Devil's Embrace (31 page)

“That will teach you to fight me.”

“Leave go, Giacomo. You don’t want her unconscious, do you?”

“You’ll not lay a hand on her, you filthy swine.”

“Just see if we don’t, my brave Corsican.”

Cassie looked up through a haze of pain to see the huge man pulling off his cloak. Almost gently, he spread it on the rotting floor.

“Can we, Andrea?” she heard Giacomo say eagerly.

Andrea shrugged. “There was naught said. I was told to keep her here, the Corsican too, I guess, until he comes. If you’ve no taste for such a lovely morsel, then I’ll take your turn as well.”

A wild shout broke from Giacomo’s mouth. “No, you’ll not have her all to yourself.” His voice was suddenly crafty. “We’ll have the Corsican watch. He’s probably lusted after her himself.”

The two men holding the struggling Joseph broke into furious argument.

Cassie’s heart froze within her. They were going to rape her. God, they were fighting over the order. She tried to get control of herself, to think of something, anything that
would save her. A pistol. Perhaps she could get one of the men’s pistols. Slowly, she pulled herself to her feet, but the pain in her chest was so great that she gasped aloud.

“Ah,” Andrea said, “the little lady wants us to begin. Look at how she comes to us.”

Frenzied, excited laughter met his words. He was on her in the next instant, tearing off her cloak, and ripping at her riding habit.

“No, damn you, no!” Cassie yelled. The pain in her chest faded from her consciousness and she fought him, clawing at his eyes through the black mask, kicking wildly at his legs.

“Hold the wildcat, Giacomo,” Andrea shouted.

Andrea tore off her clothing, delighting, she thought wildly, in shredding every layer. She twisted frantically, even as Giacomo wrenched her arms behind her back.

Andrea stepped back, his dark eyes glistening, his large tongue running excitedly over his lips.

She stood naked, her body quivering with cold and fear, her hair hanging loosely down her back and over her breasts.

He reached out his hand and cupped her breast. A piercing scream broke from Cassie’s mouth, and without thought, she leaned her head down and sank her teeth into the back of his hand.

He struck her, full in the face, and she fell back against Giacomo. Giacomo’s hands moved urgently over her, down her belly, around her thighs. She could hear his breathing in her ear, heavy and rasping in his lust. Cassie jerked an arm free of him and thrust her elbow into his stomach.

She heard his bellow of rage and hoped that his blow would leave her senseless.

But it was Andrea who struck her. He drove his fist into her belly, and she fell to her knees, clutching her arms about herself. She was hurled upon the cloak, her arms yanked above her head and held there by Giacomo’s knees. She felt his hands pulling her hair from her face and shoulders. His fingers closed over her breasts, tender from her pregnancy, hurting her badly.

“She does not like your gentle attention, Giacomo,” Andrea said, laughing. “Let us see if she prefers this.”

Cassie’s eyes opened wide, despite herself. Andrea had dropped his breeches and bared himself. He was built like a bull, a brute, a raging animal.

She kicked wildly at his hairy belly as he grabbed at her legs. He grunted and thrust himself between her thighs.

Dimly, as if from a great distance, Cassie heard Joseph screaming curses.

“Lay the Corsican out, Giulio. I need both of you to hold her down.”

“Bastardo!”
Cassie screamed, and craned her neck forward to see Joseph slumping onto the floor. She was sobbing, screaming her own curses at them, English oaths that they did not understand.

Suddenly there were hands all over her body, rough fingers digging into her, pulling her legs apart. For an instant, the room was silent, save for the rasping breath of the men who held her. Then her body exploded into agony. Andrea drove into her, tearing her, his hands jerking her hips upward to engorge himself with her.

For the first time in her life, Cassie prayed for death, for blessed unconsciousness that would free her of this horror. But the pain continued, plummeting her mind into senselessness. She was scarce aware when the second man took his turn, for he could not tear her body more than had Andrea. Until Giulio. “Damn,” she heard him curse, “the wench grows too slippery.”

She was pulled onto her stomach. And she screamed, screamed until her voice was a hoarse groan in her throat.

“You rutting bastards.”

It was a new voice, a man’s voice, laden with fury.

She was rolled onto her back and the vicious probing hands left her.

“You did not say that we could not enjoy her,” Andrea said, his voice sulky.

“Get out, all of you. What if someone comes, you fools, the lot of you mucking around with your breeches down. For God’s sake, get out of here and keep watch.”

For a moment, Cassie’s mind detached itself from her torn body, and her eyes focused on the man. Like the others, he wore a black mask. But there was something
different about him, other than the richness of his clothing, something that she couldn’t quite grasp.

“Joseph,” she whispered between swollen lips. It did not occur to her to beg mercy for herself. She knew with the hopelessness of certainty that there would be none.

“Pazza fragitara nigli inferno,”
he said, his voice low and strangely slurred.

Caesare stared down at her and felt a spasm of revulsion at what his
bravi
had done to her. He had thought to take her himself, but now he wanted only to leave this place and forget her eyes staring up at him, wide with helpless terror, forget the sight of her naked body, bruised and bleeding. He turned abruptly on his heel and strode to the door. “Andrea!” he shouted. “Do as you like with them. Just be certain, if you value your life, that they are never found.”

“No,” she whispered after him, trying to pull herself up, but he was gone.

Andrea appeared in the open doorway. “No more need of these, lads,” he said, and pulled off his mask.

Cassie stared up at his coarse-bearded face, his mouth slashed wide in a grin. “Let her see your handsome face, Giacomo,” he said, again unfastening the buttons of his breeches.

Giacomo’s thin face was drawn and sharp, his eyes a strange golden color, like those of a fox. He ran his tongue over his blackened front teeth. “Wait your turn, Andrea. She’s mine now.”

Giacomo was angry that they had beaten the fight out of her, for he had wanted to feel her heaving and struggling against him.

She moaned softly, helplessly, when he thrust himself into her, and he could feel her quivering with pain.

“Fight me, damn you.” He slapped her breasts and belly with the flat of his hand.

But there was no fight left in her, only a vast emptiness shrouded in pain. Dimly, she remembered the man’s words, their leader’s words. “
Pazza fragitara nigli inferno.
May he rot in hell.” She was to die now, as was Joseph. Somehow, the knowledge did not quite touch her. She raised vague eyes to Andrea, and saw him pulling down his breeches.
She cried out, deep in her throat, and fell into merciful blackness.

Andrea sat cross-legged on the filthy floor, eyeing his three comrades. “Well, what will you, lads? Kill them now or wait for the wench to come around again?”

“What a bloody waste to carve the wench,” Giacomo said, rubbing his hand over the stubble of beard on his chin. “The Corsican though—” He pulled his knife lovingly from his belt.

Andrea nodded. “Gut the Corsican, Giulio.”

Giulio rose to his feet and drew his stiletto free of its leather sheath. He was caressing its razor edge with the tip of his thumb when a shot shattered the silence of the room, and Giulio screamed, clutching his belly.

The earl hurled into the room, the force of his body tearing the cabin door from its rusted hinges.

“Out, men!” Andrea shouted, and kicked over the lighted lamp, plunging the cabin into darkness. The earl heard a booted foot shatter the back door of the hut. At the same instant, he fired his other pistol, and one of the men grunted in pain. He whirled about and rushed out of the hut, to see three men hurling themselves onto their horses.

He turned and dashed back into the hut, his pistols still clenched tightly in his hands. His jaw was grinding spasmodically in fear. He had had only a brief glimpse of Cassie, sprawled naked upon her back, unmoving.

He fell to his knees, his hands groping for the overturned lamp. Frantically, he pulled it upright and lit it with flint and steel from the tinderbox that lay next to it.

The earl strode across the creaking floor and dropped to his knees beside her. “Oh, Cassie, no,” he whispered.

Her face was turned away from him. Her eyes were open, but she did not respond, locked so deeply into her own horror that she was scarce aware of his presence.

She felt a large hand, a man’s hand, lightly stroke her cheek and shoulder. Her horror turned itself outward. “No, please—no,” she whimpered, and tried to draw away.

“Cassandra, don’t be afraid, there is nothing more to fear.”

His fingers lightly stroked her face, smoothed back her tangled hair. Slowly, she turned her head to face him.

She saw her own pain mirrored in his eyes. “I did not think you would find us.” It hurt so to speak. She ran her tongue over her swollen lips. “Joseph, please, you must help Joseph.”

The earl saw movement from the corner of his eye and whipped about. Scargill stood in the open doorway, a pistol in his hand.

“My lord.” He lowered the pistol slowly to his side as he took in the sight of Cassie, of Joseph lying slumped on his belly, and a second man lying in a pool of blood. “Paolo and Marco are outside,” he said feverishly. “We couldn’t keep up with yer stallion.”

“I know, Scargill,” the earl said firmly, seeing shock beginning to cloud Scargill’s ruddy features. “Pay no attention to that scum. See to Joseph, quickly.”

Scargill raised his head a few moments later, his eyes filled with impotent anger. “He’s bad, my lord.”

The earl closed his eyes to blot out his fury. His voice rang out in the silence of the small room, harshly cold. “Send Paolo back to fetch a surgeon to the villa. You and Sordello’s father”—he could not seem to remember his head gardener’s name—“take Joseph back. I will see to Cassandra. As to him”—he jerked his head toward the dead man—“we will fetch him later.”

When the earl turned back to Cassie, her eyes were closed.

“Cassie!” he shouted at her. Her thick eyelashes fluttered open, and she looked at him, vaguely questioning.

“I must take you home now.”

Gently, he slipped his hand beneath her back. She moaned at his touch. His hand froze when he saw a dark bruise over her ribs, beneath her breast. He carefully eased his hand away. Although there was a dank chill inside the cabin, he felt beads of perspiration form on his forehead.

“
Cara,
I am sorry, but I must hurt you.” He thought of the relentless miles back down the dark, winding road to the villa, and his hands shook.

“I cannot hurt any more than I do now,” she whispered.
She was wrong. Suddenly, the muscles in her belly drew taut as a bowstring, then contracted ferociously. She screamed, all vestige of control stripped from her. Her legs, as if from instinct, drew up, and her hands clutched wildly at her belly. She focused her eyes, deep pools of pain, dumbly upon the earl’s set face.

“The babe,” she whispered, and then she was lost to him. He felt the fierce power of the contractions as he gently probed her belly beneath her clawing fingers. Her screams burned into his mind, and he felt completely helpless. There was nothing he could do to help her, or the child.

Cassie was scarce aware that her body was being covered and that she was being carried. Dimly, she heard him speaking to her, but his words were meaningless sounds. She tried to bring up her legs, hoping to lessen the wrenching pain, but she could not. She struck at the arms that held her, clawing for her release. She became aware of a moaning, jagged scream, and understood vaguely that it came from her mouth. It was odd, she thought, dazed by a sudden absence of pain, that she had screamed so. She never screamed. She tasted blood and salty tears. Then she tasted nothing.

The earl felt a great shudder go through her body. Her head lolled against the crook of his arm, and he tightened his grip on her. He quickened his stallion’s pace, thankful for the sliver of moon that shined weakly, lighting the road. His lips moved, and it shook him to discover that he was praying.

T
he front gates of the Villa Parese were flung wide. Myriad candles lit the windows of the villa and splashed their light onto the courtyard. The earl flung Marco his stallion’s reins and carefully dismounted, holding Cassie tightly against his chest.

“Joseph?” he said sharply.

“The surgeon has just arrived, my lord.”

He saw Marrina standing at the foot of the staircase.

“Send me Rosina.” He shifted Cassie in his arms, and realized the cloak in which he had wrapped her was soaked through, sticky and wet. He stared down at his hand and saw it was smeared with blood, Cassie’s blood.

He shouted over his shoulder, “I must have hot water, and strips of linen,” and took the stairs two at a time.

Bright scarlet blood covered her thighs. He pressed towels against her to stem the flow, and gently lifted her hips to place more towels beneath her. They were quickly speckled with vivid red. His hands trembled, and he forced himself to draw a deep, steadying breath.

“
La signorina
lost the child?”

“
Si,
” he said shortly, briefly turning to the white-faced Rosina. He waved his hand at the blood-sodden cloak on the floor. “Take it and burn it.”

Rosina looked at the cloak and felt dizzying bile rise in her throat. She closed her eyes, blindly gathered up the soaked cloak, wrapped it in towels, and fled the bedchamber.

Cassie moaned, and his hands grew still. Her head turned slightly on the pillow, and she was again silent. He was not
certain what was holding her from consciousness, her pain or her terror of what had happened to her.