Page 74 of His Scandalous Viscountess
“But I already have, Julia. You don’t mind if I drop all the formality, do you? After all, with your husband so neatly dispatched last night, the way is now clear for me to marry the grieving widow.”
“Never.”
She spat the word at him and turned away, as though she couldn’t be bothered with entertaining him.
Then a hand sank into her hair and jerked her head back until she looked up into an all-too-familiar pair of dark eyes that held a malicious glint. Like a specter from her past, the burning gaze of her dead husband seared into her miserable soul.
“That debauched bastard is finally dead—as he should have been years ago. Now there isnothingkeeping us apart. You’re all mine Julia.Mine.”
The last word came out a snarl as he slammed his lips down on hers.
Repulsed by everything the man said and was, she waited for him to jam his tongue into her mouth, and then she bit down. Hard. The coppery tang of blood satisfied a little of the rage that burned within, but her victory was short lived.
“Bith!” Wallthorpe drew back and backhanded her across the cheek with a brutal force that whipped her head around.
Pain burst through her face for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. With a cry of outrage, she sprang at him, her fingers curled into claws as she reached for his face. The evil man deserved to look as hideous on the outside as he was on the inside. When her nails found flesh, she dug in and then raked her arms in a downward motion.
Wallthorpe slapped her hands aside, but left her free to try and run as he pressed his hands to his bleeding face. With fierce determination, she picked up her ragged skirts and shouldered him out of the way as she ran toward the door, ignoring the searing pain in her ankle as freedom teased her from the other side of the door.
Just as she was about to throw the portal open, a hand snagged her dress and yanked her back into the attic room. Wallthorpe had abandoned his scratched face in favor of keeping her contained in the attic. He then wrapped a hand around her wrist and dragged her toward a tattered old mattress she hadn’t seen tucked in the corner.
With a strength she’d never have credited him with, he threw her on the pallet and crashed down on top of her, pinning her with his hips and legs. Fear choked the breath from her lungs as she realized his intent. With her wrist once again manacled by him, there was little she could do to fight him off. Free to do as he wished, he reached down and ripped the front of her bodice until her corset was exposed.
“Bloody undergarments are a fucking nuisance,” he cursed, and then shifted tactics.
His free hand reached down and yanked on her skirts, hauling them free of both their legs. Desperate to escape as her nightmare became a reality, she attempted to jam her knee up into his family jewels with no success. He was too close for her to do more than bruise her own thigh.
With a shriek of fury, she balled up her free hand and swung at his face. To her surprise, she connected with his cheekbone, though her blow did little more than infuriate him further.
“You stupid little hellcat. I betyoukilled my father that night! He probably keeled over with a heart attack, from fighting you as he tried to fuck you.”
The thin gruel she’d eaten curdled in her belly as she remembered the night her first husband had died. The apoplectic anger that had washed over his face as he raised his arm to beat her with the riding crop he’d held high. And Julia realized that his son shared the exact same look as he loomed over her prone body.
For the first time, she considered she might not survive what was to come.
~
Wolf stood outside the ramshackle building in Seven Dials as dawn forced the night back where it had come from. Linc, Flint, and Arthur were making their way around the back of the building, while he, Cooper, and Stone waited in the front.
Then a feminine shriek pierced the morning stillness, and his barely harnessed agitation snapped free of its reins. With a growl, he unleashed his rage and kicked the door in. As he barreled into the rickety house, he slammed into one of the thugs he’d grappled with the night before. He punched the man square in the jaw, sending him reeling into the wall. Then he turned and made for the stairs, as Stone and Cooper swept in behind him to clean up the riffraff.
Fear and fury propelled him up the stairs, where he met the man who’d shot him. With a low growl, he powered into him, causing him to stumble backward on the stairs. More of a match for him, the thug landed a solid punch to Wolf’s gut that took the wind out of his sails a bit. Gasping for breath, he threw himself down on top of the shooter. As they wrestled on the stairs, thuds came from behind them. The next thing he knew, Flint had pulled him off the brute.
“Stop wasting time with the hired help. Get the hell upstairs.”
Then Flint reached up, grabbed the thug, and jerked him forward until he fell down the stairs. With his path cleared, Wolf continued up until he came to a door that sat ajar. The unmistakable sounds of a struggle sounded from inside as he pushed the entry open.
What he saw nearly undid him. Wallthorpe had Julia pinned to a putrid excuse for a mattress as he tried to rape her.
With a roar that was as animalistic as a jungle cat’s, he lurched forward and ripped the bastard from her body. Wallthorpe stumbled backward against a wall. Wolf’s gaze swept over the weasel as he noted his pants remained fastened.
Relief swamped him. He hadn’t been too late. And yet, despite the balm that the knowledge brought, it was not enough to calm his rage. Wallthorpehadto pay. He had to pay for his sins and his father’s, since Wolf would never have the opportunity to right that earlier wrong. He’d not have considered punishing the son for the father’s behavior had he not proven to be as bad, if not worse.
“You rotten bastard. I’ll kill you for this.”
Wallthorpe paled, but did not cower. “Not if I finally kill you, once and for all.”
Then the man pulled a knife from some hidden sheath and brandished the weapon.
