Friendship's Bond (31 page)

His appetite needed no boosting. Thomas Thorpe leered into the face lifted to his by the force of his fingers threaded into thick sherry-gold hair. He was ready now ready to take what he had so often promised himself . . . but not yet. Some deep sense intimated that to rush things was to deny himself the thrill of seeing fear mounting to dread, seeing the tremor of horror ripple through the slender body as the last shred of clothing dropped away; then hear the sob of utter despair as he forced that naked form on to the bed. Yes, it was right he should claim that pleasure; he had earned it by providing a roof for those weeks. She could have given her thanks then, quietly paid the true cost of renting this house yet . . . had Ann Spencer acted willingly then this enjoyment, this extra amusement, would have gone by the board. But she had not acted willingly. He was grateful to her for that, glad of her refusal for this way he could delight in her misery every bit as much as he enjoyed his own gratification.

He clamped his mouth hard on her lips, stifling a plea starkly visible in wide frightened eyes.

After releasing Ann he breathed deeply as she stumbled from his arms. He must control his emotions, keep desire in check or nature would take its own course and while providing ease it would cheat him of the satisfaction of that first delicious moment. But self-denial would be short-lived. Flesh reared hard and demanding. There would be many other moments. He smiled eagerly at Ann as she backed away from him.

‘I think we’ve waited long enough,’ then with each syllable dripping lust he added thickly, ‘take off your clothes.’

Ann shook her head. ‘No.’

In an instant the sensual smile was gone, replaced by cold menace. Thorpe’s narrow eyes glittered beneath heavy half-closed lids. ‘No? Then I will do it for you.’

‘Wait,’ Ann’s arms crossed protectively over her chest, ‘first tell me where Alec is.’

‘First!’ he sneered. ‘Why would I tell you first?’

‘You promised if I came here you would tell me where to find Alec.’

‘After!’ He emphasised the word. ‘A sensible businessman doesn’t hand over goods until they are paid for; you know my price, the sooner it is paid the sooner you get those goods.’

Ann at once realised that there was nothing to prevent Thomas Thorpe going back on his word, no guarantee he would reveal where he had Alec hidden. Goods. The word stung in her brain. That was all she and Alec were to this man: no more than a paper bag which once used was thrown away. But buying and selling was a two-way operation. Head lifting determinedly she said, ‘We both have a price, Mr Thorpe. Mine is that you produce Alec now or the business you hope to engage in is ended.’

‘I’m the one to say when it is ended and that won’t be for many a day.’ Thorpe’s screech of anger echoed through the silent house and he struck Ann hard across the cheek, the savagery of it banging her head against the wall. A second blow sent her tumbling to the bed; a laugh rattled in his throat as he reached for her.

‘What was that?’ Edward Langley paused in mid-stride. ‘Did you hear anything?’

‘Someone shouting, probably came from the alehouse across the street.’

Maybe. There was nothing unusual in a man’s raised voice when leaving that place but the sound which had come with it, the quiet underlying sound of a woman’s cry, was not so usual.

‘Not the alehouse,’ he said, ‘much nearer; it could almost have come from the chapel.’

‘But there was no one there, you saw for yourself.’

Yes, he had seen – he had also heard. Edward stared at the darkened building; somewhere close by a woman had cried out, a sound alive with fear. Ann? For a moment the thought stunned him. Could the woman be Ann Spencer, had she tripped and fallen in the darkness, was she lying injured? Edward forced himself to stay calm. A quick search of the grounds would settle matters.

‘Best take a look around the back, someone could be hurt.’

He did not want to wait even a minute; that minute could be spent searching for Ann. Alec followed, stopping as his glance caught the gleam of light in a window of Chapel House.

‘Samuel Bradley saw Ann coming here.’ Edward too was looking at the gleam peeping between curtains not quite closed together. ‘Maybe she has been given a night’s lodging.’

‘She will not be in that house!’

It had come too quickly. Edward looked at the lad already turning away.

‘Why, Alec?’ He caught the boy’s shoulder. ‘Why would Ann not be in that house?’

‘It . . he held fear for her.’

Edward frowned. ‘Fear of what? Does it have rats?’

‘I do not think it was an animal caused Ann to be afraid.’

These two, so gossip in town had it, had of their own choosing left that house. But if vermin were not the problem then what had been?

‘Alec.’ Edward turned the boy to look at him. ‘Tell me truthfully, why did you and Miss Spencer leave here, what was she afraid of?’

‘You ask for the truth Edward but what I say may not be truth, for Ann did not say what troubled her.’

‘But you knew all the same.’

‘I can only guess . . . but I think it was to do with the man who came to collect payment for use of the house. It was on those evenings Ann was feared; I asked on each of those occasions should I remain in the room with her but she would not allow me to, so you see I cannot say with truth if it was this man caused her to be frightened.’

Edward stiffened. Just what sort of payment? Leah had said Ann Spencer had come to her with no money to speak of so what had that rent collector asked in lieu?

‘This man, do you know who he is, can you tell me his name?’

‘I did not see him on either of those evenings but I heard Ann talking with him, she called him Mr Thorpe.’

Thorpe! The one man whom Leah spoke of only with loathing. What had he to do with Ann Spencer?

Another cry, this time cut sharp as though by a blow. Edward ran for the house. If it were not Ann Spencer in there he would apologise; though if a man was using his fist on a woman that apology would be given along with a blow or two to his own head.

Inside the house, at the foot of the stairs, Edward’s hand stopped the boy. ‘Wait here.’

‘But . . .’

‘Wait here!’ The curt reply brooked no more argument. Alec nodded as Edward took the stairs two at a time.

At the open door of a bedroom he halted at the sight of two figures. Thorpe! But it was not the furious face turning to look at him that Edward saw in that explosive moment; he focused only on the face of a young woman, a scarlet weal vivid across her pale cheek, the nape of her neck gripped in Thorpe’s left hand while the other grasped the cloth of a dress ripped open to the waist.

‘Get away from her.’ Little more than a murmur, it pulsed fury.

Shocked, Thorpe stared into eyes gleaming murder.

‘Let her go or I swear I’ll kill you where you stand.’

In the seconds it took for Edward to make that threat words of a very different kind came to Thorpe. Langley, they whispered, Langley is in love with the girl. Like warm sunshine it melted the coldness of shock. He could use the knowledge to torment the man as he had, and would continue, to torment the woman. Another blessing! He dropped the cloth still held in his fingers while pushing Ann a step forward.

‘But of course I’ll let her go,’ he smarmed, ‘did you think I was holding her against her will?’

Ann couldn’t . . . she couldn’t have come willingly. Edward looked at the slight figure pulling the torn dress to cover her bare flesh, seeing the rest of that waxen pale face flush scarlet as the weal marking it. He was certain.

Small eyes the colour of slushed ice held Edward’s stare; mockery in the voice was loud as an open laugh as Thorpe pushed Ann one more step towards Edward.

‘Tell him Ann, tell him did I bring you to this house or did you come of your own choice.’

She had to say she had come looking only for a place to spend the night, that what he had seen had been forced on her. His heart seeming to stand still, Edward waited for Ann’s reply. With the whispered, ‘It is my choice,’ his certainty died.

‘Satisfied?’

Like a spark to dry tinder Thorpe’s sarcasm ignited the passion of hurt smouldering deep inside Edward, hurling it upwards in a volcanic spurt.

‘Not quite!’ He spat venom. ‘I want to feel the kind you get from striking a woman, except mine will be got from beating you senseless.’

‘No Edward, stop, you don’t understand.’

Thorpe was already in his grip, he was dangerously close to delivering a blow. Ann’s cry halted the strike. Edward answered savagely, ‘No I don’t understand, I don’t understand how you can humiliate yourself like this.’

‘I did it for Alec!’

That wasn’t the cry of a tuppenny whore! Edward shot a glance at Ann, whose eyes glistened with shame; then his grip on Thorpe tightened.

‘Alec,’ he snapped, ‘you came here on account of Alec! Do you want to tell me why? Or should I ask Thorpe!’

Conscious of the anger throbbing in Edward, afraid his treatment of her attacker would make Thorpe refuse now to say where Alec could be found, Ann hesitated.

‘I . . .’ A deep breath helped her search for the right words. ‘Mr Thorpe and I met yesterday evening. I had been searching for Alec but found no trace of him; Mr Thorpe said he knew where Alec was.’

‘But he didn’t tell you there and then.’

‘No. He . . . he had a very urgent visit to make and could not spare the time it would take to explain.’

Edward looked scathingly at the man he held in an iron grip. ‘Couldn’t spare the time,’ he grated, ‘or didn’t you want to miss the chance of having a girl who otherwise wouldn’t come within a mile?’

‘She can leave now but she won’t get to know where the boy is.’ The words squeezed with difficulty past the barrier of fingers clasped about his throat but Thorpe’s eyes screeched dark hatred.

‘Edward please go . . . just go.’

‘Yes, I’ll go,’ Edward answered, but his eyes stayed with those blazing hate. ‘But first Mr Thorpe is going to answer my question: do I take it you have Alec hidden away somewhere?’

Frantic with fear that Thorpe would take revenge by not disclosing where Alec was, Ann cried out across the room. ‘Mr Thorpe was taking care of Alec, he . . . he promised to take me to him.’

‘And was that promise made before or after you slapped her face, before or after you tore the clothes from her? Either way you are going to regret both.’

‘Do that,’ Thorpe snarled as Edward’s fist raised again, ‘strike me, Langley, and neither you nor the girl will ever see that brat, you’ll never find him – never!’

‘Is that a fact? Then I must be mistaken. Let’s find out shall we?’ At last Edward’s glance shifted to Ann. ‘Miss Spencer, would you be so good as to call my friend? He is waiting downstairs in the hall.’

‘I am here, Edward, I could not stay downstairs any longer.’

With a gasp of incredulity Ann stared at the boy in the doorway. ‘Alec – oh thank God!’

Alec caught the tilt of Edward’s head signalling that he take Ann down to the hallway.

‘So!’ Edward jerked the figure he held on to. ‘You told Ann Spencer the lad she searched for was with you, that she should come get him. That lie was told simply for your own ends and we both know what they were; you didn’t like being refused, did you, that hurt your pride, but hitting a woman did no harm to your self-esteem. My guess is it did just the opposite. Well, we all have fancies and right now mine is to beat the daylights out of you.’

Edward stared with disgust into eyes now clearly showing fear but the look raised no pity in him.

‘Edward . . . please, no more; Alec is safe. Let that be enough.’ Ann had refused to be coaxed away.

No! Edward resisted her words. The swine had to be made to suffer for what he’d done.

‘Edward, please.’ Rushing forward, Ann placed a hand on his arm. Edward struggled to think rationally. Thorpe deserved a beating . . . but what would be the effect upon Ann of witnessing yet more violence?

‘Think yourself lucky,’ he said as he threw Thorpe from him, glaring down on the sprawling figure, ‘you’ve got away with it this time you filthy swine, but I advise you to listen carefully: should you approach Ann Spencer again, should you even look in her direction, I will break every bone in your miserable body.’

Chapter 28

She had heard little apart from Ezekial’s account of his talk with Samuel Bradley and how he had seen Ann turning into Queen’s Place. That had been dubious from the start.

Leah stared at the butter muslin she was making into cheese covers.

Why? she had asked herself. Why would the wench go to the chapel which had openly displayed rejection of both her and the lad? And if not the chapel . . .

Leah’s needle rested in the cloth.

Samuel Bradley’s conversation with Ezekial had revealed there was no service that evening so the place would have been closed up. There was only one more building in Queen’s Place and that was Chapel House. But why in God’s name call at the very home she had literally been thrown out of? Yet that was where Edward and Alec had found her.