“Oh, Julian.”
“I was so angry—livid and furious—I could barely think. I never blamed Gareth, you understand; I’d seen my father threaten and coerce enough servants into having sex with him that I knew it wasn’t really Gareth’s fault. But I blamed her. Yes, I blamed her.”
“What did you do?” My voice was barely audible now.
“At first? Nothing. I stormed out of the hallway and walked right into Brightmore. She had seen everything. She knew everything.”
I was beginning to understand. Remembered Brightmore’s words. I told the master how to handle a wayward wife. And he did.
“She didn’t say anything at first. But she left and she came back with the rector’s wife. Mrs. Harold had contrived some excuse or another to stay the night, probably for a chance to be alone with me. Our paths had crossed at many social events in the past…I knew she wanted me to take her to bed. I’d never followed up on her advances; I was never interested.” He sighed. “Brightmore dragged her to me. She told me that
I needed to show Violet that I was the husband, I was the master, that her adultery would not be tolerated.”
Mrs. Harold. Her tears today made more sense now.
I had a hand pressed to my mouth now, the other hand fisted in my skirts. Oh God, the skirts that Mrs. Harold had helped dress me in…for my fucking wedding. The woman that Brightmore had hauled before Mr. Markham like a harem girl had helped me prepare to marry him and she had tried to warn me…
Julian buried his face in his hands. “And God help me, I listened. I wanted Violet to know—to feel—how I felt, even if it was only for a second, even if it was the barest shadow of the feeling. I pulled the rector’s wife into my room, threw Gareth out, and rounded on Violet. I tied her wrists to my bedpost.”
“What did you do to her?”
“To her? Nothing. But to Mrs. Harold…” He trailed off and then gave a bitter laugh, a dark noise that sent chills down my spine. “You know, she didn’t even say anything when my housekeeper hauled her to me like a slave, or when I tied Violet naked and crying to my bed. That woman dropped to her knees when I told her to, opened her mouth when I told her. All in front of my wife.”
I tried to hide the disgust in my voice. “So you made Violet watch?”
He looked at me. “If I’m to make a confession, I should confess it all. I may be damned, wildcat, but for some reason I feel as if we are damned together. That you will love me anyway.”
I glanced away from him. He’d hit upon the confusion that had been dogging me these past few weeks, the worry that I was as monstrous and toxic as he was. And he was right, I would love him anyway.
But loving and staying were two different things.
He stood, pacing in a jerky, agitated way. “I know I’m a terrible man, Ivy. But you must understand, I’ve never been that angry, before or since. All I could think about was hurting Violet in the same way she’d hurt me. The rector’s wife was so eager too, even with Violet right there. I fucked her over and over again, on her knees, bent over a chair, on the floor. I fucked her until I got bored with her, with my anger. I fucked her until I got bored of hearing my wife cry.
“I was consumed with watching Violet. I didn’t look at Mrs. Harold once. No, I only watched Violet, the way her wrists chafed raw as she pulled at her restraints. The way she begged me to stop. She tried to look away, but I wouldn’t let her. I told her I’d keep her tied to the bed for the rest of the day if she did.” He closed his eyes. “I can still hear her now. Sobbing, yelling obscenities.”
I lowered my hand, feeling ill. I imagined Violet’s tears, her flushed and splotchy face as she demanded to be untied, as she begged Mr. Markham to stop. I’d known he could be barbaric. But this…
“It all made me hard. Her futile rage. Her betrayed shock. Her incandescent hatred. No matter how much I came, it wasn’t enough to release me from my need for revenge; I was able to fuck that Harold woman over and over again while Violet watched. I was lost to myself,” he continued. “But I didn’t care. I didn’t care at all anymore, and that’s what I realized at the end, as she screamed at me, as I fucked another man’s wife in front of my own. After a couple hours, I finally sent the woman away and untied Violet, expecting her to hit me, to try to hurt me. I would have let her. I hated her and I hated me, and for a while revenge felt delicious. But in the end, it was an empty gesture. Nothing would heal us, not punishment, not discipline, not matching betrayal for betrayal.”
He sat again, staring at the fire. “She never expected me to fight back like that, I think. She was so used to everybody—lovers and family and friends—giving her everything she wanted. I know that’s what broke her.”
I was such a tangle of confused feelings at that moment. I was horrified by Mr. Markham’s cruelty, terrified that he could wield that same cruelty against me. But I also couldn’t deny that there was a certain sickening justice in what he had done. I couldn’t deny that Violet was not an innocent party.
I couldn’t deny that a part of me, low and dark, flickered with something like jealousy of Violet or of Mrs. Harold. I didn’t cry when Julian unleashed his worst on me, I climaxed. And then begged for more. What would I have done? What would I have felt?
And why was I even considering something so awful?
“But she didn’t fight me. She’d stopped screaming by that point and was just staring at me. I’d never seen her like that…so upset and yet so quiet.” He ran his hands through his hair. “I told her to leave—that I planned on riding to Scarborough myself to tell the police she’d been found and that a formal search would be unnecessary. She didn’t storm away, she didn’t yell. She left. But I could see it in her—in the way her face had gone white, in the way her hands shook. She was about to break. Violet never bore anything patiently or quietly. This was the calm before the storm.”
“And then she died.”
“And then she died,” he echoed hollowly. “She’d always been a horsewoman, and she rode whenever she was upset or angry or happy…anything she felt, really, was reason to ride. When I got to the stables to leave for Scarborough and I saw Raven missing, I knew.” His voice cracked. “I knew she’d taken him. Of course, she was such a good rider, I didn’t worry. Not at first.”
The fire popped and I closed my eyes, still fighting back nausea. The rain outside continued to lash at the windows, thunder rolled in from distant skies, and the wind tossed the leafy branches and blew around the old corners of the hall. I listened to the comforting sounds of the storm, wishing I was outside running in it. Wishing I was away from this truth and this man. This cruel, perfect man.
“I didn’t cut the saddle,” Mr Markham said quietly, his voice barely audible over the rain. “But I was the reason she climbed into it in the first place.”
I could find no words to convey the tangled feelings and thoughts inside of me. I couldn’t even look at him right then.
