Shameless (13 page)

Cold fear slid through her veins.

“Who are you?” she tried again, pulling away from the woman’s ministrations. This brought the pale blue eyes up once more.

“Never you mind who I be.” The woman’s accent was as coarse as her face. The rag was withdrawn and plopped down in a white crockery bowl half full of water, which rested on a spindly table beside the bed. Her reddened hands lifted the rag again and squeezed water from it with a practiced move. “You’d best be saving your worries for yourself, ducks. They’ll be coming for ye soon enough.”

“Who—who will be coming for me?”

Despite her best efforts at maintaining her composure, Beth could not quite keep her voice from cracking. Wherever she was—and her quick survey had told her only that she was housed in a tiny, dungeonlike room with stone walls, a beamed ceiling, a small slit of a window that no human being could possibly fit through and that revealed what seemed to be an impenetrably black night beyond—her situation was bad. Terrifying, in fact.

“Them that’s in charge.”

The slopping rag slid across her neck, then along her shoulders and over her décolletage in quick, practiced strokes that were as impersonal as if she were no more than a china doll. A remnant of damp chill about her person made Beth think that perhaps she had been given a sponge bath all over. A horrified glance down at herself brought the reassuring knowledge that she was still fully clothed. In fact, she was still wearing the lemon-colored morning gown in which she had been abducted. It was sadly crushed now and dirty, and her stockings felt loose about her legs, as if her garters were on the verge of giving up their grip, but nothing indecent met her gaze and she had no sense
that any outrage had been committed upon her person while she had been unaware. Indeed, she was still wearing both shoes.

“Here, lift your head.”

Beth complied automatically, to find that the woman had replaced the rag with a brush, which she proceeded to drag through the masses of hair that tumbled about Beth’s face.

“What do you mean, them that’s in charge? In charge of what?” Beth jerked her head away, and when it could retreat no farther she allowed it to drop once again to the flat mattress, there being no pillow. The brush followed inexorably, continuing its work. “What is this place?”

“’Tis not for me to say.”

“Ouch!”

The brush caught on a tangle and was pulled on regardless. The tiny pain was lost in a swift uprising of panic. Glancing furtively around, Beth discovered that, even if she managed to somehow free herself of her bonds and evade her keeper, a heavy-looking wooden door that was closed and almost certainly locked also stood between her and escape. Even if she could somehow manage to get through the door, there was no telling what lay beyond. Whatever it was, she doubted that it was a clear path to freedom. Her gaze returned to the woman, whose attention was all on her task. Beth frowned with incomprehension as she realized what that task was: styling her long tangles of hair. The thick sausage curls the woman was coaxing to life by brushing them around her fingers and arranging them, one after the other, across her bosom, seemed to have no possible reason for being brought into existence. Likewise, the sponge bath made no sense.

“Would you tell me what’s happening, please? Why are you doing this?”

Something—a quiver of fear, perhaps, in her voice, though Beth tried not to allow it—caused the woman to meet Beth’s eyes with a degree of sympathy in her own.

“Listen, ducks. Ye do as you’re bid and they’ll not hurt ye over much.”

Beth’s stomach tightened. “What do you mean?”

“’Tis a hard thing to endure, to be sure, but still no more than what every woman must—”

“Open up!” The shout from outside the door, which was accompanied by a loud pounding on the thick wooden portal, made Beth jump. Her gaze shot toward the door. Her heart leaped. Her throat tightened. “’Tis time.”

“Aye, just let me finish,” the woman called in answer.

“Please, you must tell me what’s happening.” Panic that Beth didn’t even try to hide any longer shook her voice as the woman replaced the brush with something—a tin of red-colored salve, Beth realized as the salve was rubbed into her lips and cheeks. To tint them, obviously. But why? Beth’s eyes widened as the most horrible suspicion began to take shape and weight in her mind.

“The mercy is ’tis over fast.” The woman was whispering now. “That’s somethin’ you just must needs keep tellin’ yourself.”

“What—what is over fast?”

“Woman, will you open this door?” The roar was accompanied by loud banging. Beth’s heart banged with it. Her breathing quickened as her gaze flew fearfully toward the door.

“Please . . . ” She breathed the entreaty, looking back at her keeper, who was no longer looking at her. “Please, you must just tell me . . . ”

“Aye, I’m coming,” the woman called, ignoring Beth now. She stood up, dropped the tin of salve on the table, and moved toward the door. For all the response Beth got to her continued whispered pleadings for information, the woman might as well have been suddenly afflicted with deafness.

When she pulled the door open, Beth instinctively went silent and still as a corpse. Her eyes were fixed on the door.

“Ye took yer own sweet time,” the man who walked through it grumbled, giving the woman a condemning look before striding to the head of the bed. He was middle-aged, with close-cropped grizzled hair and a lined face, a servant from his dress. A big, burly servant with a cruel expression. Battling the urge to scream for help, which she knew
would be useless, Beth instinctively shrank into the mattress as he leaned over her. His rough hands brushed hers and then gripped her wrists. A moment later her hands were free, and she realized he had cut through the rope with the wicked-looking knife he now held.

He could have as easily slit my throat
.

The thought was terrifying. It was followed by another one: did they mean to kill her?

No,
she comforted herself stoutly, though her heart raced at the thought. If killing her was their object, she would already be dead.

In any case, cringing paid no toll. Taking a deep breath, she sat up.

“Who are you? What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, drawing on the last dregs of her courage in the faint hope that perhaps she could win her freedom through words alone. Grimacing at the tingles that shot through her arms and fingers as she shook them out, ignoring her swimming head as best she could, she cast a quick, calculating glance at the open door. If they would just unloose her ankles, perhaps she could make a run for it.

“Oh-ho! Talks like a duchess, this one does.” Knife in hand, the servant addressed his words to the woman as he moved farther down the bed and slid a hand under Beth’s skirt to grip her calf just above the bindings. Beth stiffened as the warmth of his pudgy fingers went clear through her stocking to her skin, and he must have felt her reaction because he smirked at her. “Well, you’ll not be acting so high in the instep come mornin’, and that’s God’s truth.”

“I do not see how you can speak of God at the same time as you are taking part in such villainy,” Beth said severely.

“I’ll speak of God when and how I like, ye ken?” The man tightened his grip until his fingers dug painfully into her leg. Unable to stop herself, Beth caught her breath sharply.

“Ye’d serve yourself best by keeping your tongue between your teeth,” the woman, leaning forward, muttered hastily in Beth’s ear as the man, satisfied that he had hurt her, lowered his gaze and roughly shoved her skirt and petticoats almost up to her knees.

The awful familiarity of it made Beth nauseous. She itched to box
his ears at the very least. But such an act would be folly of the worst sort, she knew, and so she steeled herself not to react as he leered at her lower limbs. Still, she couldn’t help her body’s instinctive response: as his hand slid back around her calf, her insides shuddered with revulsion and fear.

“My family is quite wealthy. And they will pay well to have me back.” Knowing the woman’s warning was wise but feeling that she had to try anything and everything she could to gain her release, Beth addressed the man again with what she considered truly commendable composure, and played the strongest card she held. Then, as his eyes met hers with a gleam in them she could not mistake, she added hurriedly, “Unharmed. They will pay well to have me back unharmed.”

Lingering hopes of perhaps somehow still avoiding utter ruin kept her from revealing who her family was, or telling him her name. If and when he showed an interest in freeing her in exchange for money, there would be time enough to announce that she was Lady Elizabeth Banning, and provide him with her direction. Of course, her kidnapper had known who she was: he had asked if she was Lady Elizabeth Banning before hitting her over the head. But it was possible that these miscreants did not know, and she had no desire to bruit her identity about to all and sundry. If she could possibly keep what had befallen her quiet, it was in her best interests to do so.

“Oh, unharmed, is it?” The servant chuckled, looking up at her as he cut with quick, deep strokes through the rope binding her ankles. “That’s rich, that is.
Unharmed
.”

He could not be persuaded to help her, Beth was suddenly certain, no matter what lure she dangled before him. As he finished his task and straightened, the look in his eyes as they ran over her made her skin crawl.

I have to do something
. The thought brought panic with it, because she could think of nothing, not a single thing, to do that might better her situation a whit.
Oh, Claire, Gabby, where are you? Hurry
.

“Up you get.” The man sheathed his knife in his belt and moved toward her.

“Very well.”

She acquiesced so readily because she could not bear the thought that he might touch her again. Dodging his reaching hand, she hastily slid her legs over the edge of the bed so that he could see she meant to obey. Her instinct was to hurl herself through that open door and run like a rabbit as far away as she could get as soon as her feet touched the floor, but the woman stood between her and the door and the man was close, and anyway her fear was that her legs would not support her through such an endeavor. She must just test them before tipping her hand. The consequences of failure would be nothing short of disastrous, she was certain.

A beating, she felt, would probably be the least of it.

“I’ve a pressing need to make use of the facilities,” she lied as she cautiously stood up. The wave of dizziness that enveloped her was almost strong enough to override the pins and needles that attacked her feet as blood rushed into them. A pair of tottering sideways steps was the best she could manage before having to steady herself with a hand on the cold stone wall. Running was beyond her for the moment, and as she realized that she despaired. Her breathing quickened and her stomach roiled, and she fought desperately to clear her head.

I must just play for time
.

Wetting her dry lips, she directed her plea toward the woman, who had at least shown her a glimmer of sympathy.

“Is there a convenience I might . . . ?”

“’Tis too late for such.” Before Beth realized what he meant to do, the man grabbed a thick handful of hair at the crown of her head and hauled her after him toward the door. “You be wanted below.”

W
HILE SHE WAS BEING DRAGGED
past the wooden platform at the far end of the Great Hall of what she had discovered over the course of the last few minutes was an enormous, ancient stone castle, Beth’s heart stuttered and her blood ran cold. What she beheld was a hideously clear vision of what her fate would be unless she could somehow, by some miracle, save herself. Though help was undoubtedly coming, it was as certain as it was that leaves fall in the autumn that unless it arrived within minutes, it would be too late.

The knowledge brought panic with it.

Ruin is nothing. I’ll gladly embrace it, if that’s what is necessary to be delivered from this
.

“Ye be sure an’ give me a wave when it’s ye up there, Duchess,” her captor chuckled over the roar of the crowd.

“I am Lady Elizabeth Banning,” she said clearly, although it was hard to force the words out past her constricted throat. “My brother-in-law is the Duke of Richmond. As I said, he will pay well to have me
restored to him. You may also believe me when I tell you that he will punish you most severely if you fail to help me.”

“Oh, a duke, is it?” The hand in her hair tightened viciously, making her cry out. “I don’t care if he’s the bloody King o’ England. I got me job to do, and that’s it. And if you don’t quit flappin’ your lips at me like you’ve been doin’, I’ll stick a gag down your bloomin’ throat, see if I don’t.”

A scream snapped her attention back to the stage. What she saw made her knees go weak.

No, no, no
. But Beth didn’t say it aloud.

Horror and pity and a terrible clawing fear for her own fate combined as she came to the dreadful realization that the girl on the platform was being sold. Auctioned off to the highest bidder, for a purpose that was all too sickeningly clear. The shouts were offers of money, and the bidding had been whipped into a frenzy as the poor unfortunate’s clothes were ripped away piece by piece until she was left to stand naked in front of them all.