the letter for his master. I didn’t see him though . . . the gentleman was waiting inside the carriage.”
Sev swept his gaze over everyone in the foyer. “Did no one see Miss Hadley outside?”
“I saw her through an upstairs window,” a maid volunteered. “She was behind the house, talking to a gentleman.”
“Who?” Sev demanded.
The servant shook her capped head. “I’ve never seen him before and I would have remembered for certain.”
“Why?” Sev pressed, desperate for some clue, something, anything that would lead him to Grier. “Why would you have remembered him?”
“Well, it was his hair. It was a really bright red—almost hurt my eyes to look upon it.”
Red hair. So bright it could hurt one’s eyes. He knew one such man. Or rather, he didn’t know him. Not in the least. Not if he would abduct Grier.
“Malcolm,” he breathed. A myriad of feelings flooded him. Betrayal. Confusion. Why would Malcolm steal Grier away? Simply because he didn’t wish Sev to marry her? He couldn’t wrap his head around it.
Even as he failed to understand why, the reality of the situation pressed down on him.
She was gone.
Malcolm took her . . . could harm her . . .
Impotent rage burned through him. His hands curled into fists at his sides until he wanted to break something. Namely his cousin.
“Your cousin?” Cleo angled her head “What would he want with Grier?”
“To keep us from marrying, I suspect. He wasn’t keen on our match . . . unfortunately now I realize just how much.”
Jack blustered, various shades of red and purple churning over his face. “If he harms one hair on her head—”
“She will come to no harm,” Sev swiftly cut in, his voice an icy wind, even as he knew nothing anymore. Not the ground he stood upon, not the gnawing fear inside him.
He never suspected Malcolm would do such a thing. Why should he care so much whom Sev married? It didn’t affect him.
“Where did he take her?” Cleo echoed his own thoughts, looking at him with expectation bright in her eyes. As though he should know.
Sev shook his head, despising that he didn’t. That this terrible thing had somehow come to pass and he hadn’t seen it coming.
“You don’t know?” Jack bellowed.
“No. He didn’t exactly inform me of his plan to abduct my fiancée.” He dragged a hand through his hair. “Look,” he said in a calm voice that reflected none of his turmoil. “He doesn’t know I know that he took her.”
As much as he wanted to do something, scour the vastness of London and the world beyond—that would be senseless. He hadn’t a clue where to begin searching.
“So? What does that help?” Jack snapped.
“He’ll return. With nothing to fear, Malcolm shall return. Either here or to his mother’s residence.”
“So we wait?” Cleo shook her head, looking as frustrated as he felt.
“We haven’t
another choice.” As much as he loathed the idea of doing nothing and sitting around while Malcolm did God knew what to Grier, he saw no other solution.
He’d wait.
And be ready for Malcolm when he returned.
True fear flickered across Cleo’s young face. “While we wait your cousin could be doing anything—”
“We’ll wait out his return,” Sev cut in, not wanting to discuss the wretched scenarios already playing out in his thoughts—all the possible horrors that Grier could be suffering at his cousin’s hands.
“I don’t think Malcolm will harm her,” he said, even though he knew no such thing but felt the need to placate Grier’s sister.
“He abducted her. I’m certain you didn’t think he would do that, either!” Hot color splashed Cleo’s cheeks.
“No. I confess, I did not,” he replied uneasily, admitting that he did not know his cousin at all.
“What if he kills her,” Jack grimly inserted with no care for anyone’s feelings. “While we wait, as you suggest, what if your cousin decides to kill my daughter?”
A tremor ran through Sev as he was forced to meet the possibility. As he was forced to recognize that a piece of himself would die, too. That nothing would matter to him in the event of Grier’s death—not his life, not his future.
Nothing would ever matter again.
Instead of answering, he turned and motioned to five strapping-looking grooms watching them as if they were street performers putting on a grand show. “You five there.” He snapped off directions to his Aunt Nesha’s rooms in Seven Dials. “Wait there in case my cousin returns. Watch the street for him. I want him and the driver that conveys him. Do not let the driver leave, do you understand? If my cousin proves unwillingly to talk, good coin should break the driver’s silence. Come, I’ll put you all in a carriage.”
“And where are you going to be?”
“At my townhouse. I suspect he’ll return there. Better lodgings and finer fare. I’ll be in wait for him and his driver. One way or another, I’ll have him. And Grier’s whereabouts.”
“Don’t think things will go light for you if something befalls my daughter, Maksimi. You’ll not find another bride so easily when everyone hears you’re responsible for killing the last one.”
“Father,” Cleo whispered harshly, her wide eyes horrified at his blunt words. “He didn’t intend for any of this to happen.”
“But it did happen. All because of him.”
Sev stopped in his tracks but didn’t turn around. Rage coursed through him, hot and acrid as the fear he battled inside himself for Grier.
Jack Hadley was completely correct. Sev was at fault here. He should have seen, should have somehow known his cousin was as rotten as his sire.
But Jack was wrong to think Sev would ever try to replace Grier. Grier was more to him than a bridal settlement. She could not be replaced.
Perhaps Grier thought the same thing that Jack did. His stomach churned uncomfortably at the notion. Perhaps she didn’t know what he was just discovering standing in the middle of Jack Hadley’s foyer with gawking servants all around him.
He was in love with Grier Hadley.
He’d fallen totally and irrevocably in love with the most unseemly female of his acquaintance.
For no other reason had he offered her marriage. For no other reason would it break him if something happened to her. If he lost her from his life, he would be lost as well.
Chapter Twenty-five
When Grier woke she wasn’t certain she was not in fact still sleeping. Trapped in darkness, she considered that maybe she dreamed, caught in some state between sleep and waking, the air as deep and pulsing as a night in the thickest woods.
She shivered as the cold penetrated her consciousness. The icy wet saturated her bones and she knew this was no dream.
Memory flooded her. She saw Malcolm’s face, remembered his cruel hands, the sting of his slap on her face.
Blinking, she peered into the penetrating dark. It seemed lighter to her left. She listened hard, trying to glean something about her surroundings. Nothing. The silence was deafening. That ruled out Town. Even in her room at night the sounds of life in the city prevailed, a living, breathing thing all around her. Wherever she was the air was still, dormant.
Wincing at the throbbing pain in her head, she pushed up with her hands. Grit and dirt scraped her palms. The floorboards creaked beneath the pressure.
Footsteps suddenly sounded. She froze, considering dropping back down and feigning sleep, but the door slammed open. Light flooded the small room. It was too late. Malcolm stood on the threshold, gazing down at her.
“You’re awake. I began to wonder if maybe I’d hit you too hard.”
Grier rose to a sitting position. “Why are you doing this?
“Because you can’t marry Sev,” he snapped, stepping deeper into the room.
“Why not?” Her gaze moved beyond him, calculating her chances of making it past him.
“No one can. At least not until our grandfather is dead.”
Grier pushed herself unsteadily to her feet. “I don’t understand.”
“Did Sev not tell you about me? That I’m the black sheep of the family? Or at least my father was. My grandfather banished my father, humiliated and shamed my parents—me.” He gestured wildly and paced the room. “That old bastard wants the satisfaction of seeing Sev married before he dies? He would like to go to his final rest knowing the Maksimi line is secured? Well, he shall not have such peace. I’ve waited years to make that old man suffer. I’ll make bloody hell certain of that.”
Grier moistened her lips, quite convinced she was in the hands of a madman. He would thwart Sev’s matrimonial goals for the sake of disappointing their grandfather. No. She doubted he’d stop there. He was too obsessed with devastating the king. She wouldn’t put it past him to try and destroy Sev. He was simply warming up with her. She doubted he would ever let Sev return to Maldania alive.
“But weren’t you encouraging Sev to court Lady Libbie?”
“Of course. Because I knew it would go nowhere.” The light from the main room cast one side of his face into relief while the other side stayed hidden in shadow. “I’d heard rumors. Servants talk. I knew she was sneaking about with her father’s groom. I didn’t anticipate she would run away with him quite so soon, however.”
Grier shook her head and then stopped at the sudden lancing pain.
Malcolm continued, his voice taking on an accusatory whine. “You weren’t even to be considered.”
She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders, glad that the motion didn’t make her feel instantly ill. “What do you intend to do with me then?” she demanded. “Hide me away until your grandfather finally expires?”
Malcolm crossed his arms, the motion as petulant as a child. “I hadn’t quite thought as far as that. I was simply determined to keep you from sailing for Maldania.”
Grier nodded and edged closer to the door. The fact that he hadn’t yet decided what to do with her didn’t bode well. She didn’t intend to stick around waiting for him to make up his mind.
Although he hadn’t said it, it was there, a dark shadow lurking in the back of her mind. He could simply kill her to be rid of her.
No one would ever know the truth. Her disappearance would forever be a mystery. She would simply have vanished.
Sev would never know. Not what happened to her. Not that she loved him. Her stomach lurched sickly.
She watched Malcolm, her chest tightening almost painfully. She shoved tangled strands of hair from her face and took a bracing breath.
He paced the room, tugging at the ends of his hair as if he might tug free a solution from that mad mind of his. Every once in a while he’d shoot her a measuring glance, seemingly unaware that she had been moving at a cautious, crawling pace toward the door, her
fingers twitching at her sides as her nerves snapped and trembled throughout her.
“I can’t believe Sev actually decided to marry you! This shouldn’t have happened.” He sliced the murky air angrily with one hand. “He’s the bloody crown prince and he should damn well act like it!”
She couldn’t help rolling her eyes as she inched closer yet toward the door leading into the well-lit room from which he’d emerged.
“You’ve bewitched him! Snared him in your woman’s web . . . just like that whore who tempted my father so many years ago and then cried rape after he took what she offered!” His eyes glittered with a frightening faraway light and Grier swallowed against the sudden bitter taste in her throat. “I should take you myself . . . see what the great allure of you is.”
She stiffened, her pulse spiking into a feverish rhythm against the flesh of her throat. Her every muscle tensed, bracing for an attack.
Without looking at her he continued, as if he had not just voiced that he might like to assault her. “If I didn’t fear that you would weave a spell on me, I would.” His lips twisted into a snarling grin. “I should like to take something that is Sevastian’s . . . arrogant bastard. He doesn’t know what it’s like to suffer, to have everything taken away. . . .”
Grier refrained from pointing out that Sev had spent the last ten years fighting a war in which he lost his own brother, countless friends and comrades. Malcolm was past the point of reason. He was deteriorating—making less and less sense as he paced back and forth in the small room, his boots scuffing the grimy wood planks.
Again, her gaze darted to the lighted room beyond. She didn’t know what waited outside the meager dwelling he’d taken her to, but she knew her odds were better out there than here with him.
As Malcolm dove into another diatribe on all the injustices delivered to him and his family, she sucked in a deep breath and bolted for the door.
Adrenaline rushed her veins at his shout. She cleared the door into the main room and skirted a small table, her gaze locking on the single door. Her hand grasped the latch. She yanked the door open in one clean pull and burst outdoors.
Wicked in Your Arms Page 20
