Martin Crawford stood with Vivian pulled against him, his face twisted into a sneer. One arm held her shoulders, the other hand clenched her wrists behind her back.
Vivian’s pale skin revealed her fear, but blazing midnight eyes spoke of ire.
Ashworth stood before them, his heart in his throat. He forced himself to sound calm. “This is a surprise.”
“Good morning, Ashworth. It seems I have found something of mine in your possession again.”
Something of his? “You know Miss Suttley?”
Ashworth glanced at Vivian. She looked away.
Martin laughed. “So she did not tell you of our engagement. We are to be married, although she’s no longer worthy to be my wife.”
Temper pounded in Ashworth’s ribs, his jaw tensed. “Vivian, is this man you told me about? The one your father gave you to?”
Her stare still off to the trees, she nodded.
“Did you know that we knew one another?”
Again, she nodded.
Martin rubbed his cheek along the top of her head. “She’s clever, is she not? She heard me say how much I despised you, that I hoped I’d never again see your face. So, she used you to escape me.”
Martin Crawford, the one man Ashworth most feared would find him. The one man who may realize that Harry was his own son. He hid so far away in these hills to keep Martin from discovering his whereabouts. And Vivian brought him right to them.
“You chose not to share that secret with me, Vivian.”
She winced at the clipped fury of his words, biting her lip. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears.
“Lover’s quarrel, is it?” Martin pressed his lips to her neck. “Then you should not mind if I take Vivian back with me. She has a lesson to learn.”
“Miss Suttley! Miss Suttley!”
Ashworth turned at the sound of Harry’s voice but could not stop the blur racing past him. “Harry, no!”
But his son had already latched himself onto Vivian’s legs, attempting to pull her away from Martin. “Don’t go, Miss Suttley. Please, don’t go.”
“By devil!” Martin’s voice cut through the air. “He looks exactly like Mary.”
“You knew my momma?”
Ashworth reached for his son, but not before Martin snatched him. Now the monster held both Vivian and Harry against him.
“You’ve ruined Vivian no doubt.” Wild rage flashed in Martin’s eyes, dangerous and unpredictable. “You took my Mary away from me. You had a son with her, a son that should have been mine! And he will be.”
“You aren’t my poppa!”
Martin snorted. “I should have been. I loved your mother until that man killed her.”
“A monster killed her!” Harry twisted in Martin’s grasp but couldn’t free himself.
Ice crashed through Ashworth’s blood, dimmed his sight, stole his breath. His brain scrambled for a plan. He had to get his son away from Martin. He had to save Vivian from a horrible fate.
Would he fail again?
“Let Harry go.” He lifted his head at Vivian’s distraught voice. “It is me you want.”
Martin bent and grabbed her ear with his teeth. Vivian winced but refused to cry out. “I’ll want you for a few nights, and after that it’s doubtful anyone will want you. But I’m not letting the boy go.”
Ashworth fisted his hands, spots whirled before his eyes. “Let them both go. It is me you want.”
“Now that is an interesting proposition.” Martin cocked his head. “But unless you have a pistol handy to shoot me down, I’ll not be freeing either of these two. I will come back another time to deal with you.”
Ashworth stood there, dumbfounded as Martin slowly backed toward the carriage. His arm was tight against Harry’s shoulders. One wrong move and the life could be choked right out of the boy’s throat.
He wasted time in deciding how to act. For each second brought Martin closer to the open door.
“No!”
In the moment it took Ashworth to realize the wrenching cry had come from Vivian, she had both kicked Martin and jabbed him with her elbow. The shock of her sudden attack loosened his hold on his captives.
Harry fell to his knees, then scrambled over to his father.
Vivian did not have such luck. Martin recovered and snatched her hair, yanked it back until her neck gleamed in the morning light.
Ashworth gave Harry a tight squeeze. Relief overwhelmed him only to be replaced with gratitude. Vivian saved his son. Now he must save her, no matter what the cost.
“Go inside, Harry. It is not safe for you here.”
“But what about Miss—”
“Go now, son.”
Tears streaking down his cheeks, the boy obeyed and went up the steps and inside the house.
Ashworth straightened and set his glare on Martin. “Now let Miss Suttley go. This fight is between you and me.”
“Oh no. Vivian forsook me. And what’s worse, she ran to you. A man who’d already betrayed me and killed the woman I loved.”
“You’ll not take her in peace. Pistols or the old-fashioned swords?” Ashworth would see this all end now. He could not live in fear of Martin finding Harry any longer.
“NO! I’ll not let you die and leave Harry alone in the world.” Vivian finally broke free from Martin’s grasp and ran, not toward the house, but into the waiting carriage.
Her actions stunned Ashworth just long enough that Martin got a head start on him. By the time he’d reached the carriage, the door banged shut and the wheels lurched forward.
Vivian was at that devil’s mercy. He remembered the bruises on her back, the tales of Martin’s painful assaults. That man would abuse her until she could not move, he would bloody her until she lay near death. If she lived, she would never find love again.
His throat closed in tight. He’d not give up on her.
“John!” Ashworth raced back to the front door and yanked on his friend. “Come, we must go after her.”
But John stood immobile, his eyes huge.
“Won’t you help me stop the carriage? That bastard will disappear with her.” He remembered Mary’s battered and bruised body. “Possibly kill her!”
But the tutor, his friend, shook his head. “I want her to go, Charles. I don’t want her here.”
He terrified me. Told me to leave this house or he would kill me.
I was poisoned.
John? No, it couldn’t be. Not his closest friend. Not the man who saved his soul, offered to help take care of him and Harry.
Ashworth swallowed the bitter lump souring his mouth. He hadn’t time to dwell on John’s unwillingness to help or reasons for wanting Vivian gone. He had to catch that carriage before it got too far down the hill.
By the time Demon was saddled, he feared too much time had passed. But he was able to push the stallion to a full run and reach the vehicle as it crested the hill near the village’s border.
Heart thundering as loud as Demon’s hooves, Ashworth pounded on the door. “Open this door!”
Much to his surprise and relief, the carriage slowed. Martin’s insane need for vengeance or his irrational feelings of superiority must be more important than having his way with Vivian at the moment.
The door opened to Martin’s sneer.
“No,” Vivian cried behind him. “Please, this is all my fault. I never should have come to Silverstone Manor. I never should have brought this nightmare upon this house.”
“We have unfinished business, your new lover and I.” Her captor shoved her back from the door. “Wait for me here, I’m not through with you yet.”
Ashworth slid from Demon’s back, fury scorching his veins. “If you’ve hurt her again…”
Martin chuckled. “She’s no longer your concern. She was mine first and she’ll be mine again until I tire of her. Obviously, you weren’t able to keep her.” He stepped out of the carriage and slammed the door closed. “She was leaving you, wasn’t she?”
Ashworth clenched hi
s jaw, unable to dispute it. “Follow me.”
He led them up a hill, but a cry stopped them before they reached the top. Ashworth swung around, heart lodged deep in his throat. “Vivian, no…”
She raced up the hill after them, eyes shining, hair in disarray. “Please, stop this madness.”
Ashworth hurried down to meet her halfway, to meet her before Martin could get his hands on her again. “You must go back. Tell the driver to take you back to the manor.”
“You mustn’t fight him. What if he kills you? What will happen to little Harry?”
Without thought, he pulled her in an embrace, kissed the top of her hair, breathed in her essence. Like warm wine, contentment and peace soothed his nerves. “I won’t fail.”
She sniffled against his chest. “But—”
“I can’t allow you to go back with that monster. I saw what he did to Mary. I won’t let it happen to you.”
“Martin won’t play fair.” She angled her head up to him, midnight eyes glistening in the morning light. “If you die because of me…”
“If I die, it was my time to go. This isn’t because of you, Vivian. This is because of what happened seven years ago. I’ve hidden here because of this man, because of my fears. It must end.”
“Enough!” Martin’s shout startled them. “Do you intend to provoke my anger further?”
“Go to hell, Crawford,” Ashworth yelled back, bringing a weak smile to Vivian’s lips.
She caressed his chin with her fingertips, then traced his scar. Ashworth closed his eyes for the briefest moment, savoring the gentle strokes of his angel.
“You’ll not stop this duel,” she said softly. “Not even for me?”
He pressed his lips against her forehead, swallowed the tightness creeping up his throat. “I end this nightmare for you, for all of us. Go back, Vivian, I need you someplace you will not distract me. Look after Harry.”
Rocks bounced down the hill, alerting them to Martin’s descent.
Vivian wiped her eyes and stepped back from him. “I love you, my lord. You are no monster to me.”
Without giving him the chance to respond, she turned and hurried down the hill to the waiting carriage.
Ashworth straightened his shoulders and began the climb again, passing Martin without uttering a sound. He led them to a nearby clearing, surrounded by trees on one side and a cliff on the other. There, his groomsman waited, a sword in each hand.
Ashworth reached for one. “We duel.”
“To the death?”
“To the death.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ashworth had not touched a sword since London.
Martin stopped in the center of the field and raised his face to the faint sunlight. A gust of wind lift his hair. “You obviously think I cannot best you in this. You are wrong.”
Ashworth joined him. “I want it over. The nightmare that began seven years ago must come to an end now.”
Martin lunged for him immediately. Ashworth swung away, then returned with a strike of his own. They parried over the length of the field, at one point coming dangerously close to the edge of the cliff. But then Martin pushed his way back.
Ashworth sliced through the air, the tip of his sword catching Martin’s arm. A cry of pain rang across the field as blood formed on the fabric.
“You bastard!” Martin charged, forced him to retreat. The ground was muddy, slippery as they fought.
Ashworth’s pulse swelled and crashed in his head, sweat dripped down his neck. Only the sounds of their blades clashing echoed in the air. The sharp tang of blood saturated the senses.
“You killed her!” Martin’s voice rose with depraved madness. “You took her from me, got her pregnant, and then you forced my wrath upon her.”
He lunged toward Ashworth, who leapt back from the blade. In the process he slipped on the wet ground and landed on his back.
Martin stood over him, poised, hatred blazing in his eyes.
“No!” A scream rang out in the distance. They both looked over to see John running towards them. “Don’t kill him.”
“Well, well, John Hughes.” Martin caught his breath. “Heard you’d become nothing more than a boy’s tutor.”
“Please don’t hurt him.”
“John, leave. This is not your concern.” Ashworth started to rise but Martin jabbed the sword at his neck.
John struggled to breathe. “Why-why did you have to chase after her?”
Ashworth stared into a gaze ripe with perverse anguish. Obsession. “Why do you want Vivian gone?”
John yanked off his glasses. “I wanted Catherine gone. I wanted them all gone!”
Martin narrowed his eyes. “All?”
“I—I was in a rage. I followed Charles to that house, I saw him with that whore.”
“Whore?” Martin’s sword swung to John’s neck.
While the other two were distracted, Ashworth slowly sat up. In a heartbeat, he shifted into a crouch.
“Yes, she was a whore. All women are. Conniving, heartless and wicked. They were all in my way.”
All in my way.
Ashworth’s breath lodged in his throat. Had it truly been John all along just has Vivian said? Could it be true?
“In your way for what?” Martin’s sneer rang out through the fog.
“Charles is too good for them.”
The sword slid down John’s skin, drawing blood.
“Mary was better than him or any of those other wenches.”
Despite the sharp blade, John actually laughed. “And yet you beat her.”
Martin’s face contorted in rage as he shoved John to the ground. In an instant, he was on his chest. The sword lifted high to the sky, catching a glint from the weak sun.
Ashworth leapt up and knocked Martin off. “John, are you crazy? You’re taunting a madman!”
But with the wild glare in those blue eyes, Ashworth suddenly believed John was just as mad.
“I want you to love me, Charles. Me!”
Blood pounded like thunder in his eardrums, yet he had to know the truth. All of it. “Did you take Mary’s life?”
“She was nearly dead anyway. I just finished her off.”
Softly. “Did you try to kill Vivian?”
Tears filled John’s blue eyes. “Instead of sending her away, you asked her to marry you.”
Betrayal crushed deep in Ashworth’s chest. Shock made him immobile. John had been his only friend, his only remaining link to the outside world, and all along he’d been the culprit, allowing Ashworth to suffer the horrific visions, the terrifying nightmares, the loneliness. He had valued that friendship more than Vivian’s trust.
“You killed Mary!” Martin’s shriek came with the sudden flash of the blade. Before Ashworth could react, blood spurted into the air and a gurgle escaped from John’s throat.
Ashworth rose up in a engulfing rage and charged toward Martin, knocking him over. The two of them rolled on the grass, wrestling, kicking, swinging punches. With each roll, each swing, they moved closer to the cliff’s edge.
Pain swelled and crashed in Ashworth’s bones, crackled in his skull, but the wrath did not lessen. He knocked Martin backward with a hard punch to the jaw.
A shriek split the air as Martin slipped. “I’m falling! I—I can’t hold on.” He clung to the edge of the cliff, terror frozen across his features.
“You do not deserve to live.”
“Save me, please. I’ll go, I—I promise.” He squealed, scrambled to clutch more grass and tree roots. “Hurry! I’m slipping!”
Ashworth stared down at the monster at his feet. How easy it would be to kick him off and send him to oblivion. He could free the world of one more devil.
A man who would murder would not live his days in torment over the possibility of it. He would not resist falling in love and being vulnerable to keep others away. You are no murderer, Lord Ashworth.
He had not killed Mary. In fact, he had tried to save her life after Mar
tin’s beating. He tried to save the baby’s life before being knocked unconscious. He awoke with the knife in his hand because John had put it there.
All these years he’d carried demons which weren’t his own. He believed the rumors the villagers told, would not dare to look at himself in the mirror. He thought he had been marked as a monster.
But Vivian had faith in him. From her first meeting as a girl to the moment she walked out the manor’s doors, she had not feared him. She did not recoil from him. She wanted him. She loved him.
You are no murderer, Lord Ashworth.
He bent down and yanked Martin onto solid ground. “I did not kill before and I shall not kill now.”
Heart heavy, eyes damp, Ashworth started toward to John.
Suddenly a vice tightened around his ankle, tripping him toward the hard ground.
Martin!
Ashworth twisted around, but the predator clutched harder.
“You took Mary. You took her child. You took Vivian. Now I take you!” Martin reached forward, murder blazing in his eyes.
Instinct lifted Ashworth’s free leg and drove it forward with a hard thrust. The kick sent Martin flying backward. This time there was nothing to stop him from going over the cliff.
Shaking, Ashworth slowly rose to his feet. In a matter of minutes, two monsters were dead. Would Vivian still want the third?
***
The kiss of early evening blew a scented breeze against Vivian’s skin. She smiled and lifted her eyes to the stars emerging in the darkening sky.
She should be exhausted. But while everyone was still inside partaking in the revelry, dancing, and fun, she would rather enjoy the beauty of the evening. After being within Silverstone Manor’s walls for several weeks, the sight of other houses and city lights was a welcome distraction.
“So, my lady, here is where I find you.”
Vivian’s heart melted at the sound of her husband’s voice. He came up behind her and she leaned against his chest. “I needed fresh air.”
“And I need you. Every day I need you more.”
She squeezed his fingers. “I still find it hard to believe that we are here in London.”
“No more than I. It’s been almost eight years since I’ve left the manor. I had forgotten how many people there were in this city.”
Beauty Tempts the Beast Page 23