Page 18 of Marry in Scandal
She glanced up at the coachman, who sat holding the reins, staring straight ahead, pointedly indifferent to her fate. No help there.
Nixon gave her a little shove. “Go on, then. What are you waiting for?”
She indicated her bound hands—she couldn’t relieve herself without free hands to deal with her skirts. He hesitated, then untied her. “Don’t think you can get away. There’s nothing for miles.”
She pulled the gag off and, rubbing the circulation backinto her hands, she staggered toward a small clump of grass, slipping and stumbling in the mud as she went.
The clump of grass didn’t provide any privacy, and she was aware of him standing only a few yards away, openly watching her, enjoying her shame and embarrassment as she squatted to relieve herself.
Despite her fear, despite the drug and the freezing cold and her deep humiliation as she squatted in the open under the gaze of two horrid men, a warming surge of anger sparked deep within Lily. This man, this vile excuse for a man, was nothing to her—less than nothing. He was vulgar, greedy and cruel, but even though he had her trapped and in his power at the moment, she vowed he would not win.
She would not be a cowering frightened creature, a victim of his evil scheme. Die before she let him marry her? Never!
She would killhimbefore she let him take her as his wife.
“Finished?”
She straightened, feeling so much better than she had just a few moments before. The fear of lying, trapped, in a puddle of her own making had passed, and the bracing, moisture-laden wind had given her fresh hope and determination. And anger, she discovered, gave her strength.
She looked around. Even if she’d been steady on her feet, there was nowhere to run. The road was empty and there was no sign of people or any kind of habitation. She had no choice but to return to her captivity.
She made her way carefully back to the carriage to where Nixon was waiting. He grinned at her discomfort, at her disorientation and unsteady gait.
How she loathed him.
She wasn’t even a person to him, she was athing, a way to get money. He would happily ruin her life just to enrich himself.
He retied her wrists and replaced the gag, then helped her into the carriage. He lifted the lid and gestured for her to get in. It was fastened, she saw, with a small hook catch. If she could block that...
“Carriage coming, sir,” the coachman called out.
Nixon swore. “Get in, blast you, woman.” He shoved her roughly back into the space beneath the seat, and jammed the little blue bottle into her mouth. She managed to stop it again with her tongue, but not before a trickle of the vile liquid made it down her throat. He pushed her head down and closed the lid. An instant before it closed, Lily tried to slip a fold of cloth over the catch. But in her haste, she missed, and the lid closed tight above her.
As the lid closed over her once more, shutting her into that dark, cramped airless space, Lily fought the sensation of despair that threatened to swamp her.
For the second time, she’d managed to block the neck of the bottle with the tip of her tongue and keep from ingesting the amount of drug he intended. That was some kind of victory, she told herself, a kind of fighting back.
And next time he let her out to relieve herself, she’d try again to block the catch of the lid. She was better off than before, she told herself; now she had a plan.
Still, she’d absorbed enough of the drug to have to fight with every bit of willpower she had to keep from sliding into unconsciousness again.
If she didn’t stay awake, she couldn’t escape.
Time passed. She fought the drug with everything she could think of, mentally reciting poems and rhymes she’d learned over the years, reciting her times tables, counting backward, keeping her eyes wide open, staring into the dark, and scrunching up her toes and tightening and relaxing her muscles to keep her legs from falling asleep again as they had before.
She needed to keep her legs in full working order in case she got the chance to escape.
• • •
“Any news?” Rose said before she was hardly in the room. She and George had just returned from their morning ride. Emm had practically had to force them to go out as usual.
Emm shook her head. Rose flung herself onto the settee. “Ihatethis, hate going about pretending Lily is just sick inbed upstairs. I don’t know why we have to go riding and pretending everything is all right. I need todosomething!”
“I know, my dear,” Emm said patiently. “But though it doesn’t feel like it, you are doing exactly what needs to be done. It’s the best—theonly—way we can protect Lily at the moment—act as if nothing is the matter.” They’d had this out before. The girls were desperate to take action of some sort, but there was nothing they could do except wait. And hope and pray that Cal would find Lily soon and bring her home safe and sound.
In the meantime they must all act as usual, so that nobody would suspect anything was wrong.
“But it’sunbearable, having to make meaningless, polite conversation whenanythingcould have happened to poor darling Lily!”