This is my first submission to Literotica. I do hope you will enjoy it.
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Madeleine rode to her fate in a truly grim state of mind. One would think that she were facing the hangman instead of her betrothed. Her father, the merchant Hawthorne, had given her hand to the Earl of Dunnington in trade for forgiveness of his own gambling debts. How she hated the miserable sire who had never treated Madeleine or her mother better than he did his hunting hounds. She had always expected little of him, but to trade his own flesh and blood to a perverted lecher with a reputation like the Earl's was even lower than Madeleine could have imagined.
Perhaps, Madeleine thought, she might bribe the coach's driver to help her escape. No, too risky. He was her father's man, after all. Perhaps the innkeeper at their next stop would be better, but even that was risky. While her jewels were valuable, they could not compare to the reward her father would offer to anyone who foiled her escape. He had too much riding on this marriage to let his beautiful but otherwise insignificant daughter interfere with the transaction.
"Well," she thought with determination. "If I can't find a means of escape, I'll simply have to kill myself. That would be far better than dying of shame!"
On that thought, Madeleine fell into a fitful sleep. Her nightmares of the brutish Earl sent chills through her young body. In her dreams, she escaped, only to be caught and returned to the Earl's leering eyes and groping hands. She saw herself standing at the altar, bound and gagged with tears streaming down her face, shaking her head furiously when asked "Do you take this man. . .", yet nevertheless hearing the dreaded words "I now pronounce you man and wife."
Was it the nightmare that woke her, or was it something else? A loud thud from the area of the driver's seat put Madeleine's senses on high alert, as did the fact that the carriage was now moving at great speed. Looking out of the window, although the early morning sky was still dark as night, she saw riders who had overtaken her entourage. Alarmed, she shook her lady's maid awake.
"Beatrice! Wake yourself, you ninny! Something is happening!"
Before the hapless maid was fully conscious, the carriage came to an abrupt halt, throwing Madeleine to the floor. In the process, Madeleine's head roughly hit the opposite bench. "Merde!", she cried out just before losing consciousness.
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"Oh, will this godforsaken carriage ride never end?" Madeleine thought as she struggled to regain consciousness. She was horribly uncomfortable, and her head hurt dreadfully. Realization dawned on her, however, when she realized that she was not on a moving coach but, instead, lying on a bed of straw.
Her stiff limbs tried to help her into a sitting position, but the pain in her head instantly made her nauseated and she fell back.
A deep voice came from above her. "Mam'selle, you had best lie back until your head feels better."
Shocked at hearing a strange man's voice, Madeleine overcame her queasiness. She bolted upright. In the darkness, she could barely make out a roughly clothed giant of a man sitting near her. Fearlessly, she demanded "Who are you? And where have you taken me?"
"Hush! You do yourself no good by getting upset," the giant said calmly. "My name is Jacques. You've just had a small change in your travel plans. But you needn't fear. You won't come to any harm. Winston told the men that he'd kill anyone who dared to touch you. He knows that you're to be wed, and after he receives your ransom from your father, you'll be back on your way to your intended, happy as you please."
That, of course, was the last thing that Madeleine wanted to hear. "Who is this Winston?" Before she could continue, a door opened. Unaccustomed to the bright light that streamed in, Madeleine at first couldn't see the man who entered the musty chamber.
A new voice responded to her question. "I am Winston, at your service, Miss. And we are in a borrowed stable, en route to my home."
For some reason -- perhaps it was the commanding voice or perhaps it was the impressive silhouette that loomed above her -- Madeleine's bravado fled her and she was suddenly quite afraid. She was calmed only to a small extent by the knowledge that dead, she was no use to her abductors.
The man called Winston closed the door behind him, returning the room to darkness.
"So, Miss Madeleine, are you comfortable?" The deep voice, surprisingly, was not unrefined. A finger traced the line of her cheek. She felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise and a small chill run up her spine. When she did not answer, the man struck a match and lighted a lamp on the table beside the bunk.
Bringing Madeleine to her feet so that she could face him, his breath caught in his throat. Jack Winston had seen beautiful women before, but never one so unspoiled in her beauty as Madeleine. Briefly, the thought of her in the grasp of the vile Earl of Dunnington revolted him. But he pushed aside his sympathy. "No doubt she enters this marriage in return for the fiend's riches," he thought cynically.
In the meantime, without intending to, Madeleine inspected the face before her. He was not at all what she expected. Instead of a rough, dirty lout, she found him to be almost impossibly handsome. He was quite well groomed, with a trimmed beard and brown-gold waves that reached his shoulders. His full lips curved into a smile, somewhere between mocking and seductive, while his eyes, intensely green, were locked on hers.
Although she tried to appear composed, Madeleine she found herself nearly hyperventilating. When she saw him taking in her rising and falling breast, her cheeks burned with embarrassment.
