Twice Tempted by a Rogue (Stud Club #2)

He sincerely doubted that. But they were here all night, and he could tell she wasn’t going to let the matter rest. Fine, then. He’d have out with it, and then he’d drink himself into oblivion. And when he woke in the morning and crawled out of this hole, he would leave this place behind. Forever.

He cleared his throat and prepared a dispassionate tone. “The month after my mother died, my father brought me down into this pit. He told me to stand in the empty center. He melted back into the shadows. And then a fist came out of the darkness. Sent me sprawling to the ground. I was stunned. It took me a minute to realize he’d hit me. I thought it had to have been an accident. He told me to get up, and so I got up. And then he hit me again, harder.”

“‘Get up,’ he’d say. ‘Stand, you miserable wretch.’ And so I would struggle to my feet. Only to be hit again. And again, until I couldn’t stand at all. We played that amusing little father-son game a few times a week, for the remainder of my childhood. Me standing just about there”—he pointed toward the dark center of the room—“and him beating me until I could no longer stand. Took longer every time.”

“For God’s sake, why didn’t you just stay down?”

“I don’t know,” he said. And he truly didn’t. That would have been the clever thing, he supposed—to feign defeat. But he’d been nine years old, and the old man was his only parent left alive. It simply hadn’t crossed his mind to disobey. His father said, “stand”—he stood. He stood and took another blow. It seemed to make the old man oddly happy. What else does a son long to do, but make his father happy?

And after so many years, it was as though that voice had become a part of him. In every brawl, in every battle. Whenever he took a blow or a musket ball and crumpled to the ground, he heard that harsh, brutal command echoing in his head. Up. Up, you filth. On your feet. Stand and take another.

So he always got up. No matter how desperately he’d wished to slip over into the next world and leave this one behind, that voice would never let him stay down.

“I don’t know why he did it. And he’s dead now, so I never will. Maybe he’d been beating my mother and needed a substitute. Maybe he took some perverse thrill from it. Sometimes I think … he just wanted to make me strong. Stronger than he felt, in his own life. Indestructible.”

“It’s very hard for me not to touch you right now.”

“Don’t,” he snapped in reflex. “I mean … I’d prefer you didn’t.”

“I understand.” She paused. “You have every right to be angry. I’ve been angry with that bastard for nearly two decades now. When word reached us of his death, I wanted to take the next boat to Ireland just to spit on his grave.”

“I’m not angry.” But even as he said it, his speech grew clipped. “Just what is it you want from this conversation? Are you trying to convince me that my father was a sick bastard? Because I already know that, Merry. Or is this little talk supposed to make me feel better? Should it warm my heart to know that you and your father and every last footman and chambermaid were all perfectly aware that I was being beaten within an inch of my life, and yet stood by and did nothing?”

“No,” she said, inching closer. “No, of course not. That’s exactly why you should be angry. Not just angry at him, but at this whole place. We all failed you, Rhys. You don’t owe this village anything.” Her leg grazed his thigh, and he flinched. “You’re holding so much emotion inside. I can feel it coming off you in waves. Just let it out.”

What he let out was a long, steadying breath. “The man is dead,” he said after a time. “If I get angry, I’ll just end up taking it out elsewhere. Hurting someone or something that doesn’t deserve it. And it won’t change a damned thing.” He cleared his throat. “In the end, I’m alive, despite his every attempt to kill me and my every attempt to die. Things happen the way they’re meant to happen.”

She growled. “I am so bloody sick of hearing you talk like that. You were not delivered to this place and time by the hand of destiny, Rhys. You survived, despite everything, by your own strength and wits and courage. I know it, because I’m a survivor too. And it’s so frustrating, to hear you go on about fate and destiny and ‘meant to be,’ when I’ve been holding that village together with hard work and sacrifice for years. I stayed when others left. I kept working when others had given up. For God’s sake, I married a man older than my own father. Don’t tell me it was all for nothing, and that my life would have turned out just the same no matter what. You insult me when you speak that way. You insult yourself. You’ve stayed alive, and not because fate preserved you, but because you’re a strong, courageous, quick-witted, resilient, good-hearted man. And it cuts me deep, every time I hear you deny it.”

He didn’t know what to say to that. He rose to stretch and add wood to the fire.

“More brandy?” she asked him, once he was seated again.

He accepted wordlessly.

“I think I’ve come up with the story. For Darryl to tell, about the pool. Do you want to hear it?”