Lord Beast (26 page)

What did he mean by that? Dani
didn’t have time to think further on it as his mouth crashed down on hers with
brutal force, bruising her lips with his callousness, and a fear unlike
anything else encompassed her. She writhed in his arms, pounding her fists
against his hard, impenetrable shoulders until he was forced to break the
connection, his eyes hard and ruthless. “Suddenly you don’t find my attentions
so agreeable,” he hissed. “I wonder what has caused the sudden change of mind.
Perhaps now that you have cuckolded one man into being your husband, you no
longer find the use in tempting him with your body.”

Dani narrowed her eyes at him,
despising the mocking tone and words that he had uttered. “Is that what you
think?” she asked, slipping out of his stiff, implacable arms and crossing her
own defensively. “Is that what you think of me?”

“I have been given no alternative
impression.”

“Oh, you despicable man!” she
snapped angrily, outraged that he could come to such a horrid conclusion about
her person. “How could you? I’ll not marry you tomorrow! I refuse! Not Lucifer
nor his hounds could drag me down the altar-”

Furiously, Rhys stepped forward, his
eyes flashing, and bent his face close to hers. Seething, he told her, “Oh,
you’ll marry me tomorrow, my dear. You wouldn’t miss the chance to bind
yourself to your earl, would you?”

“You disgust me,” she hissed.

“The feeling is only mutual, my
sweet,” he informed her drolly, forcefully turning her to face the door and
pushing her out of it, giving her backside a lecherous slap as he did so.
Outraged, she seethed a furious breath of indignation. “Now tell me, do you
still love me?”

Dani turned to him furiously. “Go
to hell.”

“Good.” The door slammed in her
face.

The memory of last night only
served to reinforce the urge to flee, to run away. She could take the little
possessions she owned and hop ship, begin a new life in the Americas like so
many of her countrymen.

Dani stared morosely at her
reflection and realised that she couldn’t do that to the people she loved. Oh,
she couldn’t care less about what the scandal would do to Rhys. It’s the impact
it would have on Fiona and George, Vicky and Gabriel, that worried her the
most. Dani just couldn’t abandon her friends and loved ones to clean up the
mess she would leave behind.

So she would marry Rhys today.
She would force her steps to take her closer to the cold, distantly hateful man
waiting for her at the end of the aisle, and she would repeat her vows to him,
like the dutiful woman that she was, and all the while she would be dying a
little on the inside.

Vicky straightened a belligerent
curl of hair that was escaping its pin from behind Dani’s ear. “Are you ready?”
she asked, concern etched on her brow.

Dani nodded. Her heart beat a
little faster knowing that she was about to take the last steps of the journey
that would seal her fate forever.

“Good, because the carriage
that’s taking us to the chapel is waiting downstairs,” she said with a timid
smile.

Another nod and Dani moved
towards the door of her bedroom. “Dani,” Victoria said suddenly, stalling her
before she exited the room. She turned her head so that she examined the woman behind
her over her almost-bare shoulder. “Just so you know, at Hawthorne you are
always welcome. Whenever you want to visit.”

Dani nodded, again. She was doing
that a lot lately-  it was easier than formulating a response, she supposed.

The journey to the small village
chapel was too quick and Dani found that despite the cool façade she was
displaying externally, on the inside she was weeping. The closer she moved to
Rhys Ashcroft, the more she wanted to scream, to give rise to the volatile
emotions warring within her, to howl at the heavens about how unfair her lot in
life was, but she didn’t. To the people she shared the carriage with, George,
Fiona and Victoria; she remained the coolly emotionless and poised bride,
utterly devoid of the happiness she had once felt at the prospect of marrying
Rhys.

A small gathering had assembled
within the chapel, only the closest acquaintances of the couple having been
invited to the nuptials, and Dani knew that in the front of the rows of pews
her ominous husband waited her arrival.

She swallowed her nervousness and
allowed her uncle to assist her from the carriage while she held her skirt out
the way of her feet. Her legs felt quite unstable and she wasn’t sure how she
was to make the long journey down the aisle or how she was to command her legs
not to obey her imperative desire to turn cowardice and flee. Victoria silently
handed her the bouquet of white roses and her aunt silently bestowed a motherly
kiss to her cheek before they turned towards the doors of the chapel and
disappeared inside, leaving Dani alone with her uncle.

Her uncle scrutinised her quietly
for a moment. “You look exceptionally lovely today, Danielle,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“I couldn’t help but notice that
you don’t seem to be happy.”

Her eyes swung to his, startled.
She hadn’t meant to reveal the true state of her emotions to her uncle, or the
seriousness of the way things stood between her and Rhys, but George was an
exceptionally perceptive man, especially when it came to the well-being of the
people close to him. “Things are different,” Dani admitted slowly.

George Smith nodded slowly and
thoughtfully, his grey eyes ponderously and speculatively considering the
contours of her face. “Do you want to know what I think about Rhys Ashcroft?”
he asked suddenly.

Unsure whether she wanted to hear
him out or not, Dani nodded… again. “Lord Ashcroft is a man,” he began, “who
values honesty. When he first came to me that morning, he didn’t beat around
the bush and attempt to fib his way out of marrying you. He said to me that he
had compromised your reputation and would do right by you because he held you
in high regard. Admirable trait.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

George looked at her sternly. “I
am telling you this, Danielle, to help you make your marriage work.”

“I have never been
dishonest
with him!” she protested hotly.

“I did not say that you had,”
George told her patiently. “I am merely trying to give you a point from which
you can draw on to succeed in the future. You may choose to use it as you wish.
Shall we?” He held out his arm to her and Dani hesitantly slipped her gloved
hand through it, mulling over the significance of his words. Was he informing
her that she should be honest with Rhys when that was all she had been doing
from the very beginning of their acquaintanceship?

The doors were held open for them
as they entered.

The church organ boomed the first
notes of her entrance and Rhys’s dark eyes swivelled to her. She hardly noticed
anything else around her so pinned were her eyes to his. If somebody asked her
later to identify the guests in the pews who stood for her entrance, she
wouldn’t be able to. If she had to identify the garlands of flowers adorning
either side of the aisle, she would not have been able to if her life depended
on it. Rhys’s eyes were so formidable and unwelcoming; they stopped the path of
oxygen to her lungs and kindled a wild panic to take root in her limbs.

There was nothing pleasant or
familiar about the hard face staring dispassionately at her as she took her
first steps down the aisle and Dani’s legs involuntarily froze to the spot,
unable to complete the journey. Oh, God. Oh, God! She couldn’t do it. How could
she marry a man who didn’t return her affections?

His eyes grew colder.

If it weren’t for George’s gentle
tug, urging her forward, Dani wasn’t sure whether she would have been able to
complete the rest of the journey to take her rightful place at her husband’s
side. After that she must have entered a trance-like state of disassociation,
separating herself mentally from the events taking place around her because a
few hours later she suddenly realised that she was sitting next to Rhys, the
glittering lights from the chandelier in Falmouth Castle’s dining hall hanging
with ethereal charm above her head, a band of gold on her finger that sealed
her fate to the man next to her, and a toast being made to the newly wedded
Lord and Lady Ashcroft.

Oh, God. How did this happen?
Maybe it was all a dream and Rhys
was
actually fond of her. She looked
at him unhappily, already sensing the tension emanating from him, and witnessed
for herself the terseness of his features, the aloofness of his eyes.

“Do stop looking so miserable, my
dear,” he drawled in the tone of voice she was coming to abhor vehemently.
“You’re putting some of the guests off their food.”

Rhys, unnoticed, silently studied
his wife from the threshold of the door that separated their private quarters,
trying to ignore the hurt and turmoil he was putting himself through just
standing there.

She had her back to him as she
slowly, mesmerizingly, ran an ivory comb through her long, dark hair. The
action was unconsciously seductive and just the sight of her uninhibited and
unaware of his presence made him yearn for her. For her body, that is. He would
never want for anything more from her.

I love you.

He shoved the thought aside
viciously, detesting the lie. She’d looked him right in the eye when she said
it, when she had proclaimed her feigned devotion to him. If she thought that he
would accept a lie, accept her deceit, then she was sorely mistaken. Why else
would she come to him with words of promise and affection if not to improve her
own station in this farcical marriage? She had never felt compelled to utter
them
before
he had discovered her for the lying, deceitful woman that
she was. It was only after he had learned that she had summoned Victoria to the
castle that day to discover them in a position of debilitating compromise that
her
feelings
had been voiced.

How conveniently timed.

He couldn’t help but notice the
thin peignoir wrapped around her body, the sheer white material gleaming
transparently in the dim candlelight of the vast room. The robe was draping
lazily off one deliciously rounded shoulder as she moved her arms with artless
grace in the process of grooming her thick hair. She was lovely and looked
inviting and soft, just as she was. Rhys knew better though. He knew he could
never trust her again.

If he made a sound, he was
unaware of it, or maybe it was because she sensed the sudden force of his anger
that made her suddenly turn to face him, blue eyes startled at the dark
presence loitering in the threshold. For several moments she did not say
anything, her arm suspended in mid-air as it prepared for the next stroke
through her hair.

Finally, and on a small,
uncertain breath, she said, “What are you doing here?”

At that, he wanted to laugh. He
wanted to taunt her, to make her uncomfortable and wary, to hurt her as she had
him. But he didn’t. Coolly, dispassionately, he crossed his arms over his wide
chest and considered her indifferently.

“It is our wedding night, is it
not?”

He witnessed the fear waver
across her face, the way her throat constricted to work and the sudden paleness
of her skin. Good. Let her fear him. It was what he wanted, wasn’t it?

Her arm lowered unsteadily and
she set the brush aside on her extensive vanity, her movements deliberately
slow as if she were attempting to stall for time so she could think of what to
say next. At length, she faced him again and her eyes were unreadable, dark and
wide. “No,” was all she mouthed. The sound was firm and supported with
conviction, causing his body to tauten with anger.

Who was she to refuse him his
rights? Thrusting his shoulder from the frame he had been leaning on, he stalked
towards her, noting that she held her ground proudly, the fingers of her hands
folded primly against the silken waves of the peignoir. “No?” he repeated,
dangerously.

Her chin wobbled, but she didn’t
cower or flinch when he stopped inches before her, his powerful body towering
above her. He could easily overwhelm her and she knew it. “No,” she said again,
this time a shaky whisper of a sound.

“You do realise,
wife
,” he
snarled viciously, “that you are not at liberty to deny me anything?”

Her eyes were bright and shining
as they bored up into his and Rhys watched her face intently, his heart aching
at the lovely and familiar contours, the dips of her cheeks and the smooth line
of her stubborn jaw, and the
freckles
… Lord, the freckles. “The law may
state that,” she informed him, “but I may not agree with it.”

“You don’t have a choice to agree
with it!”

“I’ll not lie with you willingly
until this marriage improves,” she told him and tears suddenly pricked her
eyes, causing her to look away, studying the top buttons of his shirt which was
just about eye-level for her.

“Always a condition,” he snapped
coldly. “I’m beginning to doubt the intention was ever there in the first
place.”