“I have to go back to the estate to see if he’s there,” she said, marching past Christopher and back into the inn.
“My lady, if you will forgive me for saying so, that is madness,” Christopher said, staying hard on her heels. “As you said, Shayles is home. I know you do not have much experience with the blackguard, but I can assure you, he is the worst sort of villain.”
“I know,” Angelica said, dodging her way through the busy common room to the lobby.
“He is particularly dangerous for women, for a woman such as yourself, to take on,” Christopher insisted.
Angelica paused in the lobby, pivoting to face Christopher, who nearly slammed into her in his failure to stop as quickly as she had.
“Lord Shayles may be a formidable foe,” she said, “but he has never seen the likes of me. He may very well cower in terror when he sees what I’m made of.”
It felt good to assert her power again, to reject the worry and anxiety. She grasped hold of her old determination never to be a victim again, even though a tiny voice at the back of her head warned her to listen to Christopher, to listen to Mark, to listen to reason.
“That is all well and good, my lady,” Christopher started.
He wasn’t given a chance to finish.
“Lady Gatwick?” the clerk behind the inn’s front desk asked, even though he looked loath to interrupt the conversation. When Angelica turned toward him, eyebrow raised in both question and indignation, he rushed on with, “Lord Gatwick left this for you.”
He held up a folded piece of paper.
With a sudden rush of anger, fear, and longing, Angelica leapt toward the desk and snatched the letter out of the clerk’s hand. She opened it and scanned Mark’s written words with a burst of frustration so powerful and so sudden that she had to stop and reread the letter to grasp its full impact.
“My dearest Angel,” it began. “I know you will not understand, nor will you forgive me, but I am going to Ravencrest Hall to end this madness with Shayles once and for all. My hope is that Sir Christopher Dowland will have arrived to take you home by the time you receive this letter. Please go with him and do not come after me. This is my cross to bear and my battle to bring to an end. I have left the inevitable for too long. I cannot continue in inaction. Shayles’s reign of terror must end, but you must also stay safe. I can only hope that I have given you the child that I know you have longed for. Blackmoor Close and everything in it is yours, now and forever. I do what I do now to secure your future and your happiness. Your beloved, Mark.”
Angelica gasped for breath, pressing a hand to her stomach. “That—” She didn’t know whether to call Mark a vile name or to bless him for going to such extremes to protect her. Either way, his actions—which he must have seen as a heroic sacrifice—had to be stopped. “I can’t let him do this,” she hissed, marching for the door.
“You can’t stop him,” Christopher said, jumping after her and blocking her from the door with his body.
“Get out of my way, Sir Christopher,” Angelica said, her voice shaking with fury.
“I cannot,” Christopher said. “Not if you intend to fly off to Ravencrest Hall in pursuit of your husband.”
Angelica glared at him. He must have read at least part of the letter over her shoulder. “I do intend to,” she insisted. “And if you do not move this instant, I will barrel right through you in order to do so.”
Christopher held up his hands. “I won’t stop you if you are indeed that determined,” he said. “But please, I beg of you, allow me to accompany you.”
Angelica blinked in surprise. She never would have expected the amiable man to offer to march into hell with her.
“And if we do go,” he continued, “we cannot simply charge in without a plan.”
Angelica took a steadying breath. “You will not try to stop me?” she asked him, still wary. In her experience, even if they sounded agreeable, men rarely let women take any sort of action from a position of strength. Other than Mark and Grandpa Miles, she hadn’t met a single man who cared to admit that women could be strong at all.
Christopher’s stance softened, as though whatever initial danger he’d felt had passed. “There was a man, a chief-inspector of Scotland Yard, who worked with my friends to bring Shayles to justice. Detective Jack Craig. He is in London, but it’s early still, and if we send him a telegram, what with the way trains run these days, he may be able to be here by supper.”
“Supper?” Angelica’s brow rose in indignation. “That’s far too long. If Mark went to Ravencrest Hall—” She stopped, whipping back to face the clerk behind the desk. “When did Lord Gatwick leave this message for me?” she demanded.
“Before dawn,” the clerk answered, stammering in shock at being addressed so forcefully. “Not more than an hour and a half ago.”
Angelica nodded, then spun back to Christopher. “He must already be at Ravencrest Hall,” she said, her stomach roiling. “He may already have confronted Lord Shayles. It may be too late, even for us. There is no time to send for a Scotland Yard inspector.”
“We can still proceed to Ravencrest Hall on our own,” Christopher said. “But we should send for Det. Craig all the same. We should involve the local police as well.”
“Against Ravencrest Hall?” the clerk interrupted. He shook his head as Angelica and Christopher turned to him. “They won’t get involved in anything over there. Not now, not never.”
Angelica clenched her jaw in fury. From the little she knew, that sounded right. Lord Shayles must have had some kind of devil’s deal with the local authorities to keep them out of his business.
“All the more reason to telegraph Det. Craig,” Christopher argued. “We can send the telegram immediately, then proceed to Ravencrest Hall on our own.”
“Telegraph office is located in the station house, right across the street,” the clerk butted in yet again.
This time, Angelica was more grateful than furious at the young man. She sent him a look, then glanced to Christopher as she started for the door. There was no time to lose, but if the local authorities had been cowed into inaction, perhaps reinforcements from London would be necessary.
As bitter a pill as it was to swallow, having Sir Christopher with her sped things along in ways Angelica never could have accomplished on her own. He sent the telegram—paying for it from his own pocket, as Angelica had forgotten to bring money with her—then convinced a local tradesman to drive them to the gates of Ravencrest Hall. The man refused to take them to the front door, but he took them far enough.
Angelica’s sense of dread instantly deepened as they reached the house after a long walk up the front drive. The massive front door had been locked tight the day before, when she and Mark had first arrived, but it was open now. Not only unlocked, but listing open by a few inches.
“This doesn’t bode well,” Christopher said, pushing the door open farther.
Angelica held her tongue over the painfully obvious comment, storming into the house. The faint smell of smoke lingered in the air, but the hallway as far as she could see was as pristine as it had been the day before—meaning it still had an air of dusty abandonment.
“Lord Shayles, where are you?” she called out. “I’ve come for my husband.”
Her declaration echoed eerily through the abandoned halls. It was met with silence. The hair on the back of Angelica’s neck stood up.
The echoing silence stretched for so long that Christopher turned to Angelica and asked, “What do you want to do?”
She answered his question by heading for the stairs. Christopher followed her. Their footsteps thumped in the silence. Surely Lord Shayles could hear them coming. Surely Mark could as well, if he’d reached the house before them. Unless he was being held captive somehow.
That thought quickened Angelica’s steps as they reached the top of the stairs. She rushed through the receiving room that she and Mark had passed through the day before and into the long hallway at the other end.
The doors to most of the rooms were shut, as she and Mark had left them before, but they hardly mattered. If Lord Shayles and Mark were anywhere in the house, they would be where the painting was.
She picked up her pace, breaking into a jog. Another wave of dread hit her when she spotted the open door to Lord Shayles’s bedroom. She skittered to a halt when she reached it, peering into the room.
“Dear Lord,” she gasped at the sight that met her.
The painting was gone. Shattered glass covered the carpet in front of the fireplace where it had hung the day before. Some of the shards of glass bore traces of blood around the edges.
“There’s been a struggle,” Christopher said, taking a tentative step into the room. “Look.”
Angelica glanced to the bed, where he was pointing. Its hangings were askew, and the corner of the coverings had clearly been tugged, as though someone had grabbed hold for purchase as they tumbled to the floor. Flecks of blood covered the fabric, but there was no way to tell whose blood it was.
“What’s that?” Christopher asked, stepping deeper into the room.
Angelica swallowed hard, then looked. A section of the wall was cracked open. She’d mistaken that section for a door the night before. It was the door Shayles had appeared from.
Christopher crossed through the room, broken glass crunching under his boots as he went. When he reached the open wall, he said, “It’s a secret passage.” He glanced uncomfortably at Angelica. “They went this way.”
Angelica lurched into motion, walking gingerly over the glass to join Christopher. The passageway behind the wall was dark, but not so dark that she couldn’t see the trail of blood leading down a narrow flight of stairs. Her heart pounded in her ears. Whatever had happened to Mark, it was imperative that they found him and Lord Shayles as fast as possible.
Chapter 18
“And that is for informing the Duke of Westerfield that I was balls-deep in his wife’s ass,” Shayles growled, slashing Mark across the chest with his dagger.
Mark barely flinched at the cut. He’d given up flinching two dozen slices ago. There wasn’t any point in protesting or even reacting anymore. The pain of the slashes had melded into one, never-ending, dizzying sting.
“And another for intervening when I was about to lay the man flat.” Shayles lashed out, cutting Mark again.
Shayles had been waiting for him when he’d come to call at dawn. He hadn’t answered the door, but the moment Mark set foot in the house, he knew Shayles was aware of him. He’d been like a mouse willingly walking into a trap as he climbed the stairs to the first floor of Ravencrest Hall and walked through the receiving room and hallway, like a man going to the gallows.
It had come as no surprise to him that Shayles was waiting, sprawled in a chair that faced the cold fireplace and the glass-encased painting of Kitty. He’d been disheveled and unkempt, with dark circles under his eyes and a twitch in his temple that hinted he hadn’t slept all night.
As soon as Mark stepped through the door, he’d attacked.
“And this is for helping that pitiful what’s-her-name escape from my club.” Shayles lashed out again, another cut shredding Mark’s shirt and adding to the blossom of red as his blood spilled.
Mark wasn’t certain who Shayles was talking about. Part of him doubted Shayles knew either. But that didn’t stop him from inflicting pain. The man apparently took the phrase “death by a thousand cuts” literally. Mark’s head swam with pain and blood loss.
“And that—” Shayles slashed the blade across Mark’s face, causing him to wince. “That’s for no reason at all.”
Shayles stumbled back, panting as he stared at Mark, on his knees in the grass beside one of Ravencrest Hall’s ponds. He’d bound Mark’s hands behind his back as soon as he’d jumped him in the bedroom. The whole thing had happened so suddenly that Mark hadn’t had the presence of mind to fight back, even though he could feel how weak Shayles was. He wasn’t certain if he would have fought back. Every blow, every slice, every ounce of pain he felt was deeply deserved.
“Well?” Shayles demanded. He wiped his sleeve across his mouth and continued to breathe heavily. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”
Mark looked up at him, meeting his eyes. Shayles was clearly out of his mind. He’d been out of his mind for almost as long as Mark had known him. He saw that now. Madness was nothing but evil left unchecked. What surprised him was how calm he now felt in the face of such madness.
“No,” he said at last, no emotion in his voice.
Shayles’s face contorted in rage. He roared forward, kicking Mark in the gut. The blow was enough to double him over and leave him gasping for breath. He fell to his side, his chest and arms stinging as the dozens of cuts that had torn his flesh to pieces kissed the dew-damp grass. He concentrated on breathing, concentrated on feeling the pain, accepting it, and letting it pass.
“Get up, you worm,” Shayles shouted into the blackness that threatened to envelop Mark, pacing around him. “Get up and face your master.”
Mark clenched his jaw, gathering what strength he had left.
“Get up,” Shayles yelled a second time.
Slowly, Mark marshalled his strength. He shifted to his knees, his chest and arms a blanket of pain, and steadied himself before straightening. He didn’t do it because Shayles commanded it, he held himself upright because he fully intended to face death proudly.
Proud. He wanted Angelica to be proud of him. He wanted her to mourn him as the man who had sacrificed himself so that she could have the life she deserved. More than that, he squared his shoulders and tilted his chin up because he wanted to meet his father as the man he was supposed to be. He wanted, for once in his life, to be the rock that he’d never had to cling to.
“Say something,” Shayles growled. “Beg me for mercy.”
Mark kept his jaw hard and his lips pressed tightly shut.
“Beg me to spare your life,” Shayles demanded.
He finished a circle around Mark, then rushed at him, grabbing him by his hair and tilting his head back to hold the knife to his throat. Mark’s only reaction was to suck in a breath of shock. He schooled himself to steadiness as soon as he accepted his helplessness.
“Don’t you want to live?” Shayles pressed him. “Don’t you want to go back to your lovely wife so that you can fuck her senseless? Or do you want me to do that for you?”
A tremor of rage reverberated through Mark, but he kept his mouth shut. He would not bow to Shayles’s baiting. The more he said about Angelica the greater danger he would put her in.
“If you’re going to kill me, get it over with,” he hissed, staring straight up as Shayles’s knife snicked across the skin of his throat.
“Oh, no,” Shayles cooed, seemingly calmed and fueled by Mark’s words. “I’m going to make you suffer first, as you made me suffer.”
He let go of Mark’s head, knocking him off-balance as he stalked back and began to pace around Mark once more. Somehow, Mark managed to stay upright. He could feel blood trickling from the line Shayles had carved in his throat and the cut across his face, but it was just one more stab of pain on top of a lifetime of bitter cuts.
“I’ve lost everything because of you,” Shayles sneered, making Mark dizzy as he circled. “My money, my club, my freedom. I want you to experience every bit of the humiliation I felt in that prison. Men who aren’t worthy to lick my boots telling me when to get up, when to lie down, when to eat, when to piss. I will not be denied my freedom again.”
No, Mark thought to himself. Not if he had anything to do with it. If his plan succeeded, neither of them would walk away from the pond that morning.
“You’ve been the cause of all my misery for years,” Shayles seethed on. “You held me back when I should have excelled. You steered me in a thousand wrong directions when I knew full well where I wanted to go.”
Mark blinked in spite of his determination to remain still and expressionless. He couldn’t recall ever doing su
ch a thing. Shayles had only ever done exactly what he wanted whenever he wanted to. He had hurt and destroyed people without impunity for decades. Mark had been helpless to stop him.
And yet, every one of the vicious slashes across his chest and arms seemed to tell a different story. Each time Shayles had drawn blood, it had been in response to some imagined offense Mark had inflicted on him. And they were legion. Enough to cloud his mind with pain as sweat mingled with blood, stinging him. The more pain Mark felt, the more long-buried memories had surfaced. He had held Shayles back. The man was a monster, but he could have been so much worse.
“Say something,” Shayles shouted, repeating the cycle they’d been stuck in since dawn, since the moment they’d met. “You have no right to stay silent when I want to hear you whimpering.”
Mark turned his head to follow Shayles in his pacing. “That was always your greatest flaw.”
“What?” Shayles roared, his eyes going wide with indignation.
“You always needed an audience. You always needed the encouragement and praise of others.” The truth was suddenly clear. For all those years, as far back as university, Shayles had always played to the crowd of his cronies. Even if the audience had fallen away over time. Mark was the only one who had stayed. Shayles had never pushed him away, never grown tired of him. And ultimately, Mark had been the instrument of his undoing.
Shayles must have sensed some version of the truth as well. He growled, lashing out again. His knife dug deep into Mark’s cheek, so close to his left eye that a jolt of fear pulsed through him. He didn’t want to lose his sight. He didn’t want to die.
That thought bolstered him, even if it didn’t shake the bedrock of his belief that the end was near. “Everything that has happened to you, you’ve brought on yourself,” he said, as calm as if they were discussing poetry in a library. “You could have cast me off at any time, but you needed me.”
October Revenge Page 20
