Say You Love Me

by Angel

  A noise upstairs distracted him. He glanced back at the last bit of material that still clung to Kelsey and slipped the knife under it. Her shredded clothing draped each side of the bed to the floor. None remained to cover her.

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  “Did you hear me?” she asked frantically, her panic soar—

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  He didn’t even look at her. He dropped the knife to the floor, done with it-for the moment. He then looked down for his whips and tsked when he couldn’t find them right off. He had to bend down to lift the material of her dress to find one of them, but he stood back up with it in his hand. it was short-handled, with many long, thin strips of leather dangling from it. He rubbed the handle against his cheek fondly. “Answer me, damnit!”

  He scowled at her tone. “Answer you?” “Your father is going to be furious with you. Don’t you realize that?”

  He chuckled. “I hardly think so, my pretty. The old man

  died quite a few years ago. His heart stopped while he was—

  amusing himself. Not an unpleasant way to die.”

  Oh, God, he was back to his normal self again, which meant she was out of time. Would begging help? She doubted it.

  He laid the whip across her bare legs so he could remove his coat. Her legs wouldn’t bend enough to dislodge it. And just the feel of that leather on her bare skin started her trembling.

  He laid the coat over her legs as well while he started unfastening his shirt. It didn’t cover but a small portion of her shins. But she hadn’t expected this. Was he going to rape her first after all? “What are you doing?” “You don’t think I’m going to ruin a perfectly good set of clothes, do you?” he asked. “It’s too tedious, getting blood Out of good broadcloth.”

  Kelsey blanched. He expected enough blood that he was going to be splattered by it? Then the buckets of water were Probably there to wash the blood from him afterward, not

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  her. The fastidious bastard thought of everything, didn’t he? But, then, he’d done this so often he’d learned how to keep things simple.

  She couldn’t stop him. There@ was nothing else she could do-but let him know her rage, “I hope when Derek finds you he cuts your heart outslowly. You’re a pathetic excuse for a man, Ashford, as crippled as your caretaker is. You can’t even-”

  She sucked in her breath sharply. He’d picked up the whip and slashed it across her thighs. Welts rose up in several places, but the skin hadn’t broken. And he laid the whip back on her to finish undressing himself.

  He’d done it to shut her up, and it absolutely enraged her, that she wasn’t even going to be allowed that outlet for her emotions. Like hell she wasn’t. “Coward!” she spat. “You’re even afraid to face the truth.” “Shut up! You know nothing about me.” “Don’t I? I know that you wouldn’t know what to do with a woman if she wasn’t tied down for you. You’re a sick little boy who never grew up.”

  He picked up the whip again. She stiffened, waiting for the blow. It didn’t come. He glanced at the door instead, frowning. She followed his gaze but didn’t know what had drawn it. She hadn’t heard anything. But he had. “John, stop making that noise!” he shouted. “You know better than to disturb me when I-how did you get down here? You can’t come down here!”

  Kelsey burst into tears at seeing James Malory suddenly filling the doorway. Her relief was so incredible it controlled her utterly. All she could do was sob. Perhaps because she couldn’t really believe it. And if her mind was playing tricks on her …

  But then Derek was there behind James as well, and pushing his way past him. Ashford, well, he was merely indignant

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  that James was there. But Derek, Derek he was terrified of, because Derek he had already tangled with twice, and both times had lost.

  Derek took one look at Kelsey, then at Ashford behind her with the whip in his hand, and he tore across that room. He didn’t even go around the bed to get at his target, but dove over it, taking both him and Ashford to the floor, where Kelsey couldn’t see them very well, could only hear …

  James came over to the bed, removing his jacket as he did so to cover her with when he reached her. “Shh, m’dear, it’s over now,” he said gently. “I-I-I know! I-I can’t help-it!” she cried.

  He smiled at her, keeping his eyes tactfully away from any of her still-exposed limbs. And he made haste to unbuckle her straps. Anthony Malory was there, too, she finally noticed, standing by the end of the bed and watching his nephew pound away at Ashford. “Bloody hell, he’s not going to leave any for us, is he?” Anthony complained to his brother.

  James chuckled. “You might as well break that up, Tony. I don’t believe the bastard is feeling any of those blows just now, and I hate to see good retribution going to waste, especially when he deserves so much. Besides, the lad needs to take Kelsey out of here.”

  Kelsey was sitting up by then, and quickly slipped into James’s jacket. She could see for herself that Ashford was unconscious. But that wasn’t stopping Derek from hitting him.

  Anthony had to literally pull Derek away. It took a moment for the fury to fade from the younger man’s eyes. But the moment they met Kelsey’s, he came to her and held her close, very, very close … and she burst into tears again.

  James rolled his eyes. “Women. She was giving him hell as we Nvalked up the hall, now she’s safe, she cries. I will

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  never figure that out, dan-Ln me, but I won’t.”

  Anthony chuckled. “It’s a womanly thing, old man. We ain’t supposed to understand it.”

  James snorted, but he glanced at his nephew again and nodded toward Kelsey. “Derek, take her out of here-back to town, if you like. Tony and I will see to this scum.”

  Derek hesitated, glaring down at Ashford again. “He hasn’t suffered enough yet.” “Enough? Believe me, youngun, he hasn’t even begun to suffer.”

  Derek stared at his uncle for a long moment, then nodded in satisfaction. Whatever James had planned for the man, it wouldn’t be the least bit pleasant.

  Derek gently lifted Kelsey and carried her out of the room

  and down the hall. Her arms had wrapped tightly about his neck, almost in a death’s grip. “I can’t believe you came-that you found me,” she whispered. “How?” “My uncle had men following him.” “There was mention of trespassers,” she said as they mounted the stairs. “The caretaker put them in the stable. One might be dead. Your uncle’s men?” “One of them was, yes. The other was your coachman. But they’re both alive. The other of James’s men came to tell him that you’d been taken. And they had followed Ashford here before, so we knew this was one place to look for him.”

  He didn’t mention that he had feared they would be too late. She didn’t mention the hell she’d gone through to postpone her “punishment.”

  She gripped his neck harder. “There are other women locked down there. This place has been their prison. We have to release them.” “They will be.”

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  “He’s truly sick, Derek. He killed the proprietor of that

  house, the one who auctioned me.” “He admitted it?” “Yes. He killed his mother, too, and God knows who else.” She trembled again. “Don’t think about it, luv. You won’t ever see him again, I promise you.”

  it was much later when Anthony and James came upstairs. Both of their expressions were still grim, after what they’d witnessed in that prison under the cellar. James had hoped to find one of Ashford’s victims. He’d had men searching the wharf taverns and brothels all week. He had not hoped to find what they did, four women so terrorized and tortured that it was doubtful they’d ever fully recover.

  Amazingly, they were in much better condition than would have been expected-aside from the scars they had been given. Raw wounds had been reg
ularly tended before they were reopened. They’d been fed. Their cells weren’t warm, but they weren’t unduly cold, either, which had possibly kept down infections and the growth of germs. The stench they lived with and were accustomed to came from old congealed blood merely washed under the floorboards, and buckets for bodily wastes that were emptied only infrequently.

  Only one of the women, a pretty young blonde, still had raw wounds and was the most terrorized. The others were covered in scars from their waists down, but they were fully healed and less fearful, since Ashford had stopped paying them visits long before. And what the caretaker did with them, well, it was nothing that they hadn’t already experienced.

  It could have been much, much worse, their minds as damaged as their bodies, if they hadn’t already been accustomed

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  to the brutality of men before Ashford found them-and -used to selling their favors for a living. Fully clothed, there would be nothing to show for their ordeal there. But they would know, and they would never forget.

  And James was giving them their revenge. Anthony had fetched clothes for them from that room upstairs, old to be sure, but serviceable for the time being. They had declined wearing them-yet.

  The oldest among them explained, “He always stripped down before the whippin’s. Blood splatters, ye know.”

  An excellent point, since James and Anthony had strapped Ashford to that same bed that Kelsey had occupied before they woke him. The whips were there. The knife was there. And they left the women there with him. “They may kill him,” Anthony pointed out as he closed the cellar door to block out the screams that were already coming from below.

  James nodded. “If they do, then we’ll give him a nice burial.”

  Anthony chuckled. “You don’t think they will?” “I think they’ll want to pay him back in kind, and that, dear boy, is what the chap deserves. I expect he’ll be ready for Bedlam when they’re done with him. If not, I’ll have to take care of him myself, to keep Derek from doing it.” “Hmmm, I agree, the lad’s too young to go around killing chaps. Wouldn’t want anyone to say he’s taking after his uncles.” “Put a lid on it, puppy.”

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  TER HER ORDEAL WITH LORD ASHFORD, KELSEY ALmost forgot that her Aunt Elizabeth and sister were in town and expecting to see her the next morning. She sent an excuse

  to postpone their visit until later in the week.

  That visit was going to be a trying, emotional meeting as

  it was, endeavoring to keep the lies straight, undoubtedly having to come up with new ones-and missing them both as much as she did. She couldn’t face that after the trial she had just gone through. Besides, Derek refused to leave her side, and she’d have a hard time visiting her relatives, whom he didn’t know existed, with him tagging along.

  In fact, it took nearly all week, and a great number of assurances that she was all right, to get him to relax his guard and go about his normal business. And even then, he wouldn’t stop pampering her and treating her nearly like an invalid, until she agreed to speak about the incident. She supposed he felt that if she couldn’t talk about it openly she would never really get over it.

  There might be something to that, because it wasn’t easy to begii, telling him everything that had happened to her that

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  day, but it grew easier. Afterward she did actually feel better. And he’d had other things to relate to her as well, things that she hadn’t been aware of.

  She hadn’t known the caretaker had broken his neck, hadn’t seen his body lying there in the cellar, because Derek had kept her head turned away from him when they’d passed him. The other man who had been bludgeoned and left in the stable with Henry had been her driver, who was

  going to be all right. He’d tried to help her, and for that Derek had added a huge bonus to his salary. The man would probably be devoted to Kelsey for life.

  As for those poor women who hadn’t been as fortunate, Derek’s uncles had settled enough money on them so they wouldn’t have to return to their previous occupations, wouldn’t have to work again at all if they didn’t want to. The Malory brothers didn’t have to do that. It had been very nice of them that they did.

  And Lord Ashford, well, she wasn’t a bit surprised to hear that he was totally insane, since he’d already been very close to it. But what had pushed him beyond the brink did surprise her. “He’s been admitted to Bedlam, where he won’t be leaving, now that his mind is completely gone,” Derek had told her several days later. “My Uncle James turned those women

  loose on him, you see, and well, they gave him back what he’d given them-and then some.”

  Kelsey didn’t mention that she’d probably have turned him into a eunuch as well, if she’d been one of those women. Derek didn’t mention that one of the women had thought of that.

  And then the morning came when she couldn’t delay visiting her aunt and sister any longer. And it was as emotionally exhausting and upsetting as she had suspected it would be. The hardest part, which she hadn’t expected at all, had

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  been keeping Derek out of her conversation. Amazingly, his name kept coming to the tip of her tongue quite naturally, and she kept having to bite it back each time.

  She got through the visit without making any mistakes. However, she went home quite upset over the whole affair and stayed upset all day. And unfortunately, that night was

  when Derek asked her to marry him.

  They were having dinner. She had just taken a sip of red wine. It was fortunate the tablecloth was dark blue. It wouldn’t show the stain too much. “Sorry.” Derek grinned sheepishly. “Didn’t mean to startle vou like that.”

  Startle her? Shock was more like it. “That isn’t something to jest about,” she admonished, frowning at him. “That isn’t something I would jest about.” “But you can’t be serious!” “Why not?” “Don’t be obtuse, Derek. You know why. I’m your mistress. A lord in your position doesn’t marry his mistress. It simply isn’t done.” “It’ll be done if I want it to be done.”

  That was such a ridiculously … stubborn statement, she almost rolled her eyes. But she was too upset by the subject to find anything amusing about it.

  Of course, she’d love to marry him. She couldn’t think of anything she’d like to do, more. But she knew as well as he did that it was impossible. And that he’d brought it up to begin with made her angry. How dare he tempt her?

  It didn’t matter that she was a quite suitable match for him, or at least she had been before she’d sold herself in a house of ill repute in a room full of London lords. Selling herself had made her utterly unsuitable for marriage, even if he was the one who’d bought her.

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  “I won’t marry you, Derek,” she said in a stiff voice. “And I won’t thank you for asking me.” “You don’t want to marry me?” “I didn’t say that, I said I won’t marry you. I won’t cause

  you and your family yet another scandal.” “Kelsey, let me worry about my fam-” “My answer is no, Derek, and it won’t change. And I would appreciate it if you don’t stay tonight. I would like to be alone.”

  He stared after her incredulously. She’d walked out on

  him. And she was furious. He recognized the signs. She contained it well, but she was bloody furious with him-because he’d asked her to marry him. And here he’d thought she’d be pleased by the notion, delighted even-he’d at least thought she’d say yes.

  Derek sighed. He hadn’t even gotten used to the idea himself yet, had only just figured out that he wanted to marry her, and that after a long week of fretting over some very strange feelings. What had started it was when it had occurred to him that with Lonny dead, and Kelsey aware of it, there was nothing
keeping her with him other than her own

  honor. There would be no fear now that Lonny would en—

  force the bargain she had made. And she had to know Derek well enough by then to know that he wouldn’t hold that bill of sale against her. She could leave at any time, just like a

  normal mistress. That he’d paid a lot of money for her no

  longer mattered.

  And that put him into a bit of a panic. When he’d realized that he was panicked, he’d tried to figure out why. And the answer had come to him readily enough. He’d gone and fallen in love with his mistress.

  It was a bloody stupid thing to do. Even he knew that. But he’d done it anyway. And he knew he didn’t have to marry her. They could go on perfectly well just as they were-as

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  long as she was willing to stay with him. But he didn’t like that “as long as.” He wanted permanence. He wanted to move her into his own house. He wanted her to bear his children. He didn’t want to hide her anymore.

  But she’d said no. And she’d said her answer wouldn’t change.

  By God, it would change-maybe not that night, though,

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  REK STAYED AWAY FOR THREE DAYS. WISELY, AS IT happened. It had taken that long for Kelsey to calm down. She finally determined that his marriage proposal had possibly come as a result of the Ashford incident, because of how extremely worried he’d been over her during it. The proposal had probably been impulsive, too. And now that he’d had more time to think about it, he’d realized what a

  fool notion it had been.

  He didn’t mention the proposal again when he showed up three days later, so Kelsey decided to leave the subject alone as well. Besides, after her anger over it had subsided, she’d actually taken it as a good sign, or at least as a sign that he was growing fonder of her than she’d realized. When a man

  didn’t tell you how he felt, it was nice to get clues that gave some indication, and a proposal of marriage was a pretty strong clue.