Heartless (The House of Rohan 5)

“Not the delicate flowers of Mrs. Howard’s establishment. That’s why they could demand the highest prices. They were very particular about their clientele, as if the sluts had any right to be.” He cleared his throat and spat. “And she was a worthless lay.”

All right, now she truly was going to throw up, Emma thought, thinking of frozen lakes and snow-covered hills. She had never looked at the men who’d been led into her room, never noticed who she’d been servicing in her drugged stupor. The very thought that Butcher Fenrush had once touched her was enough to make her gag.

“I might take a poke at her before I finish her off,” Collins said in a thoughtful voice. “Dunno whether I have the French disease or not, but if she dies being afraid of it then so much better. She owes me for the beating I got.”

“You should have finished her off before Rohan’s brother rescued her.”

“I likes to take me time.”

She felt the boot again. “Think she’s still knocked out?” Fenrush said.

“Hard to say. Might be dead already—she hit the marble floor hard.”

“She’s not dead,” Fenrush said grimly. “You said yourself, life’s doesn’t work out so conveniently. Haul her up and take a look.”

Oh, Christ, Emma thought, letting her body go completely limp. If she had to look at the man she might really throw up.

It took what little fortitude remained her to keep from reacting as Collins wrapped his big, cruel hands around her arms and hauled her up, but she managed to remain limp, eyes closed, as she was dumped onto a seat and the covering was ripped from her head.

She wanted to suck in the fresh air, to blink as murky light penetrated her eyelids, but she did nothing, simply lolled on the seat like a rag doll.

Someone kicked her leg but she didn’t react. At least it was an improvement over her ribs. If those splintered she’d have a hard time running, and she was going to need to be able to, sooner or later.

She felt a hand on her breast, tweaking it cruelly, but she still remained passive, and she heard Fenrush’s snort of disgust. “How hard did you hit her? She’s still out cold.”

“I didn’t hit her—I told you, she smashed her head on the marble floor. T’aint my fault if it scrambled her brain. She’s going to be dead in a short time—what does it matter to you?”

To her disgust she felt the seat shift as Fenrush moved closer. He stank of body odor and formaldehyde, and she couldn’t react, mustn’t react, when he put his doubtless filthy fingers on her face and pried up an eyelid.

That was one thing she couldn’t fake. “I thought so,” he said with a little crow of triumph. “She’s faking. She’s been awake all this time.”

But Mr. Fenrush’s knowledge of human anatomy had always been imperfect, and he wouldn’t know a sign of life if it bit him on the arse. She let her eyelids drop to half-mast, staring at him blearily and making a mumbling sound from behind the revolting gag, then sank back and closed them again, seemingly succumbing to unconsciousness once more.

“I dunno,” Collins said. “Looks kinda half dead to me.”

She heard Fenrush’s snarl. “You are hardly a respected medical professional.”

Neither are you, Emma thought, allowing her body to sway a bit. Since total insensibility was denied to her, she could instead appear dazed, non compos mentis, and an idiot like Fenrush wouldn’t know the difference. Collins said nothing, and Emma didn’t dare let her eyes do more than flutter open. He was picking his teeth. She closed them again.

They were in a carriage, or what passed for one, though it couldn’t be the fancy conveyance Fenrush travelled to work in each day. This one had no springs, the seats were torn and stained, and the smell was appalling. It must have . . . oh, god.

She knew that smell. Fenrush had risen to the top of his profession on the strength of his ability to procure one of the most needed of medical commodities. He’d been able to deliver hundreds of cadavers to the surgeons’ academy, some dead not more than a couple of hours, and no one had asked where they came from. They’d come from this carriage—the unmistakable smell of putrefying flesh was everywhere.

She gagged, unable to help herself, and no matter how hard she tried, visions of mountain streams and snow couldn’t stop her. If she vomited she would die, and Fenrush and Collins would watch her, unmoved. She gagged again, trying to swallow her bile, trying to think.

The mountain stream came again, and the snows, but the vision was clearer, and she knew where she was, even if she’d never set foot there in her life. She was in the Highlands of Scotland, by a deep, icy mountain burn, and Brandon was in the water, naked, long hair flowing behind him, swimming, impervious to the cold, impervious to everything as his eyes met hers across the distance, blue and calming, and she felt tendrils of comfort seep into her bones, cool, clean, washing away the horror.

The slap across her face jarred her back, but the crisis had passed, and she was tired of not fighting back. Her eyes flashed open, her hatred piercing through Fenrush’s smug face.

“I told you she was awake,” he crowed.

He was an unexpected-looking man, bluff, seemingly cheerful, full of bonhomie for his staff and the world at large. No one would look at him and think he was a monster.

“Of course you were lying,” he went on. “Women always lie and whores are women.”

She could have come up with an argument for that if she hadn’t been gagged, but instead she simply put all her fury into her eyes.

“I knew you remembered me,” he went on, his voice hurried, anxious, so at odds with his cheerful face. “I was just waiting for you to make your move, to try to take me down. You knew I wasn’t going to let you, didn’t you? I could see you watching me, see you planning your attack, but you should have known you could never hurt me. Good always triumphs.”