CHAPTER THIRTY
VICTORIA
“Get off me, you bastard,” I scream and thrash out as I’m dragged, unceremoniously, down the hallway by a guard. I don’t want to die at the hands of Laird McGuire, and I’m going to do everything in my power to prevent it. I bite the hand of the guard, and he slaps me. It’s a sad state of affairs — but, I’m so used to being a punching bag that I don’t even react to it. We reach a closed door, and I can hear the Scottish Laird on the phone in his room. Even his voice sends shivers through me. Any pretense I had of trying to escape leaves me, and I sag into the guard’s arms.
He knocks on the door and opens it when addressed to do so.
“I’ve got your present from the Duke, Laird McGuire.”
I shudder when the brutish Scotsman looks me up and down then licks his lips. He’s dressed in a plaid kilt with a white shirt and black waistcoat. He looks every inch the gentleman, but I know better.
“A very bonny lass indeed, ye must thank His Lordship for me.”
“Where would you like her?” the guard asks.
“On the table, please. I’ve got cuffs for her hands 'n' feet. Ensure they're done up tight. Don’t worry about removing her clothes. It's a part o' my fun.” His face lights up in an evil grin, and as I’m taken across the room and laid out on the table, I watch him pull a bag from under his bed. The guard ensures that I’m securely fastened before standing back. He too looks smug and self-assured. At this very moment, I want to wipe the smirk off both their faces, but the fear has taken hold of me. Nicholas has broken me — the Duke has helped him. I thought myself in love. I gave my body to a man who played it like a musical instrument and wrote a symphony with my heart. Like many classical masterpieces, though, it will end in a violent crescendo of haunting melodies. An epitaph to the torture I’m about to experience.
“Ye can go,” the Laird informs the guard, and the man sullenly leaves. “I’m going to do this in privacy.”
I know he wants me to fight him, speak back, and enrage him into hurting me further, but I’ve lost my fight. I just want it over with and to be dead, hopefully in heaven.
“Let's get ye out of those clothes.”
The ginger-bearded Scotsman pulls a large knife from his bag and comes to the table. I’m still wearing my catsuit. It's easy for him to cut away in seconds, leaving me in only my bra and panties.
"Such a bonny little thing. What to do first?” He brings the point of the knife down to my belly button and trails it up toward my breasts. A red line of blood follows behind it. He doesn’t cut me open, but he marks the skin enough to cause me to bleed. He tucks the knife under my bra and pulls the blade up. It cuts the flimsy fabric in half and exposes my breasts to him.
“It's a shame they are na bigger. A like something, I can get my face lost in. A woman's tits are like honey to a man like me.” He bends over and wraps his hair-lined lips around my nipple. I squirm away from his touch. Big mistake.
“Ye think ye can escape yer fate.” He laughs and punches me straight in the stomach. I want to curl up, but I can’t with my hands and feet tied. “I’m going to suck these tits until they’re raw. Then I'm going to remove yer pants and stick my dick in that tight little cunt off yours for the next few hours. Don't get over excited about it, though, because I want ye dry as a bone. I’ll rip ye apart — much better that way. Ye are going scream my name in so much pain that everyone in the place will know exactly what I'm doing to ye. Once I'm bored of yer pussy, I'll be going for yer asshole. A can be fuckin’ all night, but if my dick gets tired, I have toys. Toys designed to tear ye so wide ye'll be begging for death. Once done with the fucking, the good part starts.” He punches me again in the stomach and steps back toward his bag. He drops the knife into it and pulls a gun out instead. I will him to pull the trigger and end my suffering, but he’s not done tormenting me…yet. No, he comes back over to me and trails the gun through the line of blood that he’s left on my stomach. This time, he heads toward the lower half of my body. My legs are parted by the cuffs, and he places the gun at my entrance. I let out a small whimper...I can’t help it. The smile of satisfaction on his face makes me sick. I shut my eyes. “The only way a whore like ye should die. Shot in the fuckin’ cunt. Enjoy yer last few hours, Victoria Hamilton, because I’m going make them hell.”
BANG!
The sound echoes in my head. Pain. I should feel pain. I must be dead. He shot me. A heavyweight lands on me, and a breath is forced out of me. I open my eyes, and the Laird is laying over me with a hole in the back of his head. I panic. I’m pulling the chains but can’t get free.
“Stay still.” William appears in my line of vision. A still smoking gun in his hand. He places it down and pushes the Laird off me before undoing the cuffs. I scramble up, off the table, and across the room away from the dead body. My stomach heaves, but I haven’t eaten or drunk all day and nothing comes up.
“I need to get you out of this room.” William comes up to me with a blanket. “Let me put this around you.” I can’t breathe. I should be dead. I don’t want to be rescued. I want to go to heaven and find peace from this constant pain in my chest. I can’t do this anymore. I want the torture to stop.
“Why did you stop him?” I push William away.
“It’s ok. Let’s go to a different room, and I’ll explain.”
I start crying, all the emotions flooding out of me. Over William’s shoulder, I see the gun lying on the table. I can end this myself. I speed past him before he realizes what’s going on. I pick the weapon up and hold it to my head.
“Goodbye.” He turns to face me, and I pull the trigger, but nothing happens.
“I only had one bullet.” He looks sheepish. “I didn’t really think about what I’d do if I missed the Laird.”
My situation is so utterly hopeless that I burst into laughter. Fate’s conspiring against me, I can’t even end my life or the suffering I’m under.
William dares to come closer to me. He places the blanket around my shoulders and brings me to his chest. He smells like Nicholas.
“We have to go to Scotland.” He strokes my hair.
“Why?” I ask — my whole body is feeling weak and deflated.
“Nicholas was tricked by my father.”
“I don’t understand.” I suddenly find firm feet and plant them securely enough to allow me to look up at the younger Cavendish brother.
“Nicholas doesn’t want to marry Elizabeth. He’s in love with you. The baby isn’t his either. He’s never slept with Elizabeth. It’s our father’s.”
“I don’t understand. Why’s he marrying her then?”
“The Duke made him watch you, during your trial. When you went wrong, and your father’s security were coming, he agreed to marry Elizabeth, so my father would save you.”
I gasp and reach behind me to steady myself on the table that I was strapped to, moments ago. “He loves me.”
“Yes.”
“Your father’s been playing games with us all along.”
William nods.
“I think he still is. Nicholas said to me that once he’s done what the Duke wants and married Elizabeth, then our father will allow you and him to disappear.” My friend swipes at his worry spot on his face —it’s something I’ve come to recognize as a part of him.
“But the fact that the Duke handed me to Laird McGuire for sport and execution suggests otherwise. He’s going to kill him.”
William turns pale, but I spring into action. I push past him again and head for the door.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
I turn back to him.
“Well, firstly I’m going to get some clothes on. Then secondly, I’m going to Scotland. I’m going to rescue the man I love and, hopefully, kill the bad guy.”