Read Online A Midsummer's Sin by Natasha Blackthorne - Free Book Online Page B

He had merely suppressed himself a very long time.
    She had submitted to his will.
    She had taken pleasure in turn.
    But, in the clear light of morning, perhaps she was repulsed by his darker carnal demands. Demands he certainly would never have dared share with Patience.
    Or any true wife.
    She spoke before he could collect his thoughts. “I’ve known a lot of men, it’s true.”
    A peculiar tightening centred in his chest. He did not want to know. “Keep your secrets, Rose. We all have them. Only God can judge.”
    “No, I want you to know.” She looked up, her gaze intense. “I need you to know.”
    He sat his cup down and looked at her seriously. “All right, Rose, tell me.”
    “My mother was the youngest of twelve. A blacksmith’s daughter who had beauty and not much talent. But she wanted to be an actress. At seventeen, she went to London and joined an acting company. The manager accepted her and kept her but only because she did his bidding with the gentlemen. She enjoyed their attentions. She enjoyed the bit parts Mr Boger let her play on the stage. Her other children, twin boys, were taken by their father. I certainly never knew them and Mr Boger wouldn’t tell me their names or where they went. When I was eighteen, my mother became ill. She could no longer earn her keep and so…” she paused, her throat moving rapidly, “I had to.”
    “Good God.” She had borne such abuse. And now Thomas had treated her roughly, demandingly, like men treated a whore. He began to feel ill. “Rose…”
    He didn’t know what to say.
    She stared back at him so placidly, so peacefully. “I was never actually forced, not tied to the bed and physically made to submit. I didn’t have the choice to say no to whatever they wanted because, had they complained to Mr Boger, he would have thrown me and my mother to the streets. However, they were all gentlemen.”
    “You were forced to this?” All his muscles were tightening and energy surged in his blood. He fisted his hands. “How could those gentlemen not know? Did they abuse you?”
    She shrugged. “With some of them it was terrible. They were old, ugly, poorly washed, heavy handed. But some were not so bad. One or two were handsome and kind. However, there was always a sense that I must do these things and so it was impossible to truly enjoy them or be at ease.”
    Anger boiled over within him. “Oh, come now, don’t lie to me. They were not always all of them kind.”
    A shadow crossed her face. “No, that’s true, they weren’t.”
    “And this Mr Boger, he used force to coerce you? At times?”
    She looked down and nodded slowly.
    His heart contracted. “Didn’t that make you hate men and their demands?”
    “It made me hate Mr Boger for putting me in that position. But he’s not all men.” She glanced up and her brown eyes shone with such a purity of spirit, such an open willingness to face life, he didn’t know what to say.
    Pain for her suffering knifed through him. Hatred burned his guts.
    He closed his eyes and balled his fists tighter. Boger deserved to die.
    Thomas would write to Harvard College and tell them he would be delayed in accepting his teaching job. He’d go to England, seek Boger and kill him.
    She paled and her dark eyes grew large. “Don’t look at me like that…please!”
    Her words did not register. He only heard her anguish.
    It was too much.
    He couldn’t keep looking at her. Anger pounded through him. Anger like he’d only known once before. It energised him to the point of being unable to think. He jerked to his feet. He needed to move his body. To clear his head.
    He needed to make plans. To think things through.
     
    Watching Thomas stride to the door and leave the house, Rosalind’s throat constricted and began to burn. She placed her hand to her collarbone, as if she could force the welling emotion down. She’d known the telling might repulse him. But she’d had to tell him. She’d gambled and lost for he was