Ensnared by Innocence: Steamy Regency Shapeshifter Read online

  Ascending faster than she would have believed possible, he disappeared up the stairs.

  What had just disappeared? The younger brother to her beloved? Or a monster?

  Gasping, Francine looked around her, one hand going to the tender spot on her hip where she’d collided with the table. The house appeared typical, if sparsely furnished, but for the inconsistent thumps from overhead.

  Secrets. She’d known Erasmus had them.

  Had that not been part of his allure?

  The haunted look in his eyes she’d sworn to ease? Perhaps erase?

  And now…

  Now—

  The wounded cries came again. Fainter but no less intense. Such an unfamiliar, foreign noise but one that captured her, rooted her feet to the spot as surely as the kindness and passion that Erasmus had wrapped her in these past months had planted seeds within her, ones that had quickly become entrenched, intertwining throughout her body and heart, blossoming into something much more than she’d ever expected.

  Another moaned wail, drawing her gaze toward the stairs. Yet trepidation sent it scurrying toward the locked door. The one she could open, could escape through… Return to Rowden House with no one the wiser.

  Nay. For that way lay heartache. Shame. Loneliness.

  If they were to be her lot in life, so be it, but she’d not choose them. Not when it was time to save her man.

  Secrets be damned.

  Though her mind railed at her to leave, her heart stood firm. She wasn’t going anywhere without answers—or without Erasmus.

  Her gaze jerked overhead.

  She tasted blood and realized she’d bitten her lip. Scared, nervous—oddly exhilarated—she closed her eyes and prayed for strength, because, God help her, whatever the sacrifice, she was going to save the man she’d come to love.

  Mired within The Change unlike anything he’d ever experienced, Nash struggled more with every second. How much longer could he hold the fiendish elements off? Keep them from overpowering what humanity he still claimed?

  Part of him sensed what an utter bastard he was being. But the beast controlled him now—or nearly so. He had no patience left, no soft nor refined feelings.

  No feelings at all. Other than the need to fuck, clawing at him so assiduously, ’twas a wonder he still stood.

  Oh wait, he wasn’t. Standing that is. Racing up the stairs faster than lightning, seeing the carved balusters pass at eye level in a hazy, reddened blur.

  How was it he seemed to be suffering more than Blake? As though loving the blighted bitch somehow gave his brother more strength than Nash could dredge from the depths of his soul.

  It had been like this for days—unceasing, the relentless pressure to succumb, to let the monster take hold. And it only grew once he reached London a few nights ago, hoping to find answers for why this year was different than any other.

  Previously, whether he and Blake were together battling The Change jointly or whether they did so apart, only referencing it briefly the next time he was in town, ’twas always a—fairly—simple matter of securing a wench. Slaking the Beast Lust and functioning, more or less, as a normal, lusty wastrel the rest of the time.

  Or not.

  “Regular” sexual urges increased during The Change, but didn’t overwhelm—or reign supreme—as long as that female-brought-about orgasm occurred daily.

  But this year, no matter how many willing wenches Nash found, or paid, the urges only gained strength. And knowing better than to take on the responsibility of a horse—or any responsibilities, for that matter—he’d hired a gig and driver and made haste to London, hoping for answers.

  Only to find Blake a broken shell of himself, hiding out in his bedchamber, struggling, pleading for Nash to only leave and let him fight in peace.

  Pah. The way his brother looked, he wouldn’t last the month.

  So despite the stupid lout refusing any help, Nash did what he could, in the moments of sanity he could secure, at least seeing them both fed and the more breakable possessions cleared out.

  He’d suspected ’twas a woman to blame. Had only taken Blake’s fevered rambles to confirm it.

  He also suspected the only way for either of them to truly find a measure of peace this year, was for them both to succumb to the beast—not an option—or for Blake to finally bed a bitch.

  And now the very one his blighted brother yearned for had delivered her treasure straight to their doorstep?

  If Nash could just push back the agonizing pain long enough to remain sensible, keep the beast caged long enough to keep from scaring her and her tasty little slit off…

  He hurt. Hurt with such a relentless ache, he wasn’t sure whether he could endure it from one minute to the next. Hated how rough and uncouth he’d become. How his mind and thoughts had reduced the alluring female form he normally appreciated in all its soft, gentle glory to naught but a resented means to stop the agony.

  He wasn’t a monster. He wasn’t!

  And he proved it eleven months out of the year, when he did… Well, not much of anything in truth. But certainly nothing harsh. Nothing unkind. Certainly nothing intentionally and overly rude.

  Eleven-twelfths of the year, he simply looked out for himself. What was the harm in that?

  He knew better than to depend upon his brother to smooth his way—Blake already did so much more for him than Nash deserved, providing money, a home even. What sort of irresponsible knave would he be to expect his remaining family to put to rights his beleaguered existence when he wallowed in the uncertainty of it?

  Why trouble Blake further when it was Nash who couldn’t figure out what he wanted from life?

  He wasn’t duty-conscious enough to buy into the military. Certainly wasn’t clerically minded. An educator? A scholar? Absurd. Intellectively inclined, he was not.

  He’d laugh if his demmed fangs weren’t poking into his bottom lip.

  Or perhaps, secretly he did know, down deep, exactly what he wanted. But also knew he claimed not the worth to wish for it so…

  What second son, cursed with an inherent dislike of responsibility—oh, and the pesky trial of becoming Felis leo each summer—who secretly yearned for a refined “lady” to call his very own had any chance of ever gaining his dreams?

  None.

  Nullus.

  Hakuna hata.

  None, but such remedy as, to save my aching head from such ludicrous dreams, would be to cleave my heart in twain.

  His ridiculous dreams…

  Craving a soft, sweet-smelling female to hug him and hold him when the urges became too great? Pah. He knew better. Knew better than to dream or expect.

  Knew better than to think beyond the difficult night ahead. And the sole goal of surviving the tortuous hours any way he could.

  In the end, Adam waited seven minutes. Nearly dismounted at how disreputable his friend appeared when he tore open the door, but also saw how the man looked at Francine as though she would be his redemption. So he slowly settled back into the saddle.

  Still unnerved. Still worried.

  Definitely straining his ears for the blood-curdling scream of a victim or the roar of a predator going in for the kill—his entire body shuddering at the thought. And when he didn’t discern either, he slowly guided Magnum around the way they’d come, kept his pace as sedate as he could to not draw attention in this part of London, and as soon as he felt comfortable, lit a fire under his trusty steed and raced back to the club.

  The Den and the second English “lady” he needed to see secured for the night.

  God help them all.

  “Where is she?”

  His eyes already accustomed to the dark, Adam heaved the door practically off its hinges in his rush to get back.

  But she wasn’t there. No one who mattered was, certainly one particular not-a-lady lady.

  “Where the devil is she?” he bellowed, not receiving a single response to his first—more calmly voiced—question.

  Tyndale fin
ally looked up from his lounging position behind the desk, where he was scratching out something with the pencil and paper Baywick usually kept neatly stacked, now sprawled over the desk—almost as though someone had brushed across it, all the pages haphazardly splayed. Had the bounder decided to use it for naughty or nefarious purposes?

  “What did you do with her?” Full of worry and quickly filling with rage, Adam advanced. “Where is she? Why is the desk all—”

  Tyndale gave a relaxed laugh and pushed to standing in a meandering, uncaring way that made Adam want to shake him till he cracked one of the buffoon’s teeth. “You know, I think I may have a word with Blakely about your attitude toward your betters.”

  Grinding his teeth so hard they squeaked, he gritted out from between compressed lips as cordially as he could manage, “Pray, my lord, forgive me. I am quite on edge, you see. Where, please tell me”—before I break your damn neck—“where has Lady…”

  Fuck it all. He still didn’t know her name?

  Rounding the desk in a leisurely move that just made Adam’s fist yearn to slam hard into the man’s neck—yeah, fighting dirty wasn’t above him, not the way he felt right now—the other man raised his arms overhead and clasped them together, then stretched from side to side as though he had not a care in the world.

  Adam stood there seething, giving off so much heated anger he was surprised the low ceiling overhead didn’t start to melt.

  Only after a big yawn, another interminable six seconds of stretching that was stretching Adam’s vanishing patience to the breaking point, did the asshole of a London lord finally snap to and act as though he had a clue what Adam was talking about. “Oh, you mean that wild little piece?”

  At least, that’s what he heard. Wild little piece, having no idea that, in fact, the other man had said Wylde’s little piece.

  Just as the muscles in his upper body instinctively tensed, readying to throw that punch after all, Tyndale finished, with a dismissive flick of his fingers toward the door Adam had just come through. “Scurried out of here when—”

  “You let her leave?”

  In a flash, Tyndale slammed into the wall, Adam’s shaking fists at his throat, knotted in the voluminous neckcloth and drawing it perceptively tighter every second. “You motherfucker! Do you not know what’s been happening around here? There’s a killer on the loose, for God’s sake. Baywick!” Adam finished in a roar.

  Tyndale’s eyes got wider than a flying saucer. Didn’t know if it was how he’d just been addressed, the tightened neckcloth possibly starving air from his imbecilic brain, or what he’d just been told.

  Maybe a bit of all three.

  Adam didn’t care.

  “Baywick!” he hollered again, shoving the lord to the side with a vicious thrust of both arms and turning to wrench the inner door open just as the doorkeeper did the same.

  “The other one—” He held his hand out, chest high, indicating her height as opposed to the tall one. “She’s gone? Left?” he asked the man.

  Baywick scanned the inner sanctum. “No, sir. She was here not three minutes ago.”

  Three minutes. Three fucking minutes!

  Red-faced and jaw clenched, Tyndale was already climbing from the floor. Sparing not a thought to his ridiculous rank, Adam speared him with a finger in his face. “We’re getting out there and finding her! And if we don’t—if something’s happened? You’ll be next.”

  Without stopping to think or arm himself further, he was gone, racing out the small door, running to the right after gesturing Tyndale back the way Adam had just come from, thinking she must have gone the other way or he would have already seen her.

  Could this night get any worse?

  14

  The Sauce Box to the Rescue

  And that’s another thing—some unknown language I speak with ease, without even realizing I’m doing it. So very deuced perplexing at times—how foreign sounds flow from my mouth when the beast is upon me. Beyond uncomfortable, I tell you, speaking in a tongue one has no recollection nor recognition of. Only discovered what the strange syllables meant upon viewing an exhibit focused upon The Peoples of Africa months ago.

  Imagine my astonishment, if you will, when I started translating a series of engravings before ever noticing the English versions beneath. Even stranger, I was unaware of my audible translation until the curator called it to my attention—and that only because he overheard me saying something different, and more accurate we were to learn later, than what was written.

  What other unknown abilities might this curse bless—or blight—us with, I cannot help but wonder…

  Swallowing her unease, Francine darted up the staircase after Nash. At the top of the landing, her steps faltered. Which way?

  “Erasmus!” she called with all her might, half afraid a round of servants would come running and chase her out. Although, wouldn’t they have already done so?

  But no… No one came.

  So she called out again. Waited…

  And received a tortured, soft “Francy” in response.

  Allowing the muted cries of her name to guide her, she charged down the hallway past several closed doors until she reached the one fairly brimming with untamed energy.

  Apprehension spiked through her as she gripped the knob. It wouldn’t turn. She leveraged her weight to—

  The door handle ripped from her grasp.

  Nash stood—nay, he hunched, bent to the side, blocking her entrance. But more human than the thing that had escaped up the stairs. “Says no, wants you gone.”

  “Nay! Let. Me. In!” He tried to pull the door shut but she wedged her body against his and shoved with all her might. “You fiendish brute!”

  The scent of tallow thickened the air. An abundance of candles burned in the background and she stood on her toes, craning to see over his shoulder to assess the chaos she faced.

  Royal blue, floor-length curtains hung in tatters, shredded from the bottom up. Furniture was toppled, drawers and their contents thrown haphazardly about the chamber. Her nose pricked. Beneath the burning candles, the room smelled of sweat and damp…fur?

  “Where is he?” She scanned the vast area, seeking—

  There. As removed from the door as possible.

  Shoved against the far wall, a huge bed, the glazed chintz hangings every bit as destroyed as the curtains. A man, tied—bound in the middle.

  “Erasmus!” Seeing him renewed her resolve and she ducked beneath Nash’s outstretched arm, barging past him to race to the bed where Erasmus struggled against restraints.

  Primitive, completely naked, he appeared a stranger, every bit as uncultivated and disreputable as his brother. “Oh, my…”

  No wonder she’d mistaken him downstairs. The feral savagery emanating off them both erased any hint of refined veneer. The change in his appearance defied the sennight they had been apart.

  “Fraaaanciiiine.” Heart wrenching, it was, the way the sound tore from his throat, the anguish upon his features. “Here? Now?” He blinked fast, as though disbelieving what he saw. “Night…?” gasped from his throat.

  As though to confirm ’twas dark beyond the curtains, he twisted his head to the side, toward the shuttered window. Then back to her, all color leaching from his face beneath the whiskery stubble. A tormented cry raised the hair along her nape, along with “Night!”, snarled as though the very concept should be condemned. Hate and self-loathing evident in his harrowed gaze.

  Gingerly, she cupped one bristly cheek, staring into eyes the color of molten lava. The deep red scared her as nothing else. They’d only ever glowed golden before. “Oh, my sweet. I am here.”

  He moaned at her touch. His muscles jerked against his bonds as he seethed the word again: “Night…” as though uttering the vilest of curses.

  Nash staggered over to aim one shaking, barbarian-looking hand at his brother. He all but spat, “See what you have done to him? How knowing you rendered him savage?”

  “Me?” He’d
come up directly behind her and now sniffed along her ear. She turned and swatted him away. “Stop that, you fiend.”

  “Absolutely, you,” Nash grunted, body heat coming off his hulking form in waves. “Too fragile, he said.” Mocking Erasmus with his delivery. “Cannot help us, he claimed. Said you were too delicate. Nay! I fear ’tis he who is too pigeoned by the pink.”

  Ignoring his crude taunts, heart thumping madly, she turned back to face the agony. “Oh, dear man, how can I ease your suffering?”

  Eyes closed, Erasmus bucked against the ropes tethering him to the bed and she saw what she’d missed before.

  There was more than simple twine wound about his limbs.

  Leather straps and manacles secured his arms. Chains, his ankles.

  Chains?

  Francine whipped around and slapped Nash hard across his wild face. He barely budged. “You animal.”

  Making no move to retaliate, he only hovered there, watching her, glowing, amber eyes narrowing.

  “What have you done to him, you blighted savage?” She slapped him again before swinging back to Erasmus who watched her, nostrils flaring. She clambered atop the mattress, ignoring the low rumbles emanating from both men as she scrambled to unfasten the ropes and leather straps securing her beloved.

  He looked no better than Nash—his black hair and beard turned to gold, fine fur lightly covering his chest and legs. Bulging, corded muscles twice their normal size filled out his entire frame, and his eyes, now that she was closer…

  Despite the unholy color, they conveyed the same emotions as the night they’d first talked. As the times she’d glimpsed his soul prior to that:

  Lonely. Haunted. Hunted.

  Until he slammed them shut, turned from her.