Free The Uncatchable Miss Faversham by Elizabeth Moss Page B

Nathaniel. Yet now, hearing it on her lips, he felt maddened, like a wounded animal in a trap.
        His hand sought hers again, clumsy now in his fury. Like a schoolboy with no self-control, he wanted to hurt her, to make her suffer at least a little of the pain he had suffered.
        With cruel deliberation, he raised her hand to the left side of his face, pressing her fingers against the unsightly scarring, and watched how her eyes flew wide, her flushed face losing colour.
        ‘Is this what you abhor?’ His voice was cold as steel, held rigidly free from emotion. ‘Monstrous, I agree. Is this scar why you cannot bear the thought of me in your bed?’
        ‘No!’
        ‘There was a time when you did not hate me so very much, Nell.’
        Nathaniel ignored her struggles to escape, holding her hand against his ruined cheek. He carried on raging at her, relentless now, wanting to hurt her, even as his heart burnt with such a fierce desire that every word seemed to wound him too.
        ‘I remember how you kissed me, welcomed me into your body as though you had done so a hundred times before.’ His voice convulsed. ‘But it was dark that night, was it not? There was no moon then to show you the face of the monster above you.’
        ‘It wasn’t like that. I never intended …’
        She broke off in obvious confusion, a few swollen tears beginning to seep from under those long-lashed lids, and seemed unable to meet his gaze.
        ‘Do you weep to command as well?’ He swore in disgust at the sight of that traditional female response. For a moment he struggled, then cast her hand almost violently from him. ‘Take your freedom then, and may you sleep forever lonely with it. It seems you win again, madam.’
        ‘It was never a game,’ Eleanor managed in a ragged whisper, and dragged a hand across her damp cheek, staring down at the tears glistening on her fingertips as though she could not quite believe what she saw.
        With an effort then, she seemed to pull herself up straight in a belated attempt to recover her dignity.
        ‘Where is Charlotte? I must leave. My carriage – ’
        Swaying perilously, she turned away, almost losing her balance over the low balcony rail. He caught her easily round the waist and set her to rights again, slender and trembling in her white muslin gown. Yet Eleanor no longer seemed aware of his presence, groping her way around the blowing curtains and into the house without so much as a backward glance.
        Nathaniel stood there a moment without following her, raging at himself for a fool. Yet at least tonight’s fiasco had served to reinforce his long-held belief that he must, at all costs, stay away from Miss Eleanor Faversham or risk losing his sanity. Or his good name, one of the two.
       
     

 
    CHAPTER FOUR
       
    By the time Eleanor reached the gloomy sanctuary of Faversham Hall again, dark clouds were obscuring the moon and there was a distinct air of threat about the weather. The lower part of the house was empty and mostly in darkness, but she was grateful for that, having exhausted herself on the short journey home with bitter self-recriminations, wishing she could have dealt with Lord Sallinger’s advances with the coolness for which she was justly famous in London.
        Receiving her discarded pelisse with a respectful bow, Foster muttered something about a coming thunderstorm, and asked if the mistress would allow the dogs into the kitchen for the night, as they were ‘not partial to lightning’.
        Eleanor agreed distractedly, accepted the ready-lit candle from his hand, and climbed the stairs with one hand clutching her gown. Her one over-riding thought was of bed, and the welcome, all-enveloping oblivion that sleep must bring. Though sleep was unlikely to come easily after that night’s events, an evening ruined by the sheer folly of allowing her desire for that man free rein, even if only