Chapter 4: Punishment in the Pines
The carriage rattled through the dark, the rhythmic clop of the horses’ hooves the only sound between them. Beaumont had not spoken since handing her up into the compartment. He sat opposite her, a silhouette against the moonlit window, his face a mask of polished stone. The scent of his cologne, usually subtle and expensive, was now cloying, mixed with the sharp tang of spilled champagne and his own cold sweat.
Belle kept her eyes on the blackness rushing past the glass. Her cheek still burned where his stubble had scraped it during their last, possessive kiss goodnight to her parents. Her arm ached where his fingers had dug in. The ghost of Jack’s hands, light and guiding on the dance floor, felt like a whispered promise against the brutal memory of Beaumont’s grasp.
“Stop the carriage.”
His voice, when it came, was flat, a command directed at the space between them. Belle’s head snapped towards him.
“What? Why?”
He didn’t look at her. He rapped the roof with his cane—three sharp, decisive knocks. The carriage began to slow, the wheels crunching on the rough roadside gravel before settling to a halt. The sudden silence was deafening.
Beaumont finally turned his gaze on her. In the dim lantern light filtering through the curtains, his eyes were hollows of darkness. “Get out.”
“Edmund, it’s nearly an hour to the house. The woods—”
“I said get out.”
He moved before she could protest further, throwing open the carriage door and stepping down into the night. He turned and extended a hand, not to assist her, but as a bare expectation of obedience. The driver, a loyal man of Beaumont’s imported from England, stared rigidly ahead.
A primal fear, cold and slick, coiled in Belle’s stomach. This was not the irritable possessiveness of the ballroom. This was something calculated and quiet, and infinitely more dangerous. She gathered her skirts, the silk now feeling like a fragile shell, and placed her hand in his. His grip was vice-like, yanking her the final step down so she stumbled against him.
He caught her, his other hand wrapping around her upper arm. “Walk,” he muttered, and began steering her off the road, towards the dense, shadowy line of eucalyptus trees.
“Edmund, please. Whatever this is—”
“You know exactly what this is.” His voice was a low rasp, barely audible over the rustle of their footsteps through dry undergrowth. “You made a spectacle of yourself. With him. That… refurbished criminal.”
The moon was high, casting fractured silver light through the gum leaves. It painted his profile in stark relief, all hard angles and contempt.
“It was one dance. My father insisted.”
“You smiled at him.” Beaumont stopped suddenly, shoving her backwards. Her shoulder blades hit the rough, stringy bark of a tall gum tree. The impact knocked the air from her lungs. “You looked at him like you’ve never once looked at me. Like you were sharing a secret. What is your secret, Belle?”
He was on her then, his body pressing her into the unyielding trunk. One hand fisted in the elaborate twist of her hair, pulling her head back. The other groped at the layers of her gown.
“There is no secret,” she gasped, the bark digging into her spine. “He’s a surgeon. I have an interest in his work. You know this.”
“I know you’re a lying little slut,” he hissed, his mouth against her ear. The genteel lord was gone, stripped away by jealousy and brandy. This was the raw man beneath, entitled and furious. His fingers, clumsy with rage, found the tapes of her skirts and yanked. Fabric ripped.
The cold night air hit her legs. He shoved her dress and petticoats up around her waist, his hand pawing between her thighs. She cried out, a short, sharp sound swallowed by the vast, indifferent bush.
“Quiet,” he snarled. “You wanted an adventure, didn’t you? Sneaking off to his hospital, getting your pretty hands dirty. Is this how he has you? Against a wall? In some grimy sickroom?” He was fumbling with the fall of his trousers now.
Belle turned her face away, pressing her cheek into the rough bark. She could smell the sharp, medicinal scent of the eucalyptus, the dry earth, his sweat. She concentrated on that. On anything but the panic screaming through her veins. Don’t endure. Start breaking things. Jack’s words echoed, a bitter mockery. She had no tools here. Nothing to break but herself.
He spat into his palm, a crude, wet sound. He didn’t bother with her, didn’t care if she was ready. He guided himself against her and shoved forward.
Belle bit down on her own lip so hard she tasted blood. The tearing pain was a white-hot spike, a brutal violation. He was large, and he forced his way inside with a single, grinding thrust that felt like it split her in two.
“There,” he grunted, his body slamming into her, pinning her to the tree. “That’s where you belong. Taking your husband. Taking his seed.”
He began to move, a harsh, punishing rhythm. Each thrust jolted her body against the unyielding wood. His breath came in ragged, angry bursts against her neck. His hand still tangled in her hair kept her head pulled back, exposed.
“You’ll learn,” he panted. “You’ll learn who owns this cunt. I’ll breed you on this tree, in the dirt, wherever I please. I’ll put a child in you so deep you’ll forget his fucking name.”
The obscenities poured from him, filthy and hot in her ear. They were meant to degrade her, to mark her more indelibly than the physical act. He rutted into her like an animal, his hips pounding, his fingers digging bruises into her hipbone. She was utterly helpless, a object for his fury and his fantasy of possession. The world narrowed to the pain between her legs, the scrape of bark on her back, the raw smell of him.
She let her mind drift. It was the only defense she had. She thought of the hospital, the clean scent of lye soap and iodine. She thought of Jack’s hands, steady and capable, holding a scalpel. She imagined those hands here, on her skin, gentle. It was a pathetic refuge, but it kept her from screaming.
His pace grew frantic, his movements losing their rhythmic brutality and becoming jerky, desperate. With a final, deep thrust that pushed a choked sob from her throat, he stiffened. A low, guttural groan escaped him as he pulsed inside her, spilling himself. He held himself there, locked against her, for a long moment, as if physically anchoring his claim.
Then he slumped against her, his weight heavy, his breath cooling on her damp skin. The sounds of the night rushed back in: the distant call of a night bird, the wind in the leaves. He withdrew from her body with a soft, wet sound that made her stomach lurch.
He stepped back, rearranging his clothing with a few efficient tugs. He looked at her, disheveled and exposed in the moonlight, her skirts still rucked around her waist, her eyes wide and dry. A semblance of his usual composure slid back into place, cold and satisfied.
“Clean yourself up,” he said, his voice devoid of all emotion now. He turned and began walking back towards the road, not checking to see if she followed.
Belle pushed herself away from the tree, her legs trembling. A sharp, bruised ache throbbed deep inside her. She felt trickles of warmth on her thighs—him, and a little of her own blood. She lowered her skirts with shaking hands. The fine silk was torn and smeared with dirt and bark dust. She stared at the stains, a tangible record of the violation.
She followed his retreating back, walking stiffly, each step a reminder. The carriage loomed ahead, a dark cabin against the starry sky. The driver still did not look at her as Beaumont handed her back inside.
Beaumont took his seat opposite her once more. He took out a handkerchief and meticulously wiped his hands. He did not offer her one.
The carriage lurched into motion. They did not speak for the remainder of the journey. Belle watched the shadows of the trees flow past, her body a locked cabinet of new pains. The memory of Jack’s face, sharp with a surgeon’s focus on the dance floor, was the only clean thing she could hold onto. It was a tiny, stolen scalpel in her mind. She would keep it hidden, and she would keep it sharp.