Crushing Desire (31 page)

Reena struggled to take flight inside her mind in an attempt to ignore the hell that her body would soon experience. But she didn’t want to bring the men she loved into this nightmare with her. Instead, Reena tried in vain to let her mind go blank. Martin moved toward the edge of the makeshift bed, pulling a heavy wooden chair in tow. The legs of the rickety beast released an ominous groan against the shack’s flooring as it came to rest before him. Straddling the seat, he rested his arms on the high back and gazed down at her for a moment.

“Now, where were we?” Martin’s voice turned conversational once again. “Ah yes, Michael and I were surrounded with nowhere to go. He looked at me and said: ‘this is it brother, now I’ll prove how brave I can truly be.’” As Martin spoke, he slowly removed the long, fitted coat that he wore, placing it on the table next to the implements.

Reena stared at him, he was different in more ways than she could name, and the alteration in his manner told of a transformation in his being. Reena wondered if both brothers had distorted so much in the short time that they had been gone? She desperately hoped that Michael hadn’t warped as his brother had before his death.

“That was when he ran out of hiding, screaming. A foolish gesture of false bravery that wouldn’t have happened if not for you.”

Still facing the macabre items, Martin slowly unbuttoned his shirt. As he turned to face her, Reena couldn’t take her eyes off his fingers. Her head spun. Why was he undressing?

“Oh, this.” He looked at his fingers as they loosed the last button. “It’s only that blood tends to spatter so.”

Reena bit back another cry that threatened to erupt. She wanted to say something to make him stop. She didn’t want to hear anymore of the story, but she knew that stopping him would only accelerate his plans for her abuse.

His movements were so fast that she hadn’t seen more than a blur during any of the times he’d hit her, and his blows were brutal. Reena was beginning to understand, with great horror, why he had survived when his brother hadn’t. She held her tongue, fearing that if she spoke up, he might well kill her.

“There were too many of them,” he said simply. “They caught him quickly and held him between them, still yelling but uninjured.”

Her vision swam as tears filled her eyes at the thought of Michael at the mercy of such men. Martin, movement’s casual, seemed to have planned every moment they had shared so far. His hands heaved the shirt back from his skin, and Reena gasped at the long scars that covered every inch of his chest and back.

“They knew I was still hiding, and they tried to get me to come out.”

He moved sideways in the chair and leaned over her. His eyes blazed, but his face was an expressionless mask. “When I didn’t come out, they started cutting him. Slowly drawing their blades over his body.” His fingers traced paths down her bound arms, mimicking the path of the knives he saw in his mind’s eye.

“When I remained hidden, they took his eyes.”

Reena’s bile rose, and she swallowed hard. Not at what was happening to her or what was coming, but at what had happened to the man she’d cared about. He had died terribly, because he had thought himself weak. It hadn’t been her that had given him that sense of weakness, it had always been there. It had been apparent in the rivalry with his brother and in everything he had done since the day she’d met him. She wasn’t to blame for that any more than her suitors were to blame for the inadequacies she had harbored for her body, at least until Joshua had shown her how beautiful she was. She really hadn’t wanted him to be hurt, but he had been hurt and in such a terrible way.

“Arms, legs, all gone,” Martin said, eyes dull as mud. “And when they finally finished him off, they came to find me.”

Martin stood, giving her a full view of his scarred body once more. Then he turned to the table, and his hand caressed a wicked device, which looked like it hooked to a person’s fingers and opened and closed like a crab’s claw.

“Now, I could tell you how the story progressed from there, but I do think that action speaks much louder than words, don’t you?” His hand shifted to a long knife on the table top. He picked it up, working the hilt as if testing its weight in his palm.

“We were supposed to meet another of your special friends here, but I never was very good at waiting, so…” He shrugged, tracing the edge of the knife with his fingertip.

Reena wondered for a moment who else would be coming, but the words that followed yanked her mind back.

“Oh, and don’t be overly sad that you weren’t able to witness, as I was forced to, the horrible death of a loved one.” He came before her and dropped to his knees, holding the blade appraisingly between two fingers. “Rest assured, my sweet, I shall return when I’m done with you. I did promise your son another visit.”

Reena couldn’t stop the scream that came from some unfathomable place in her chest.

9
 

Joshua raced toward the docks. He knew Gregory would know something. The look and the mocking bow had told Joshua that he’d finally found a way to harm them. Gunner rode beside him, keeping stride as they took the roads at such a pace that they were riding into the harbor half an hour after they’d left his home.

Martin had a score to settle with Reena. He had to, especially since he’d told her that they would meet Michael. The man was dead, and the sole way to meet him… Joshua closed his eyes, blocking out all thoughts of what might be happening to her at that very moment.

Minutes later on the Pampered Princess, Joshua had been prepared to tear apart the whole crew to find out where Gregory had gone. But there was only one sailor aboard the deck when Gunner and he had run up the plank. Joshua marched up to the sailor, prepared to interrogate him with his fists if need be.

“You have a Dubois on your crew? New man, blond, scar on his lip.”

“No Dubois, but that sounds like Singer. Picked ‘im up ‘bout a month ago.”

“Where is Captain Talbert?”

He didn’t expect an answer, so it was a great shock when the man answered, “He’s in the tavern.”

“The truth?” Joshua asked, preparing to have Gunner persuade the man.

“O’ course it is. A man don’t lie to a man what saved ‘is life,” he said.

It was then that he recognized the man to be the sailor that he had helped during the storm. He was sure he had the truth from him, but if not, he would be back.

He wheeled around and rushed toward the tavern at the end of the pier. The dock swayed beneath his feet, but he used the motion to help his momentum. He’d lost track of Gunner, but he didn’t have time to hunt him down. The giant of a man was more than able to take care of himself.

Joshua wanted to scream, to hurl things. He wanted Reena. She had been at this man’s mercy for nearly two hours now, and Joshua wasn’t sure Martin was capable of mercy anymore. Deserting was a serious offense, and a man had to be in a grave mental state to do it. Martin intended some kind of revenge on his wife, even if the deed wasn’t her fault.

The sound of arguing in the distance drew his attention. A tall man was being tossed out of the tavern by a short burly man who yelled something about touching his wife. As he moved closer, Joshua couldn’t believe his luck, it was Gregory. Joshua sped the last twenty yards toward the man, hitting him squarely in the chest and landing him in the alley that ran alongside the tavern. The rowdy sounds, coming from inside the tavern covered Gregory’s loud groan as he hit the ground with a
thud
.

Joshua was on the man in an instant. He jerked Gregory’s head forward and bashed it into the ground, until the man stopped coming back for more. Joshua wrapped a handful of Gregory’s shirt inside his fist and yanked the man’s shoulders and bloodied face from the dirt.

“Where is she, you bastard?”

“I have no notion,” Gregory spat. “If you’ve lost your bride, I would suggest the local brothel. You may find her there.”

He slammed his head again, once, twice, three times.

“Be civil, you bastard. Now, tell me where she is,” Joshua growled. “I know you told Martin where to find her. You probably told him where to take her as well, now tell me the truth.”

“Who the devil is Martin?” he asked, forehead creased.

“Singer, damn it, tell me where he is.”

Gregory released a drunken laugh. “Ah, Singer… What were the odds that one of my men and I would have the same woman ruin both our lives?” Gregory smirked, his voice sounding dazed as he looked from Joshua to Gunner, who now stood beside him. “It seems he knew where she lived, and so I brought him here. I have no idea where he might be, or what he might be doing.”

His sneer and something in his narrowed eyes told Joshua that he was lying. His fist flew hard, connecting with Gregory’s chin.

“Where is she?” he demanded again.

“Nowhere.”

He knew more than he was telling. Rage boiled in Joshua’s veins as it had when he was younger. His mind began to fog on the outsides, focusing only on his fist and the man he held beneath it.

“You will tell me where she is.” Joshua’s voice held a deep and lethal promise. “A man can only take so much. Oh, and scream all you want,” he added. “That tavern is so loud, you’ll never be heard.”

9

“You can shriek if you want,” he said. “You can’t keep from it long. I learned that just as you will, the brutally painful way.”

He moved the blade to the shoulder of her long gown.

“We can’t have any real fun with all this in the way.” He started the slow cutting away of the material there. “My toys will be all but useless through all this cloth.”

“Do what you would to me, but leave my family alone. They have done nothing to hurt you. Please, if I am to blame, let your vengeance die with me.” She tugged steadily at the chains as she fought to save the men she loved, her vision fogging with tears.

He ripped her sleeve to the wrist and then turned to the other shoulder.

No one knew where she had gone, so there was no way for them to find her, even if they had arrived from the port already. If Joshua did come, she wasn’t sure how he would fair against this demonic creature in a man’s body. Part of her hoped and at the same time feared that he wouldn’t.

“That wouldn’t be same for same, now would it?” Martin asked, rending the material.

“But my son is helpless, Michael wasn’t,” Reena pleaded.

Martin stilled, his body tense and ready to spring, but he didn’t turn his face to her.

“Don’t speak his name.”

The dangerous tone to his voice and the sudden stillness of his body made Reena clamp her jaw. She didn’t move, speak, or even breathe as he placed the knife tip to the bodice. Never before had Reena so wished she’d worn her stays as she did when Martin shredded the gown to her waist.

“Now, would you enjoy hearing of my first experience with my new captors?” He rubbed the side of the blade over her exposed stomach. “They took a long blade, much like this one, and traced shallow cuts along my stomach.”

As he spoke, her eyes shifted to the scars that ran the length of his stomach. Most were straight, and they covered every inch of flesh. A few crossed over others, leaving puckered scars where the flesh had torn. Fear, anger, and panic combined, making her stomach heave, and for a moment, she was sure she would void her last meal.

“Don’t dirty that sheet.” He turned his face to her. “Trust me; you really don’t want to do that.”

It was strange how his words were more a warning than a threat. As though he were caught in this trap as well.

Reena wanted to fight him. To have power over the situation in some way. She jerked at the chains, but they were held fast under the bed. Her anger that he would dare try to hurt her child fanned its own flames, and soon, steady rage built within her.

“Damn you, Martin! You aren’t angry with me. You’re angry with yourself. You were too much of a coward to come out of hiding and save your own brother, and it eats you alive! Be a man and accept responsibility!”

Martin slammed the knife point hard into the ground, his hand slipping all the way down the blade as it went. Blood gushed from the wound, but Martin didn’t seem to notice. Before her mind could process what had happened, darkness enveloped her.

9

Joshua rode as though Cerberus and all the hounds of hell followed. Gregory’s blood was still drying on his coat. He’d left the man alive, this time. But if he’d lied, Joshua would return and Gregory wouldn’t survive their next encounter.

A small fork appeared in the road precisely where Gregory had said they would find Reena. They veered to the right as instructed, and Joshua jumped from his horse mid stride. The panting horse slowed to a stop, but Joshua never did. Rushing up to the old wooden door, Joshua threw a boot into it. The wood splintered into tiny shards that sprayed into the room. Joshua could see a mattress on the floor in the middle of the room. On it laid Reena with a deranged Martin leaning over her. Her skirt was thrown back, revealing her slender thighs, and her bodice was open, showing her pale breasts. The blood that covered her neck, face, and dress brought a cry from him of such profound anguish that nearby wolves responded in kind.

Martin looked up as Joshua’s fist connected with his jaw. He stumbled back, his body crashing into the wall of the ancient cabin, making the entire building shake. Rushing forward like an enraged bull, Joshua dragged him to his feet, smashing a fist into Martin’s stomach. Martin was landing blows on his body as well, and his mind registered that they were hard, but Joshua knew no pain. At the moment, all his pain was transformed into rage. He channeled it into his fists, and Martin bashed into the wall by the substantial hearth that burned brightly in the restrictive room.