The Husband Hunt (19 page)

His gaze moved over her slowly, taking in every inch of the skin he spoke of so lovingly, and then up to caress her golden hair. “Well, I was sold on the plan then. I could not wait to get my hands on you and see how much more lovely your skin would look when mottled with a rainbow of bruises and welts. Or how that beautiful singsong voice of yours would sound when you moaned with pleasured pain.”

Charles paused and leaned forward to push Lisa’s chin up, closing her gaping mouth. She shrank back in her seat the moment he touched her, however, a shudder running down her back at the image he’d painted.

“Sadly,” he continued, seeming unconcerned by her reaction, “Fate intervened and made attaining you rather difficult in the end. First George’s plan went awry when he foolishly got himself murdered. Which was probably for the best. I’m sure we would have had a falling-out when I refused to let him kill you. However, then you and your father left town, making it virtually impossible to even try to woo or seduce you into marrying me.” He scowled at her with displeasure. “And you stayed away for two damned years, languishing in the country, where I had no excuse to see you to woo you.”

Findlay shook his head with disgust. “I had pretty much given up on having you when Mrs. Morgan happened to mention that you were in town and coming to tea.” He shook his head with a laugh. “Well, it seemed too perfect to be true. I could have you, drag you off to Gretna Green and marry you, and then enjoy you at my leisure, forever. Imagine it, Lisa, years and years of exquisite play, exploring how much pain the body can take, and how much pleasure we can get from it,” he said it as if she should be pleased that he planned to torture her for the next forty years or so, and then his mouth twisted with displeasure.

“Unfortunately, that old cow allowed you to escape, and I was forced to change my plans. I returned to the original plan of wooing and seducing you, but took the opportunities where I found them to try to claim you more quickly as well. However, it soon became obvious that you were interested in Robert, and no man had a chance at wooing you.” His mouth twisted with displeasure, and then he added, “Even so, I stayed close in the hopes of keeping tabs on you and where you would be so that should the opportunity arise again, I could claim you and carry you off.”

And she’d given him the perfect opportunity by hopping happily into his carriage today, Lisa realized grimly, but said, “You were behind the attack in my room the night I wasn’t feeling well?”

He nodded.

Lisa frowned. “But how did you know I would be home? I didn’t even know until I got sick from eating Pembroke’s sweets. I planned to attend the ball that night.”

“I knew because it wasn’t Pembroke’s sweets that made you sick,” he said with mild amusement.

Lisa sat back slightly, her eyes narrowing. “It wasn’t?”

Charles shook his head. “I slipped an emetic into your tea while Tibald was telling you all about the runner he’d hired. You were so busy chattering away, you didn’t drink the tea until everyone got up to leave.” He smiled wryly. “From the way you grimaced as you downed it, I thought for sure you would jump up and say there was something in your tea, but you didn’t.”

“It was cold and nasty but I thought it was just because I’d let it sit so long,” she said quietly, recalling the sickly sweet taste.

“Ahh.” Charles nodded, and then commented, “The emetic was supposed to be fast acting. I imagine you probably barely got upstairs before the vomiting started.”

“I made it all the way to my room first,” she informed him coldly.

“Hmm.” He shrugged. “Not as fast acting as claimed then. Ah well, it’s for the best, I suppose. Seeing other people get ill tends to turn my own stomach so it wouldn’t have done for you to vomit on me.”

Lisa was starting to think it was a shame she hadn’t. She also thought she would definitely keep that tidbit handy for future reference. If she didn’t escape, she would vomit on the man at every opportunity.

“And the attack during Pembroke’s outing?” she asked, pushing away the possibility of not escaping.

Findlay shrugged with amusement. “He refrained from inviting me to it. Or Tibald for that matter. Cutting out the competition. Most unsporting of him, really,” he said with a tsk, and then shrugged. “It didn’t matter though, I knew what he’d arranged and bribed the boat captain to tell me where the planned stop for the picnic was so that I could send my man ahead to lay in wait.”

He considered her for a moment and then admitted, “In truth, I didn’t expect there to be much hope of grabbing you there. I expected you to stick close to the others, or for Langley to be keeping such a close eye that there would be no chance to snatch you. But you decided to walk along the beach, and while Robert followed, he then turned to leave you there.”

“You were there?” Lisa asked with surprise.

“Good Lord, no. I was at my club, establishing my alibi so no one would come looking when I disappeared for a couple days to drag you to Gretna Green.”

“Oh,” she muttered.

“No, I sent my man. Sadly, from what he’s told me, he tried to grab you too soon. He should have waited for Robert to return to the others. He said afterward that he was worried Langley would merely move away a bit and then turn to watch you from a distance, so he took the chance.” Findlay shook his head at what he obviously thought had been a foolhardy decision. “The idiot earned himself a nasty knot on the head for his trouble too. But I gather he got in a good jab with his knife on Langley before that? At least he claimed he did.”

“Not such a good jab. Robert managed to deflower me the next night despite the trifling wound,” she said spitefully.

Charles’s mouth tightened. “That is most disappointing.”

“Good,” Lisa said grimly. “I hope you choke on that knowledge.”

Now he smiled. “So the kitten does have claws. Delightful. I like fight with my fun.”

“I don’t know about fun, but you’ll certainly get a lot of fight from me, my lord,” she assured him, and reached for the handle to the carriage door. But, as if he’d been waiting for just that, Charles caught her wrist at once and twisted viciously as he dragged it away from the door.

Lisa cried out and fell back on the bench seat as he released her. Cupping the injured arm with her good hand, she stared at him as a pleased little smile claimed his lips.

“Does it hurt very much?” Charles asked solicitously.

Sensing that he would enjoy knowing he’d hurt her, Lisa removed her good hand from the wounded wrist and shrugged. “Not very, my lord.”

As she’d expected, his mouth twisted slightly with disappointment at her words.

Suspecting he would try to hurt her again as punishment, Lisa quickly said, “I gather we are not on the way back to Radnor house?”

Charles blinked and then seemed to relax again and smile. “You are right, of course. We are on the way to my townhouse. I will continue my routine here in town for the next week or so to ensure suspicion is not cast my way, then retreat to the country, heartbroken at what I think is your defection after accepting my proposal.”

“That’s why you acted as if we were engaged with Robert,” she said with realization. “I thought you were just trying to protect my reputation after getting caught kissing me.”

He grinned. “Your reputation was already shot, my dear. Langley had bedded you, remember? I did suspect as much even then,” he assured her and then added, “No, I claimed we were engaged so that I could play the wounded and bewildered swain when you come up missing. I can go to Radnor and demand to know what is being done to find you. As your fiancé, they will keep me apprised of everything and in a week or so . . .” He shrugged.

“You retreat to the country with your broken heart,” Lisa repeated his words dryly.

“Exactly. At least that is what they will think. Instead I will be headed to Gretna Green with you.”

“You cannot really think I will marry you?” she asked with amazement. “You cannot force me to say the words in front of the blacksmith.”

“My dear Lisa,” he said with cocky amusement. “After a week with me you will do whatever I wish you to.”

The words sent a chill down the back of Lisa’s neck.

“Ah, we’re here,” Charles announced, peering out the window as the carriage slowed.

Lisa stiffened. If she was going to escape, this was the time to do it. She had no idea where Charles lived, but it would be in an elite area with people everywhere. All she had to do was scream and make a break for it the minute she was out of the carriage and someone would help, Lisa thought, and then glanced to Findlay sharply when he suddenly snickered.

“It always amuses me when this point comes. You women all think alike, you know. Every one of you starts scheming, hope rising in your breast like a wave. You will get away now. This is your chance. Scream and run, or just run, or some such thing, you all think.” He shook his head at her folly and said derisively, “As if I have not been taking unwilling women into my home for years and learned how best to do it with the minimum of risk and fuss.”

The words were like a splash of cold water in Lisa’s face. He had been taking unwilling women into his home for years? What for? And what had happened to those women? Certainly, he hadn’t married them as he claimed he intended to do with her, she thought, and then glanced nervously from Charles to the door as the carriage stopped. Her body was tightening, preparing to flee despite his words, the blood pumping through her body in a rush.

Lisa was so tightly strung that when the carriage door opened, she actually gave a little start. She was hoping to see what lay beyond, but a large man filled the opening. Big beefy arms reached in, and before she quite knew what was happening, one sweaty hand was mashing her lips against her teeth and the other was yanking her out the door. She instinctively began to kick and thrash, but it was like doing battle with a wall. Her arms were pinned uselessly to her sides and her feet slammed into what could have been tree trunks, having as much impact as a child’s weak blows.

Lisa was carted no more than four feet from the carriage to an open door. It was just long enough to see that they hadn’t stopped in front of a house on a busy street, but in a high-walled courtyard at what was obviously the back of the house. No wonder Charles had been amused at her hopes of escape. She hadn’t had a chance, she realized.

“Take her to the room, Max,” Charles’s voice ordered as they entered a large, hot kitchen. “I shall be along shortly.”

Lisa glanced wildly around, peering over the large hand covering her mouth and lower face. The hand wasn’t just covering her mouth, but her nose as well and she couldn’t get any air. She began to struggle more desperately, afraid she was going to be smothered to death, but it had little effect and her vision was dimming by the time she was carted through a kitchen, down a narrow set of steps, and across an open area to a door with a small barred window in it.

Her captor kicked at the base of the door, sending it swinging open. He then walked in and dropped her.

Lisa grunted in pain as she landed on something hard, and then simply lay still for a moment, desperately gasping air into her starved lungs. After a moment, however, she began to feel better and found the energy to raise herself up to a sitting position and peer about. The only light was that coming from the barred window. It was just enough to see that she was in a tiny room with nothing but the narrow bed she had been dumped on. The mattress was hard and appeared to be stuffed with matted straw. The floor of the room was nothing more than hard-packed dirt. A basement then.

Pushing herself up from the bed, Lisa stumbled to the door and searched for a doorknob, but there was none, at least not on the inside, so she grabbed and pulled then pushed on the bars but that did nothing. The door didn’t budge at all. Teeth grinding together, she peered through the bars into the room beyond and stared in horror at the scene. It looked like an ancient torture chamber with shackles everywhere: hanging from the ceiling, affixed to the walls at intervals, and even fitted on each corner of a table in the center of the open area. But it was the various whips and straps also hanging from the walls that made her blood run cold. She swore the ends of some of the items were painted with dried blood.

Swallowing, Lisa backed away and returned to sit shakily on the bed. Mrs. Morgan had understated things when she’d said that the suitor liked it a bit rough. Charles Findlay was obviously one of those twisted individuals who enjoyed inflicting pain, and in many and varied ways. Well, she wasn’t going to sit about awaiting the fate he had planned for her. She would escape, Lisa decided, standing up. She just had to figure out how.

“F
indlay?” Richard repeated the name with a frown.

“Yes,” Robert said grimly, pacing to the parlor window and peering out at the street for the umpteenth time since finding Lisa missing.

“Bastard,” Daniel muttered. “I’ve heard some gossip about him abusing prostitutes, but I didn’t think he’d go after a woman of the gentry.”

“Hmm,” Robert muttered, staring at the empty street in front of the house and willing the hack Lisa had left in to roll up and for her to step lightly out, healthy, happy and well. It didn’t happen of course, but then it hadn’t happened any of the other times he’d willed it either.

“And Lisa has been gone all afternoon?” Daniel asked.

“Yes,” Robert growled. “She had Harry hire a hack to take her out to hire a runner.”

“What?” Richard asked with surprise. “Why is she hiring a runner?”

Robert ground his teeth together and then reluctantly admitted, “Bet says she wanted to hire a runner to guard her so that I didn’t have to.”

There was silence for a minute and then Daniel asked, “And she went by herself? She didn’t even take Bet?”

“Apparently she was supposed to take Bet and a footman, but she ran off without either of them.”

“Are we sure she went willingly and wasn’t taken?” Richard asked grimly.

Robert sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Handers saw her leave. He said she ran out of the parlor and charged out the front door straight into the hack. He said she seemed upset.”