How To Tame a Rake (4 page)

“Of course. He’s a wild thing.” She stroked the fox’s back.

“Arrangements have been made for you and my mother to go to London. Tomorrow.”

Willy gazed up at him. “You’ll look after Felix?”

“Who?”

“That’s his name. Felix. “Promise you’ll look after him after I’ve gone.”

Blake tilted his head, gazing down at her. “You are a strange girl, Willy. I would have expected you to be far more interested in your trip to London.”

She stood and shook out her skirts. “I’m very excited, I assure you. I must go and pack.”

“The maids will do it,” he called after her. “But you can leave most of your clothes behind.”

Willy had a strange impulse to turn and poke her tongue out at him. But she didn’t want him to think her a child. She put her fingers to her lips. She would always remember her first kiss.

* * * *

Lady Elizabeth and Willy were soon to depart for London. The carriage stood in front of the house, packed with their trunks and bandboxes. She made a final visit to Felix. She found him trying to stand on the leg and gave him a farewell pat. He would be gone before she returned.

Blake came to see them off. He promised again, sighing heavily, to take good care of Felix. As the carriage headed off down the long avenue, Willy put her head out the window and looked back. Blake had already disappeared inside the house. She bit her lip and frowned, but couldn’t suppress her excitement. She had never been to London.

The carriage passed a farmer and his men hedging and ditching in a field. An hour went by and they didn’t see another soul. Her aunt’s eyes were closed and her maid, Gertrude’s head was nodding. Willy grew tired of watching the landscape, but was far too excited to sleep. She tried patting the dog, Charles, but he felt it beneath him to respond and rested his head on his paws, closing his eyes.

It was close to dusk when the carriage entered a dark wood, turning the day into night. Suddenly, a pistol shot echoed through the trees. The carriage swerved violently and the coachman heaved the frightened horses to a halt.

A man’s voice roared out a command to the coachman and the groom. “Step down with yer hands on yer heads.”

Willy stuck her head out the window and saw three horsemen with handkerchiefs over the lower part of their faces. They had pistols.

Lady Elizabeth opened her eyes, gasping. “What on earth…?”

Her lady’s maid, Gertrude, began to wail when a heavy-set man dragged the door open and climbed inside.

He turned to Willy. “I’ll have your valuables now, if you please.”

“As you see I have none,” Willy said. She felt the tiny locket nestling between her breasts. He would not have that.

“Oh, my goodness,” Lady Elizabeth said. “We are carrying very little.”

The man gazed at her. “There’s enough jewels on you to feed an army,” he said roughly. “I’ll have those pearls around your neck for starters.”

Lady Elizabeth unclasped the smoky pearls and removed the four rings from her fingers. She unpinned a pearl broach with shaking fingers.

Gertrude sobbed, covering her face with her hands.

“Shut yer mouth or I’ll hit ye one,” the man said and she gasped into silence.

He reached across Willy to grab the jewels in his big fist. “A maid too, are you?” he asked, looking at her.

“Yes, she is,” Lady Elizabeth said. “You find nothing of value there.”

“I disagree.” The highwayman put a hand on Willy’s thigh. She felt the heat through her gown and gasped. His eyes gleamed wickedly above his mask. “I fancy a ride with you.”

Hearing the other man snicker, she pulled away from him. “Get your hands off me.”

He stroked his black beard. “Don’t sound much like any servant to me.”

Willy desperately looked out the window for a way of escape. One of the rogues had their trunks open on the ground. He was sorting through them, pulling dresses, lawn petticoats and camisoles out into the mud. The coachman and groom sat on the ground with their hands on their heads. “Be careful,” she called down. “There’s no need to ruin everything.”

“Quiet!” The big man glared at Willy and shoved his pistol into her ribs.

Lady Elizabeth grabbed Willy’s hand. “Hush, my dear. Possessions don’t matter.”

The carriage had filled with the smell of unwashed male. Willy wanted to hold her handkerchief to her nose, but she worried it would be seen as a sign of weakness.

“Ready, Joe,” the man on the ground yelled.

“I’ll have you, girl.” Joe grabbed Willy by the waist and pulled her from the carriage as if she weighed no more than a feather pillow. She kicked her legs in the air and beat him with her fists, but he just laughed. She heard her aunt’s horrified shriek above Gertrude’s hysterics. “That’s a lady you are absconding with,” she yelled. “Her future husband, the Viscount, won’t rest till he sees your necks in a noose.”

He threw Willy up onto his horse and mounted behind her. His arms and knees cradled her as he held the reins. The other man hurriedly packed the rest of the items from their trunks into his saddlebags. Then as he mounted, the third, a ginger-headed boy, ran from where he held the carriage horses to vault onto his horse from behind.

Willy could feel the man’s big, hard body pressing into hers. As if he couldn’t wait, he held the reins in one hand and pulled at her skirt, his fingers tangling in the cloth as he groped down between her thighs. She felt a scream rise in her throat but choked it off into a strangled sob, worried that her aunt would hear. She struggled so much he took his hand away to grip the reins.

“Let’s go,” he urged the men. Her heart banged against her ribs as he kicked the horse into flight.

They galloped through the dark wood, the cold air freezing the tears on her cheeks. She barely held on, thinking she’d rather be dead than have them ravish her. They rode for miles, finally leaving the road and heading off down a track deep into the woods. When she felt she couldn’t stand another minute and would soon start screaming, they reined in beside a mill house, the wheel turning with a chugging sound. The dark-haired devil dismounted and dragged Willy down. He bundled her through the door. She fell onto her knees on the bare, dirt floor. A rough table, two stools and some straw bedding in a corner was the only furniture in the room. She climbed to her feet and backed into a corner, her knee throbbing and her chest so tight she could hardly breathe.

The youth went off with the horses. The black devil and the other man ripped off their disguises. They spread their spoils over the table, gleeful about their haul from Lady Elizabeth.

They seemed to have forgotten Willy. They sloshed rum into tankards and discussed the merit of moving their loot to their hideout. It apparently involved quite a climb and the place was dank and cold. She slowly backed towards the door. When she’d almost reached it, the black-eyed man turned and eyeballed her. He threw back his chair and in two strides had grabbed her as she turned to run. He dragged her over to the table and pulled her down onto his lap. “I’d drink a bit of rum if I was ye. It will go better.”

She held the tankard in her trembling hands and took a long swallow. It burned its way down her throat like fire and she coughed violently.

He roared with laughter and slapped her on the back. “Ye’ll get used to it.”

“How dare you treat me like this?” she gasped, fighting to move away from him. The rum had put some heat and fight back into her. “Take me back at once.”

The man had black hair like Blake, but that was where any similarity ended. His black eyes were the eyes of a beast with no compassion or humanity to be found in his gaze. His plate-like, dirty hand pinched her breast. “I like my women meatier.”

“Then let me go.”

“I’m not that fussy.”

“You go first, Joe,” the other man said.

Joe stood and set Willy on her feet. As soon as he let go of her, she grabbed the stool and swung it with all her might.

He fended it off with a beefy arm and laughed. “Bit of a spit-fire, are ye?” he said. “I like that in a woman.” He grabbed her hands, holding them in one of his, he half-lifted, half-dragged her over to the straw bedding. She heard herself whimper in fright, hardly aware she’d opened her mouth. She looked around desperately for something else with which to defend herself. There was nothing.

He pulled her down and tore away the front of her gown, revealing her chemise and her breasts heaving with distress. But before he could act on his villainous impulses, the youth came rushing into the room.

“I hear horses comin’. A lot of ‘em.”

The brute jumped up and tossed her over his shoulder like a sack of flour. When she began to fight him, he punched her hard on the chin and she went limp. He raced to the table and snatched up his pistol and the jewels.

“Shoot her, Joe,” the other man shouted as he raced out the door. “She’ll get us lynched.”

Joe dropped her so fast she staggered. He aimed his pistol at her head and cocked it.

Reeling from the blow to her jaw, Willy stood, paralysed. She closed her eyes. She heard a shot and crumpled to the ground.

Her head throbbed. When she opened her eyes again, the men had gone. She saw a band of men on horseback racing by.

She closed her eyes again.

When she opened them, a man crouched down beside her and she flinched, moving away. “Tis alright lass. I’m a policeman. We’ve been after those three for months.”

He helped her sit up. She felt dizzy. “He tried to shoot me.”

“I reckon he managed it,” he said. He put his handkerchief to her brow and it came away covered in blood.

The blood began to gush down stinging an eye.

He dabbed at her forehead. “Not a gunshot. The bullet must have splintered that post behind you.” He gently wiped the blood away. “You’ll be fine in a day or two.”

“Thank heavens,” she said before blackness descended.

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Chapter Five

Willy struggled up onto her elbows. The room swirled and her head throbbed. She put her hand up to her forehead and found it bandaged.

“Where am I?” she asked a woman she found sitting beside her bed with a book in her lap.

“I’m Susan Gray. You’re in my cottage. A member of the Watch brought you here. He had to rejoin the chase.”

Willy looked out the small window at the dark sky. “What time is it?”

“It’s early in the morning. You’ve been out to it for hours.” Susan had a pleasant face framed by chestnut hair. She looked to be not much older than Blake. Rising, she went to add a log to the fire. “I’ll bring you a hot drink and something to eat.”

Willy threw back the covers and cautiously put her feet to the floor. “I have to tell my aunt I’m all right. She’ll be waiting for me at the inn.”

Susan looked surprised. “Which inn would that be? There’s none close by here.”

Willy’s hand flew to her mouth. “I don’t know the name of it.”

Susan came to pat her on the shoulder. “I told the policeman I’d take you into High Wycombe when you’ve recovered.”

A sob burst from Willy’s throat. “Oh, Blake and Aunt Elizabeth will think I’m dead, or … or worse!”

* * * *

Returning from visiting his tenants with his bailiff, Blake found a servant waiting with a note from his mother.

He read it and frowned. “Curse it.” He read it again. She had obviously written it in great haste. The ink was smudged and her usually faultless script was difficult to decipher. From what he could make out, Willy had been abducted by highwaymen. His mother was at an inn in High Wycombe and awaited his instructions.

He felt icy anger grip his heart. Racing into the house he shouted orders at the startled servants. By the time he arrived in High Wycombe, his frantic mother had news.

“Has she been hurt?” he demanded.

“A slight head wound. There wasn’t time, apparently, for them to do worse,” she said faintly.

“Where is this farm where she stays?”

“Close to the village of Bennett End. The coachman knows of it.”

Blake nodded. He donned his riding coat and pulled on his gloves.

“But there’s no need for you to go there,” she said. “The farmer is bringing her to us tomorrow.”

He shook his head and headed for the door. “That infernal girl always seems to be in some scrape or other.”

“Oh Blake! How shabby of you!” Lady Elizabeth cried. “What
is
the matter with you?” she asked the empty room.

* * * *

Willy was feeling better, but somehow different. She knew that her place in the world was small and accepted the hand of fate in the scheme of things. It had the effect of making her even more determined to have a say in her future. She strolled around Susan’s tidy farm enjoying the peace and the beauty. A riot of flowers grew round the honey-hued stone walls of the thatched cottage. A small stream rambled through the trees at the bottom of the garden. Chickens, ducks and geese roamed at will. Black-and-white cows and a horse grazed in the field beside the red-painted barn.

Returning to the cottage, she entered the small sitting room where almost every wall was lined with books. A bright rug covered the boards and a patterned sofa and pink plush chair were pulled up close to the fire. By the window a desk was piled high with papers and pens. That explained why Susan’s fingers were stained with ink.

“Do you write a lot of letters?” Willy asked her, as Susan laid out the tea tray.

“Stories.”

“What about?”

“People mostly.”

“May I read one?”

Susan went to a shelf and took down a book with a brown leather cover. On the binding in gold letters it read,
The Family at Ravensdale Hall
by Samuel Greenly. “I write under a man’s name,” she explained. “I wouldn’t be published otherwise.” She poured the tea from a brown china teapot. “A writer likes to be read. And with the little I make, I employ a young maid-of-all-work and a laborer from the village to help with the farm.”

“Have you always lived here?” Willy wanted to ask if her if she’d ever been married, but she didn’t.

Susan nodded. “My parent’s owned the farm and my grandparents before them. After I married, I remained here with my husband and my boy.”