‘How dare you believe that I would wantonly try to hurt or maim any animal…and for what purpose? Come down out of the clouds, Rue. Yes, I would like to buy this land off you, but I don’t want it so badly that I’m prepared to destroy my principles to get it!’
He gave her such a savage look that she quailed beneath it. How had he managed to turn the tables on her and make her feel that she was the one who was at fault…that she…?
She shook herself free of the sensation his anger was arousing inside her and demanded huskily, ‘Well, someone shot him, or are you going to tell me that I imagined that as well?’
‘No, he was certainly shot…but whether deliberately or by accident it’s hard to know. I understand that the previous owner of the Court rarely visited the place, and that some of the villagers and locals tended to rather make free with the land.’
‘You mean that it would have been poachers?’ Rue asked.
‘Either that, or perhaps a group of teenagers fooling around shooting at rooks and hitting Horatio by accident.’
It was feasible, she knew that, but despite the fact that Horatio had only sustained a minor wound some instinct she could not explain told her that the dog had been shot at deliberately. There had been his terror, for one thing.
‘By the way, Hannah was telling me that I’m not the first person to want to buy your land.’
Rue frowned. A glance at her alarm clock when she had got out of bed had showed her that it was half-past one in the morning. She had slept away almost an entire day, and with every minute that passed she felt more alert, in control of herself, but surely the same could not be said for Neil? Surely he must be tired? Too tired, she would have thought, to want to exchange small talk about her land? Unless he was concerned that she might out of spite sell it to the builder.
‘No, you’re not,’ she told him shortly, cross with herself because she felt hurt that he could suspect her of such small-mindedness. If she was to sell to anyone it would be to him; the land had, after all, originally been part of the estate, and it was only fair that if she did he should have the first option to purchase it. Not that she was going to sell. ‘There was a builder last year who wanted to buy it. There’s been a rumor in the local Press that the land around here might be designated ‘‘white land’’ instead of green belt.’
‘And so prime land for building development. Especially yours, with its main-road frontage.’
‘Well, yes, although that doesn’t seem to be important, because he’s now bought an acreage behind me from the man who farms what used to be the home farm. Mrs Dacre—that’s our old housekeeper—was telling me about it when I went to see her.’
She bent her head over Horatio, stroking the dog’s soft fur, and so missed Neil’s quick frown.
‘He’s going to be perfectly all right,’ he told her quietly, walking over to the basket. ‘I brought him up here because I thought it would reassure you if you woke up.’
A huge lump had formed in her throat at his thoughtfulness. Why was he doing it, when he had every reason to dislike her? Surely he must know by now that she wasn’t going to sell the land?
‘Thank you,’ she said huskily, and looked up just in time to see his eyes crinkling with amusement.
‘It wasn’t so very difficult, after all, was it?’ he teased her, and just for a moment she longed to throw all caution aside and to respond naturally and warmly to him, but she couldn’t allow herself to do that. She must never forget the cruel lesson loving Julian had taught her…and Neil would hurt her too, if she let him.
Sidestepping his question, she said quietly instead, ‘What are you doing here?’
‘The doctor said you weren’t to be left alone. Hannah volunteered to stay, but since she has a family to look after, I said I’d do it instead.’ He looked up at her just in time to catch her expression. ‘Rue, for goodness’ sake, let the past go, and stop punishing me for another man’s sins.’
She was tempted. Oh, how she was tempted, and the knowledge of that temptation, and what lay behind it, panicked her into saying harshly, ‘It doesn’t make any difference. You…Julian…you’re all the same.’
She saw the anger touch his face like lightning, illuminating an expression of such savagery that she shrank from it.
‘Well, in that case, you won’t find it surprising if I do this, will you?’ he told her grittily, and then she was being lifted off her feet and carried over to the bed.
She started to cry out, but the sound was lost as he dropped her down on the bed, and then the weight of him was on top of her, imprisoning her there, his hands pinning down her arms.
Rue tensed, terror surging through her as she remembered her wedding night. They had been married quietly in a register office, which had disappointed her, but Julian had pointed out to her that with her father so recently dead a church wedding might not be seemly.
He had told her that he had rented a cottage from a friend for their honeymoon, and she had pictured something small and intimate in an idyllic setting, but in reality the place he had taken her to had been virtually derelict, and very far from attractive, one of a row of similar cottages, none of which were inhabited, miles away from anywhere outside a grim mining town. The house had been damp and smelled musty. She had later discovered that the house had once belonged to
Julian’s parents. Tired and disappointed, she had behaved like the rather spoilt nineteen-year-old she had been, protesting that she didn’t like the house, until they had quarrelled and Julian had stormed out, taking the car with him.
When he returned in the early hours of the morning, she had been contrite and penitent, eager to make up their quarrel, but Julian had been drunk.
Because of her, he had told her brutally when she had complained…because that was the only way he could bring himself to possess her—and he had to possess her to make their marriage legal.
He had spared her nothing then: neither the full reality of his contempt and dislike of her…of all those who had the wealth he had not…nor his vision of the way their life together would be.
She had fought him at first, until she realised the violence it unleashed in him and the way he enjoyed hurting her.