“Yes, and I’m sorry for it.” He sounded brusque, impatient. “I am glad to find you so composed. I expected to find a weeping mess.”
“That will come,” she told him dryly. “I can feel again now, but events still seem somewhat distant.”
“Then while you can, tell me.”
She would tell the raw, naked truth. They would know, whether she told anyone or not. Her bruises had not gone unnoticed, and they had not been there yesterday morning. She glanced down at the marks circling her wrists. They might not be gone by the time she climbed the scaffold.
“My husband did not allow my maid to prepare me for bed, so eager was he. The first time he took me I was dressed.” Swallowing, she forced herself to continue. “It hurt, as I was told it would.” She met Sir Edmund’s eyes boldly. “Then he cut the clothes off me with his army dagger and threw me on the bed.”
She could not say any more about that terrible time. Could not articulate, did not have the words. Surely she had told him enough about that. “He used me sorely, sir. I hurt all over when he’d finished.”
By meeting his gaze, she could keep calm about what happened. Sir Edmund steadied her, made it possible for her to tell him what he needed to know. Why should she not unburden herself to a stranger, when nobody close to her cared if she lived or died?
“A husband has the right to treat his wife however he pleases, short of murder, and I was told that I must not complain.”
“Do not say that!” The vehemence of his words shocked her. Even more the fire in his eyes, and the twist of his mouth. He must despise her for what she’d just told him. She was ungrateful, cold, frigid, all the words her husband had thrown at her last night. He’d forced her to do things she had no conception of and only laughed when she’d used the chamber pot to vomit in.
Tears sprang to her eyes, but if she let them fall, she would never stop. So she forced them back. “I cannot say more, and it can have no relevance.”
“It does,” he said gently. “His treatment of you gives you motive for murder. However, the charge could be reduced to manslaughter, if you were fighting for your life. I can work with that.”
Shock at his searing honesty made her catch her breath. Nobody did that in the circles in which she moved; they prevaricated and danced around the facts of a situation. The truth was to be avoided, because it made a person vulnerable. The truth was a weapon. “But I didn’t do it. Surely I would remember if I had.”
“Did he let you sleep?”
She closed her eyes again, but the visions that came to her were more vivid that way. She opened them. “We paused for supper.”
“What did you have?”
Why would he care about that? “I ate nothing. But I drank a glass of wine. Foul stuff, but he seemed to enjoy it, and it had the effect I was craving. It numbed me to what was to come. I needed the fortification.” For the continuation of her ordeal.
“What did it taste like?” he demanded.
She stared at him. “What difference does that make? It was far too sweet for my preference and it had a bitter aftertaste I didn’t like.” She had thought it the remains of the blood she’d drawn when she’d bitten the inside of her cheek to stop herself screaming. Later, she’d given up trying to retain her dignity and screamed out her agony. Nobody came.
Sir Edmund got to his feet and paced about the room, his actions abrupt and agitated. What was he about? What had he seen? He turned and faced her, finding her gaze unerringly. “What do you remember next?”
Vague recollections entered her mind. “I heard something, a kind of sighing grunt from my husband, and I smelled tobacco. My husband did not smoke pipes or take snuff, so why would it be there?” The memory was so nebulous it could have been a dream. “I thought I heard someone move around the room. A servant, perhaps.”
“A servant would have seen your husband, presumably alive, or he would have sounded the alarm. That would give us a time to work from.” He touched his bottom lip with the tip of his thumbnail. “And after that?”
“Waking up this morning. When I woke, I had my back to Godfrey, but I knew he was still there by the weight. I saw the blood first, then I turned over and—he was there, dead.”
That awful squelching sensation when she’d moved to get out of bed would never leave her.
“I see.”
She followed his movements, tracing the way the sharp, white teeth dug into the soft flesh of his lower lip, the concentration helping her to remain calm. He sucked in a breath, his chest expanding. He was a powerful man, something that had escaped her notice at first. “Then there is a chance,” he said, as if to himself.
“A chance of what?”
“Of your escaping the gallows. I need to know more.” He came back to her, reaching for her, and she let him help her to her feet.
The shock of the warmth, the contact made her gasp and flinch away. Nobody had touched her, other than Wood, since her husband. He dropped his hand immediately. “More what?” she asked him.
“I believe there is more to this story than meets the eye.”
“Truly?”
He searched her face, as if looking for something. “Do not wish for too much. Do not assume I can save you. But I can ensure you have a fair hearing, though I am afraid you must live under guard for now.”
“I have been in prison most of my life.” As she said it, she recognized the truth of what she was saying. She had, from cradle to what
