October Revenge

by Farmer, Merry

  “I did not.” Shayles laughed dismissively, but his eyes flashed with misgiving. “Don’t give yourself airs. You are no more important to me than a beggar on the street.”

  Mark stared unblinkingly at him, unmoving in his opinions.

  “You are nothing, do you hear me?” Shayles barked at him, rushing forward and grabbing a handful of Mark’s tattered, bloody shirt. “You are no better than…than a kitten I drowned in the river for fun.”

  A slow, menacing smile split his face, and he studied Mark as though waiting for a breakdown he was certain would follow. When Mark failed to take the bait, when he did nothing but stare back at him, Shayles lost his grin.

  It was quickly replaced by another, more sinister smile.

  “You’re no better than that whore I fucked.”

  He threw his arm to the side, pointing with his knife to the painting of Kitty. It lay in the grass a few yards away, tilted just enough so that Mark could see Kitty’s beautiful, innocent face staring back at him as Shayles tortured him. Mark swallowed, unable to keep his fury in check as he glared at Shayles.

  Shayles seemed to feed off his anger. “She liked it, you know,” he said in a sharp, ugly voice. “I’m sure you remember the way she moaned and sighed with my cock so deep inside her.”

  “You raped her,” Mark said, his voice shaking. Inexplicable courage pulsed through him. He had never dared to name what Shayles had done, never dared to speak it aloud or call him on it.

  “She opened her legs for every one of us,” Shayles went on, seemingly unaffected by Mark’s accusation. Yet, there was something feral in his eyes, like a man who had been caught in the act, the light suddenly shining on him. “She begged for more. She wanted it like—”

  “You raped her,” Mark said, louder. “Every one of you. What you did to her was abominable. Her blood is on your hands. Her death was—”

  “Death?” Shayles cut him off, jerking back. He laughed. “What do you mean, death?”

  Mark swallowed, unable to answer.

  Shayles laughed harder. “Do you think she’s dead?” Shayles dashed to the side, snatching up the painting from the grass. He pointed at the sweet image of Kitty with his knife, as if threatening her. “Do you think your sweet Kitty is dead? That we murdered her after we enjoyed her or that she killed herself in despair?”

  Mark’s mouth fell open as his heart raced. All he knew for certain was that Kitty was sent away. He was certain he had learned she had hung herself only a few months after that horrible afternoon. He’d lived every moment of his life since believing he was responsible for her death. But the realization suddenly dawned on him that Shayles was the one who had informed him of Kitty’s death. Shayles the liar.

  “Where is she?” he demanded, his voice hoarse with fury.

  Shayles laughed. “Right here.” He poked at the painting with his knife, leaving a tiny slit on the painted scarf that covered Kitty’s hips. “Oops. We wouldn’t want to hurt the poor, dear thing, now would we?” Shayles taunted him.

  “She survived your torture,” Mark said, pulsing with renewed life. “The same can’t be said for you.”

  “You think so?” Shayles continued to taunt. He gazed at the painting, licking his lips. “Poor little Kitty. It’s a shame she isn’t here now. I would have her screaming in no time.” He brought the tip of his knife to the slit he’d already made, gesturing crudely, as if he were raping her all over again.

  Mark seethed. He hadn’t thought it was possible to hate the man more than he already did, but he’d been wrong.

  “Oh, don’t you like that?” Shayles asked him in a sing-song voice. “Do you want to save your sweet pussy? I mean, Kitty?” He offered the painting to Mark with a teasing laugh, the same laugh he’d had while watching his friends do their worst to Kitty all those years ago.

  The taunting continued for a few minutes until Shayles suddenly appeared to grow bored. When he did, he hurled the painting into the pond. Mark swallowed, praying that it would somehow survive the water. It floated with paradoxical gentleness in the morning sunlight.

  “And now for you, boy.” Shayles’s tone grew sinister once more as he stalked toward Mark, knife pointed at him. “I have no use for a disobedient dog who bites his master’s hand.”

  Mark tugged at the bonds holding his hands behind his back. He sensed the moment he’d been waiting for had come. He’d had no time to secure a weapon of his own before returning to Ravencrest Hall. He’d gambled on the hope Shayles would grow careless with his own weapon. Sure enough, the chance to wrest his knife away seemed to have come.

  “Beg for mercy,” Shayles demanded, grabbing the remains of Mark’s shirt once more and towering over him. He held his knife above Mark’s throat. “Apologize for everything you’ve done and beg me to end your life quickly. Otherwise….” He shifted both his grip on Mark and his knife to lower the blade to Mark’s crotch. “It would give me enormous pleasure to slice your cock and balls open and to watch you bleed to death, writing in agony. I haven’t enjoyed the entertainments I have in my life without learning how to inflict the maximum amount of pain over the longest amount of time possible.”

  Mark stayed as still as possible, only his hands wriggling behind him. Within seconds, he’d loosened Shayles’s shoddily-tied knot and freed his hands. He was a fraction of a second too slow. Shayles slashed down as he drew his hands out from behind him to push Shayles away.

  At the same time, Angelica’s piercing cry of, “Mark, no!” split the air.

  Chapter 19

  Angelica and Christopher followed the secret passage at the back of Lord Shayles’s bedroom down through the walls of the house. It let out into a grotesquely-decorated sitting room at the far corner of the house. The door leading to that room stood open, and a trail of fine droplets of blood told Angelica they were on the right track. They followed that trail down the hall and through the ballroom, where one of the French doors stood open.

  Once they were outside, however, the trail vanished. Either whoever had been bleeding had stopped—she knew it had to be Mark, although her heart hoped beyond hope that Lord Shayles was the one who had been injured—or they simply weren’t bleeding enough for the trail to be seen in the grass.

  “We’ll have to track them some other way,” Christopher said, bursting out onto the patio behind Angelica and following her onto the lawn. “They couldn’t have gone far.”

  Angelica prayed he was right. She could only guess at the horrors Lord Shayles was capable of. She knew little about the man, but she knew he was cruel. That was enough to send her pulse racing as she and Christopher searched the gardens closest to the house like a clock ticking away to midnight.

  “They went this way,” she gasped when she spotted Mark’s jacket splayed across a sloping hill that led to some of the ponds on the estate.

  Christopher broke away from the edge of a hedge maze he was investigating to rush to her side. He took the jacket from her and studied it for a moment before standing straighter and searching the area.

  “They certainly did,” he said at last, pointing down the slope.

  Christopher’s height must have enabled him to see what Angelica finally noticed once they charged down the slope. A dark shape came into view by the side of one of the ponds as they rounded a stand of bushes. As soon as it moved, Angelica knew it was Mark and Lord Shayles, locked in some sort of confrontation. Mark was on his knees, Lord Shayles towering over him, standing so close that the two could have been wrestling. But they were too still.

  Angelica picked up her skirts and broke into a run. Her worst fears were realized a moment later as Lord Shayles raised his hand and sunlight glinted off the long, red-tinged blade of a knife.

  “Mark, no!” she shouted as Lord Shayles shifted to slash downward across Mark’s body.

  What happened next was a blur. Fury pumped through Angelica as she charged for Lord Shayles. Mark pushed the man away, but fell back and was slow to get up. That only fueled Angelica�
�s anger. Without a thought for the consequences, barely remembering Lord Shayles was armed, she barreled into him, using the force of her momentum to knock the bastard to the ground.

  Lord Shayles let out a cry, and for one, glorious moment Angelica thought she’d knocked the wind out of him. She’d landed on top of him, pinning his knife hand between them. Lord Shayles’s face was twisted in shock. Angelica was so surprised to have bested him so easily that she wasn’t prepared for his burst of energy.

  Face still pinched and twisted in pain, he muscled her to the side, shifting their positions to press down on top of her.

  “This is a pleasant surprise,” he growled, dragging his knife hand up. The blade was slick with fresh blood, but he was unable to hold it against Angelica’s throat or heart. Instead, he was forced to use the fist clenched around the knife’s handle to hold her shoulder down as she writhed and fought to get out from under him. “Do you see, Gatwick?” he called over his shoulder, panting. “Your wife threw herself at me like a whore with an itchy cunny.”

  He dipped closer to her. The stink of his unwashed body and foul breath threatened to overpower her as he tried to kiss her. She turned her face away, but that didn’t stop the villain from licking her cheek.

  “Like café au lait,” he said, catching her jaw with his free hand and trying to force her to face him. “I’m going to enjoy lapping you up, my dear. Let’s see how loud I can make you scream for you husband.” He jerked his hips against hers.

  Memories poured back in on Angelica, thick and grotesque. Lord Shayles felt like the man who had held her down on a pile of crates in the warehouse and lifted her skirts in his attempt to violate her. The gasping helplessness she’d felt then threatened to overtake her now. That man had made her feel small and weak, just as Lord Shayles was trying to humiliate her into obedience now. She knew the tactic too well, knew how evil believed it could take whatever it wanted. But she was not weak, not anymore. She had fought back. She had learned and practiced for just such a moment. Knowing that every effort she’d made to strengthen herself, efforts people had derided her for, were worth it gave her a kind of courage no man could ever have.

  “Lady Gatwick,” Christopher called out, closing the distance and reaching as though he would yank Lord Shayles off of her.

  Angelica didn’t give him the chance. “You will not master me,” she growled and marshalled every last bit of her strength to jerk her knee up. She hit her mark, and Lord Shayles yelped and collapsed on top of her. He lost his grip on his knife as he doubled over, howling in pain.

  Angelica launched into action, gripping his arm and wrenching him to the side so that she could roll out from under him. Once she was free, she twisted, lunged at him, and grabbed his arm again, maneuvering it behind his back and pinning him face-down in the grass.

  “You’re pathetic,” she panted, wrenching his arm and planting a knee on his back. “Mark is ten times the man you are.”

  Mark. She caught her breath and turned toward him. Christopher had shifted directions, and instead of rushing to help her, he’d gone to Mark. He’d helped Mark to his feet, but the sight of her husband, pale and covered with blood, his shirt shredded, the lacerations across his chest, arms, and face on full view, unnerved her.

  “Mark,” she whimpered, her heart aching for him. She could only imagine what else Lord Shayles had done to him.

  Her moment of compassion was her undoing. Lord Shayles bucked against her, throwing her off-balance enough to jerk out of her grip. Angelica tumbled to the side as he scrambled for his knife.

  Mark launched toward them with a growl. He managed to kick the knife out of Lord Shayles’s reach before falling on him. For a moment, Angelica couldn’t tell if Mark had dropped deliberately to grapple with Lord Shayles or if his strength was so compromised that he tumbled. She was heartened when Lord Shayles attempted to wrestle Mark to the ground but Mark maintained his position pinning Lord Shayles.

  “You can torture and kill me,” he said in a gruff and hoarse voice, “but you will not lay a hand on my wife.”

  “Didn’t you see, Gatwick?” Shayles spat back, struggling to break free. “Your wife threw herself at me.”

  “Never,” Angelica shouted, rushing toward the grappling men.

  To her surprise, Christopher held her back. “It’s too dangerous,” he cautioned her.

  As Mark and Lord Shayles continued to struggle, Angelica whipped to Christopher with a look of indignation. “I will not stand by while my husband is in danger. You people who claim to support him have left him to battle alone for too long. I will not.”

  She pried herself out of Christopher’s grasp and lunged to Mark and Lord Shayles.

  She was a fraction of a moment too late. Mark had taken the upper hand. He’d also snatched up the knife from the grass and now held it to Lord Shayles’s throat, though his hand shook as he did.

  Lord Shayles burst into a weak, breathless laugh. “Do it,” he taunted Mark. “Kill me. It’s what you’ve always wanted to do, isn’t it?”

  Mark held his position, perfectly still, knife at Lord Shayles’s throat.

  “You’ve had murder in your eyes since the day we all fucked Kitty. You fucked her too, or don’t you remember? You’re as black-hearted as I am, so prove it. End my life and damn yourself in the process.”

  Angelica watched as Lord Shayles’s body lost its tension. He lay flat and defenseless as Mark hunched over him. More than that, Lord Shayles had gone completely pale, looking like a specter lying in the grass.

  Mark still said nothing. He didn’t move at all. He stared hard into Lord Shayles’s eyes as the blackguard gazed up at him. Angelica swayed on her spot, wanting to help Mark in every way she could, but feeling as paralyzed as he was.

  Until she noticed a wet, red stain on her skirt. She blinked, touching it. The stain was so close to her hips that for a moment she thought she’d hemorrhaged. But no, the blood was on the outside of her skirt, though there was a small slice through the fabric. Whatever cut her hadn’t sliced through her petticoats.

  A moment later, realization hit her. She surged forward, sinking to her knees beside the prone form of Shayles with Mark pinning him. She nudged one of Mark’s legs, and when he shifted it, she saw where the blood on her skirts had come from. Blood still pulsed and gushed from a deep wound in Lord Shayles’s inner thigh. His knife had been trapped between them when she barreled into him. It hadn’t been able to cut through the layers of her skirts, but it had sliced right through Lord Shayles’s trousers and had clearly cut the artery in his leg.

  “He’s bleeding to death,” she gasped.

  Lord Shayles laughed, the sound eerie and hysterical. “Of course I am, you bitch,” he hissed breathlessly.

  Mark seemed to snap to his senses. He pushed back, settling heavily by Lord Shayles’s side across from Angelica. He tossed the knife aside, then peeled back the tattered fabric of Lord Shayles’s trousers to get a better look at the gaping wound.

  “We have to stop the bleeding,” he said, eyes narrowing in concentration.

  “Here.” Angelica lifted the hem of her skirt and tore at the cotton of her petticoat. The piece that came away was an awkward shape and too small by far, but Mark grabbed it and attempted to staunch the flow of blood anyhow.

  “We need more,” he said, working frantically.

  Lord Shayles continued to laugh, the sound growing weaker and more hysterical. “Look at you,” he panted, glancing briefly at Mark, then closing his eyes. “My loyal dog to the very end. You hate me with everything you have, and still you’re trying to save me.”

  “He would save anyone in trouble,” Angelica insisted. “Unlike you, Mark values life.”

  “No he doesn’t,” Lord Shayles continued to laugh, weaker by the moment. “He’s sick. He worships the ground I walk on still, in spite of hating me. I trained him well. Heel, boy, heel.” He made a strange, whimpering sound followed by a weak bark, then continued laughing. “What a worm.”
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br />   “I am not a murderer,” Mark said, taking a second piece of cotton that Angelica had ripped from her petticoat. “I am not a devil. I never was. You may have tortured and humiliated me, but you did not steal my soul.”

  Lord Shayles continued to laugh and shake his head, but the sound and movement faded. Mark continued to move with desperate energy, pressing down on Lord Shayles’s thigh with the bundle of cotton. But the makeshift bandage was soaked through in no time. Lord Shayles grew so still that Angelica rocked back and sat heavily, knowing there was nothing they could do. She glanced to Mark, who continued to work, though his face was pinched in a silent sob of regret.

  All at once, Lord Shayles gasped, his mocking expression turning to a rictus of terror. He jerked…then stilled, the air rushing from his lungs. The moment had come. Whatever horror he had seen in that final moment had taken him away.

  Mark continued to press against Lord Shayles’s thigh, but Angelica reached out, covering his hands to stop him. He dragged his gaze up to meet hers, and Angelica shook her head. Mark let out a heavy breath and rocked back, sitting with his arms limp at his sides.

  For a moment, the two of them sat there over Lord Shayles’s body, silently staring at him. The late-morning sun shone down on them. Birds sang as they flittered from bush to bush. The subtle splash of fish near the surface of the pond joined the chorus. It suddenly dawned on Angelica that it was a beautiful day. All of nature seemed to be rejoicing at the removal of such evil from the world.

  “There was nothing I could have done,” Mark said at last in a quiet voice.

  Angelica stood, stepping over Lord Shayles’s body and sitting by his side. She hugged his arm, surprised to find herself weeping.

  “Not just today,” Mark went on with all the calm of a man who had found peace in death. “For my whole life. There was nothing I could have done to save him.”

  “You tried,” she told him, resting her forehead against the side of his head. “I know you tried.”