Rose in the Dark - Logan Fox Page 0,25

those new logs with a strange heaviness inside me.

No, not strange. It’s a comfort. It happens whenever I drink. My body becomes lame and heavy, my mind thick as a goose down duvet.

I like it.

In this state, I couldn’t hurt anyone even if I tried. That I’d be incapable of violence, or the sadistic, perverted acts Alaine had accused me of.

For now, the beast inside me slumbers.

For now, Pippa is safe.

Diary

The beast visited me again last night. I have the marks, the blood between my legs, his seed on my skin.

Three times this week, and more the week before. Every night he comes, he leaves in a worse condition than before. When I woke, I was still bleeding.

How does he do it?

I LOCK THE DOOR!!!

Does he have keys to every room in this godforsaken place? Must I place furniture under the handle, hoping he won’t be strong enough to push through?

I would leave if I could. Brandon and his babe be damned!

But the cow downstairs refuses to let me use the coach. She pretends it’s for my own sake (says I’ll injure myself trying to drive through the snow!) but that cantankerous cunt always knew how to mince her words into the sweetest pie, didn’t she?

The snow has trapped me here as surely as this blasted infant growing in my womb.

Oh, God how I ache. It was the pain that woke me this morning. It won’t relent, even after I drank half the bottle of Laudanum Brandon’s doctor prescribed me.

Migraine cure? Ha! That quack doesn’t know his foot from his arsehole. The only thing that ever helped with my migraines was moving out of Brandon’s room. But even then…even after I was free of him, he still haunts me.

Sneaking into my room.

Taking what I no longer wish to give.

If that BEAST comes to me again, I swear

…

No, I’m not strong enough.

But I WILL leave, even if it means I don’t make it back to town. Even if it means we both die.

Why in the hell would I want to bear his demonic spawn into this world?

12

Pippa

My stomach twists. I hurry to the bathroom and stand over the basin, convinced I’m going to be sick. But the feeling passes when I splash water on my face and the back of my neck. I remain leaned over, hands over my face, trying to rid myself of Alaine’s confession.

But I can’t.

The blood, the marks, his seed on my skin.

I straighten hurriedly, and barely catch sight of my white face before I scream and spin around.

The baron lifts his hands, blinking slowly at me. “Didn’t mean to scare you,” he says. He scans my face before adding, “Are you feeling ill?”

Alaine’s diary — I left it on the rocking chair’s seat.

Somehow, I manage a smile and shake my head. “No. Just…tired.”

“Then g’to sleep.”

My heart stutters. He’s drunk. Well and truly this time, not just a little like before. His eyes are on my mouth again.

Beast.

I swallow hard and walk backward without taking my eyes off of him. “That’s a good idea, Sir.”

He smiles wide and deep. If it hadn’t been for the murky light in his eyes, how heavy-lidded with liquor they were, it would have been an intoxicating stare. One that I’m sure would have had any woman disrobing with a flick of his fingers.

Loathing surges through me, chasing away every remnant of spine-melting shame. But as much as I want to lash out at him, I can’t. If I were to anger him, those massive hands wouldn’t be tucked in his pockets any longer — they’d be around my throat.

How did Alaine die?

For a heart-rending moment, I think I’ve said the words aloud. But when Brandon doesn’t acknowledge the question, my heart starts pumping again.

“I should leave,” I say calmly.

“Why? I have a big bed,” Brandon says, eyes little more than slits. “Won’t touch you, promise.” He shakes his head. “Not like before.” He goes closer to the bed, runs his hands over the sheets as if enjoying the sensation on his skin.

His skin.

Both hands, although the left more than the right, are riddled with burn marks. Those large, square hands of his.

Red.

Burned.

Just like Rose.

Just like his infant child.

“That’s how…” my treacherous mouth murmurs. “You put her in the fire.”

The horror of that thought nearly overwhelms me. I expect him to protest, perhaps even become enraged that I dare suggest such a thing.

Instead, the baron simply stares at me with a slack face, his hands still spread on the sheets.

“Deny it!” I