Free Dark Hero; A Gothic Romance (Reluctant Heroes) by Lily Silver

winked at him. Cold, hard steel; there was nothing like it for
settling scores. It could be as precise as a surgeon’s blade; sever tendons,
penetrate organs, or remove a man’s most offensive part. A devious smile burst
forth from his lips as his eyes moved to the man crouched at the rail.
    He pushed the black scarf that hid his face onto his brow
and returned to his captive.
    “Who are you?” The captain asked a third time in a voice
weak from loss of blood. The man squinted against the glare of the sun as he
gazed up at the unmasked face of his executioner.
    The Raven poked the captain in the throat with the tip of
his blade, forcing the swine to look him in the eyes before he killed him. “I’m
the rich husband.”
     

 
     
    Chapter
Seven
     
     
    Donovan gazed at his bride now safely bundled in his bed.
Her head was wreathed in bandages instead of a lace veil. Her eyes were ringed
in purple. She had two cracked ribs and her shins were a mass of bruises that
pained him to look at. Rat bites marred her hands and feet. He applied a paste
of golden seal to them and clean linens to stave off an infection.
    The most worrisome injury was the contusion on the back of
her head. Five days had passed, yet his sleeping angel refused to wake up. As a
physician he knew the longer she remained in this unnatural slumber, the less
likely it was she would recover. She might awaken as a beautiful, living doll,
incapable of cognizant thought---or she might never awaken at all.
    A cough echoed in the small room. He jerked his head up. It
was that idiot doctor again. Damn it, if the old fool wasn’t pestering him
about bleeding Elizabeth, he nattered on about the need to examine her to
determine if she’d been molested by her captors. The dried blood on her inner
thighs, coupled with her captor’s confession, seemed quite conclusive in his
mind.
    “I didn’t mean to startle you, my lord.” Linton moved
noiselessly around the bed, reminding him of an alligator gliding silently in
the Carolina swamps. The doctor was a thin, nervous man sporting a full head of
gray hair, wire spectacles and a neatly groomed goatee. “I’m going to have to
insist that we try the bleeding, sir.”
    Donovan stood. At six foot and then some, he towered over
the doctor. “She’s lost a great deal of blood already, you idiot. The last
thing she needs is another man to cause her pain.”
    “The pain might bring her about.” Linton argued. “Come now,
trained in the Far East as you were, you’re not familiar with modern medical practices.
Why, even a medical student understands the benefits of a good bleeding.”
     “Put that lancet away, doctor, unless you want me to sink
it in your throat.”
    Dr. Linton stared blandly up at him, deluded in the belief
that a younger physician would give way to age and experience if pressed. So,
no one bothered to warn the new ship’s surgeon about crossing him. Apparently no
one cared enough about Linton to do so. Few men could comprehend that a
consequence of surviving torture was the peeling away of that thin veneer of a
civilized gentleman, exposing the primitive beast beneath.
    Donovan no longer feared that beast; he learned long ago to
embrace it.
    Without further warning, he snatched the lancet from his
opponent and pressed the sharp point beneath Linton’s jugular. Linton sidled
back with alarm and quickly exited the cabin.
    “Imbecile.” He muttered, closing the door with a defining
thud. He knelt beside the bed, lifted a limp, bandaged hand and pressed it
against his cheek. Tears breached the barricade of his tightly closed eyes
before he could stop them.
    After depositing Elizabeth on his Galleon at the London
docks, Donovan journeyed to Lord Greystowe’s estate to confront the cold
English lord and inform him that in spite of his callous neglect, his
grandchildren would be well provided for from this point on. The meeting didn’t
go as he anticipated. The old earl broke into tears at the news