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Tray bit back a groan as Alyssa nestled more closely against him. He lightly stroked her head, running the gossamer threads of her hair through his fingers as he had done for seven nights before. This would be the last time he would sleep with her now that she had regained consciousness. The doctor had seen her briefly and wanted to examine her more thoroughly the next day. It was nearly three in the morning, and everyone was exhausted.
Tray’s heart wrenched as Aly nuzzled him like a lamb seeking its mother, her slender hand resting on his chest. In sleep, she trusted him even though he was a man. He lay there a long time, aware that dawn was slowly breaking the hold of night. He desperately needed to rest, yet he also needed to hold Aly and somehow atone for all the cruelty that life had thus far dealt her.
He had forgotten the contentment that a woman could bring to him. Alyssa made him feel whole, complete. Yet he wouldn’t humiliate her further by allowing her to discover that he had held her during those nights when she had hovered at death’s gate. And Alyssa’s trampled pride would not allow her to accept him holding her at night any longer. He would now have to move to the adjoining bedchamber. A soft smile tugged at Tray’s mouth as he rested his arm on her back. Sean had been right: Alyssa was a spitfire.
* * *
Alyssa jerked awake with a gasp.
“Relax, miss,” a voice she recognized as Dr. Birch’s soothed. The man placed his hand on her shoulder. “I need to examine that head wound of yours a bit more closely.”
Alyssa froze.
Tray grimly watched Alyssa wrestle with the terror. She suddenly ducked away from the doctor’s continued ministrations. Damn her! Tray wrestled with his anger as he stalked around to the other side of the bed, making sure she would not try to bolt, thereby injuring herself further. He glanced at Birch and then down at her.
“Alyssa,” he growled, “stop this. You can’t run every time someone touches you. The doctor needs to examine you.”
Alyssa winced beneath Tray’s biting tone as if he had physically struck her. He was obviously used to having his own way and ordering others around. One part of her rebelled; and yet, with frightening despair, she knew she could not escape because her blindness prevented it. Hot tears scalded her eyes and she tipped her head back, squeezing her eyelids closed and forcing down the tears.
“Please…” she whispered brokenly, “ask me anything you want, Doctor. But don’t—don’t touch me. I—I can’t stand it. You don’t know what happened….”
Birch sat quietly on the edge of the bed. “We know what happened to you, child,” he said gruffly. “I’ll be very gentle with you. Now, you must sit there and stop agitating yourself. Do you understand?”
Tray limped back to the fireplace, his mouth set in a hard line. Alyssa’s pleading cry tore at him as nothing else ever had. God’s blood! What was this unexplained power she held over him? Each time agony showed in her lovely jade-colored eyes or Tray heard the trembling fear in her rich voice, he responded to it as if he were a part of her.
That morning, he had gently dislodged himself from Alyssa’s sleeping embrace and had stood at the bedside, staring hungrily down upon her peaceful countenance, which, in slumber, lost that mask of fear. The perfectly sculpted features of her healing face had tempted him almost beyond reason.
Tray rubbed his brow in consternation, hating himself for what he had felt earlier as he stood there. He had experienced a stirring of heat in his loins, and his imagination had taken flight. Ruthlessly, he tried to sort and examine his emotions. Shelby had been dead for longer than a year. There were many Englishwomen from Liverpool who begged him to attend their parties and balls after the official period of mourning, but he had declined. They all vied for the title of Lady Trayhern—and the vast Trayhern wealth he would inherit when his father died. Tray’s memory veered sharply to a time in his life he never wanted to dredge up again.
He had been the master of Shadowhawk since he was six and ten, with Stablemaster Thomas as his mentor. There had been little time to hone his appreciation of girls when he was growing up. The only other females were Welsh and Irish servants or tenants, and they all knew who he was: the lord of Shadowhawk, someone to treat with deference but never to become friendly with. Those had been painfully lonely years. And it was only when his neighbor to the south, a wealthy Welsh farmer, had come to visit with his son that Tray truly began to understand the shame of his clubfoot and how that condition affected women.
Evan Deverell was two years older than Tray and would often come riding up on one of his father’s handsome thoroughbreds and invite Tray to visit Colwyn Bay with him to enjoy the delights of the young Welshwomen, who, he promised, would welcome them with open arms. After a particularly bountiful fall harvest, Tray was in the mood to celebrate. He bathed, donned his best clothes, mounted his bay Welsh gelding and rode happily into Colwyn Bay with his friend.
The cobbled streets of Colwyn Bay were dreary with recent rain when they entered Evan’s world of gambling parlors. They drank until their heads reeled and then found themselves in the arms of women who traded their bodies for a few coins. Drunk for the first time in his life, Tray had staggered up to the room of a pretty girl named Glynis, which was gaudily decorated in reds and golds. She giggled as, in his inebriated state, he tried to unbutton his trousers. Glynis pushed him back on the feather bed and divested him of his black wool coat and white, ruffled shirt. He sat there, blinking at Glynis through blurred eyes as she kept up a giggly chatter, her blue eyes small and sparkling as she yanked and pulled on his right boot until it finally slid free. Tossing it aside, he laughed with her, feeling a rush of fierce sexual hunger as she leaned down between his sprawled legs to caress him through his tight-fitting breeches. A shudder of absolute pleasure had rippled through him like hot iron being poured through his awakening loins.
Glynis must have seen the shock and sudden desire mirrored in his stunned expression because she smiled coyly and continued to caress him with knowing fingers, sending shafts of longing coursing through his virgin body. Tray gasped as she gently shoved him down on the bed, proceeding to free each captive button on his confining trousers. The bulge in his breeches left nothing to guess about, and Glynis seemed absolutely delighted as she deliberately grazed his hard maleness one more time before shifting her attention to ridding him of his other highly polished boot.
The skimpy, translucent lavender gown made Tray achingly aware of Glynis as a woman. He watched in fascination as she straddled his left leg, positioning the boot between her slender thighs. He lay there, eyes wide as he watched her small rear wriggle provocatively as she struggled with the boot. Pouting, she turned and told him to push on her derriere so that the naughty boot would come off. He willingly complied, gently placing his foot squarely on that beautiful, lavender-swathed flesh. With squeals of delight, after a few halfhearted tries, Glynis wrestled the leather free. She did a little dance before tossing the boot aside and turning back to Tray. Her gaze flew to his left leg, thin, misshapen, the atrophied calf.
Tray squeezed his eyes shut, still hearing her gasp; in his mind’s eye he again watched the revulsion and horror cross Glynis’s face as she stared down at his twisted left foot. She backed against the wall, her eyes large as he looked in confusion at her. And then she started screaming.
“Monster! Monster! You’re the devil’s own! Help! Help!” She fled from the room, shrieking at the top of her lungs, the words monster and devil ringing throughout the building, bringing patrons and whores tumbling out into the hall to investigate.
Tray opened his eyes and stared out the french windows at the moody gray sky. He flexed his left fist, still remembering the humiliation, the rejection. Slowly, he lifted his chin and his gaze rested on Alyssa. Was that how she felt now? He was ashamed of the anger that he had felt toward her earlier. He mustn’t allow his frustration to transform into impatience with Alyssa. Whatever she was feeling was aimed at all men, not just at him. Tray moistened his lips, drawing himself up and wandering back to the other side of the bed.
“Listen to me carefully,