Page 51 of The Bastard's Iberian Bride
Bink shoved the candle at the housekeeper and jumped the small space, seizing the man’s collar, and tossing him back into a worktable with a loudoof. The man staggered, his breeches tangling with his legs, loose and flopping like his flagging prick.
Bink tossed laundry to the housekeeper. “Cover her, then get his lordship. He’s in the library.”
The man jerked and metal flashed. Bink dodged, just in time, a scream cutting the air. He grabbed the wrist with the knife, swept a sharp kick to a bared knee, and twisted the man round with a crack that released the knife and brought him down on his face.
He pressed a foot into the man’s kidneys and jerked the arm he still held.
“Leave off, you ox,” the man groaned.
Leave off? Bink clenched his teeth, his heart racing.
The voice was unfamiliar. This was not one of his men, not one of the Greencastle servants, or the ones from Cransdall either.
He ground his foot harder. It didn’t take much imagination to know which of the visitors he belonged to.
Images of Spain, of blood, of a woman, and then later a girl, sent his heart raging. The master might escape justice, but his man wouldn’t.
A whimper from the table brought Bink back, and he glanced up. A panting Mrs. Bradley was pulling at the girl’s bindings. She grabbed a blue garment and covered the girl with it.
The room dimmed and his chest squeezed. That was Paulette’s blue dress, the one he’d just pawed, not an hour ago, in the corridor outside her room.
Paulette.
He leaned in as the girl sat up, and breath whooshed back into his lungs.
It was Jenny, one of Lady Hackwell’s Longview girls. Not Paulette.
He dropped the arm and lifted his foot away, and hoisted the man up.
“Now there’s a sight.” Agruen growled from the doorway. “You’ve done it now, Spellen. If that flaccid thing dangling in front is your cock, no wonder you had to tie the girl up.”
Bink’s blood roared.
Before he could lash out, Hackwell pushed into the room, his gaze sweeping over the scene.
“Take care of her,” he said to the red-faced housekeeper. Then he turned his eyes on the villain. “Fasten your trousers.”
Bink checked Agruen’s man for weapons before letting him fumble with his breeches and fall. Nothing broken, nothing bruised, that Bink could see. Too bad.
Hackwell tossed a length of washing line. “Bind him. And then lock him up and set a guard.”
The girl’s gag had come off and her whimpering turned to quiet sobbing. She latched onto the housekeeper and planted her face in the woman’s bosom.
“The charge will be rape,” Hackwell said.
“Bloody bitch kicked me,” Spellen spluttered. “I never got in. And anyway she wanted it. She agreed to meet me here.”
Jenny’s head came up. “You lie,” she shouted.
“And you gagged her and tied her?” Bink growled.
“She wanted it.”
Agruen pushed forward. “Oh, come now, Hackwell, haven’t you ever heard of this game? Many women like to be tied up. Some men too.”
Bink pulled Spellen’s arms to his back, making him gasp again. “Well then, we’ll make it nice and tight so your man here enjoys it.”
Mabel’s arrivalwith a cup of chocolate woke Paulette. The sun shone brightly through the open curtains and shimmered off the yellow walls.
