Chapter 5

Warning: This chapter contains violence and attempted rape

Will had been gone every day for the last week, and Elizabeth found herself missing him. She had been living with him for two months now, and was losing some of her anxiety around him. She was still afraid of displeasing him. She knew he had all the power in this arrangement and could kick her out whenever he wished. But she was growing more confident in her ability to please him. She did not realize how much she had come to rely on his company until he had been gone this week.

Because Will did not have much to trade except physical labor, he often went to neighboring farms and aided them in whatever tasks they needed help with. This week, the Lucases were rebuilding their barn, so he had come home every night filthy and exhausted, barely grunting responses to Elizabeth's attempts at conversation.

He still was largely silent and uncommunicative, but Elizabeth had the feeling that he liked her, in his own way. He certainly liked having sex with her, and he had told her that she made his life better. She liked to think that she was making him happy, and not just out of her own sense of self-preservation. She genuinely liked him and wanted him to be happy. He was a good man and had been kind to her.

The chores around the cabin had been lighter with Will gone all day, so she had had more time to relax and even take a nap on occasion. The garden was going to be ready to be harvested before she knew it, and so she was trying to learn all she could about canning. Anne had given her a cook book which had a section about canning, and Elizabeth was reading it assiduously. She was terrified she would kill both herself and Will with botulism.

"Hey! Elizabeth! Where are you?"

Springing up in delight at the sound of Will's voice, Elizabeth ran inside from the back where she had been lying in the sun. Will was taking off his mud-caked boots inside the front door. "Welcome home!" she said, and felt good saying it.

"Good to see you, girlie," he said with a warm smile.

"You're in a good mood," she observed.

"We're almost finished," he said. "We'll finish up the barn in two days. And I only have to go in the afternoons."

"Hurray!" she cheered with a twinkle in her eye. "Now you can stay home with me."

"Yup. I wanna get some huntin' done tomorrow."

"Sounds good. Are you hungry?"

"Yeah, I'm hungry. Hungry for you," he said, his eyes heating up with a look that was now familiar to Elizabeth.

She giggled. "Wash up first," she said. "You're not touching me when you're filthy," she teased.

"Yes, ma'am," he said with a wink. "Wash up first. Then I'm takin' you to bed."

The next morning, Will and Elizabeth had another leisurely round of sex before he went to go hunting. After Elizabeth had cleaned the breakfast dishes and set the bread dough to rise, she had some time to relax, so she decided to lie out in the sun and read. Will had a lot of books, so she had many to choose from. She decided to go with a mystery she had not read yet, and settled herself in a lawn chair to read.

A half an hour passed and she was about to get up to check on the bread when she heard someone coming toward the cabin through the woods. Glad that Will had returned early, she sat up to greet him when she saw a huge, grizzled man approach confidently from the trees toward her.

She stood at once in fear. "You'd better get out of here!" she cried. "My man will shoot you!" It was a bluff, but maybe the man didn't know Will was gone.

"Just saw your man out in the woods huntin'. He won't be back for hours. I knew he had a hot little number hidden somewhere. I've passed you two walkin' near here several times. It was only today I found out where he'd stashed you."

He approached her with the movements of a predator and Elizabeth did not know what to do. Will was too far away to hear her, even if she screamed. She tensed to run. If she could get to her gun, she might be able to shoot him. Will had been training her in the use of the weapon in the last two months.

Before she could spring into motion, however, he was on her. She lifted her knee to ram into his groin, but he was so much taller than she, it glanced off his thigh. She grabbed a hammer, which Will had left lying by the path after he had used it, and tried to hit the man in the face. Instead it thudded on his shoulder. The man grunted in pain, and with a bellow, punched her in the side of the head.

Elizabeth had never felt such excruciating pain in her life. Blinded with agony, she screamed, and realized that it had come out as Will's name. The next thing she knew, she was on the ground, and the monster was on top of her. He smelled terrible, and she gagged with the horror of what she knew was about to happen to her. She screamed again as he ripped her shirt down the middle and reached down to ruck up her skirt. She heard a voice shouting in the distance, then there was the sound of a gunshot, and the man sagged down on top of her.

Gagging, screaming hysterically, Elizabeth struggled to push the heavy body off of her. There was blood and gore on her and she realized part of the man's head had been blown off. Then Will was there, hauling the body off of her.

"Fuck, oh, fuck! You okay, Elizabeth? Answer me, darlin'!"

Amid her hysterical sobbing, Elizabeth noted the endearment but was too distressed to take pleasure in it. Will lifted her up into his arms and carried her into the house, sitting down on the couch with her on his lap. He held her close, crooning and speaking soothingly to her until her hysteria waned into a few hiccoughing sobs.

It was about ten minutes until she calmed and realized that she was sitting on Will's lap, topless and covered in blood, her head throbbing with pain.

"You all right, darlin'?" Will asked, and she looked into his face to find it pale and distressed.

"You came," she managed at last in a voice made hoarse from crying.

"I heard you screamin'," he said, his face twisting with strong emotion. "But I don't know if I came in time. Did – did I?" he asked fearfully.

Elizabeth knew what he was asking. "He didn't rape me," she said, and saw the relief on his face. "But he tried. He – I should have had my gun with me. But I was at home. I didn't think I would need it at the house. It was my fault."

"Shh, no, Elizabeth, it was not your fault. You should feel safe enough in your own home that you shouldn't need to carry your gun around with you. This was my fault. It's my job to protect you and I failed in that. I don't know how you can ever forgive me."

Elizabeth shook her head. "You don't need forgiveness, Will. It wasn't your fault."

Will was looking at the bruise on the side of her face. "Let me get you some ice, darlin'. This is going to swell somethin' fierce."

He stood and went to set her down but she clung to him, unwilling to let him go. She realized what she was doing at the last second, and made herself release him, not wanting to be seen as clingy. He had made it clear there was to be nothing romantic between them. But he had obviously felt her agitation. "I'll be right back, Elizabeth. I'm just goin' to get some ice for you."

He went down into the root cellar, and Elizabeth found one of his old t-shirts to put on. She wanted a bath. She felt dirty. She could smell the man's fetid breath, feel his heavy weight on her. And she still had blood on her. She shuddered.

Will was back a minute later, picking her back up and setting her onto his lap on the couch again, pressing the bag of ice to her sore face.

"I'm so sorry, Elizabeth," she heard him say, and felt him kiss her cheek. Despite the horror she had just been through, part of her glowed inside to feel the tender kiss. He had never kissed her on the mouth, and she had all but given up on the possibility that he ever would. But a kiss on the cheek was almost as good. Slowly she began to relax. She hated to be a bother to him, but the affectionate gesture and the endearment gave her the courage to ask, "Will, could I – could I have a bath?"

"Of course, darlin'. I should have thought of that myself. You stay right here. I'll get the bathwater ready." He set her down on the couch and she watched as he prepared the bath.

She stripped down and got into the water, and Will bathed her with a tenderness he had never shown her before, and it made her want to cry again.

"I want you to rest the rest of the afternoon," he said, and she just nodded gratefully.

After she was finished with her bath, Will helped her get dressed in some clean clothes, then followed her as she went to the outhouse. She was thankful for his presence even if she thought it was a little overprotective.

When she climbed into bed he got in next to her and pulled her into his arms. At first she was unsure if he was initiating sex, but to her relief, he seemed to understand that she needed him just to hold her, and she cried a little bit again at the solicitude he was showing her. Soon she fell asleep.

She woke up a couple hours later to see Will's face bending over her. "Elizabeth, it's time to go," he said.

"Oh, okay," she said, her brain still a little fuzzy from sleep. "I hope you have a good time. I'll have dinner ready for you when you get home."

Will frowned. "No, you're comin' with me."

Elizabeth came awake at once. "Coming with you? Why?"

"It's not safe to leave you here by yourself. I'm not lettin' you out of my sight again."

It was Elizabeth's turn to frown. This was entirely impractical, as well as unnecessary. This had been an isolated incident and was unlikely to happen again. She couldn't get her chores done if she had to go with him everywhere.

Still, she did not argue with him. She never did. She just hoped that this irrational fear of his would pass soon.

That afternoon at the Lucases', she got many shocked looks at the sight of her face, and had to keep repeating the story over and over to her horrified listeners. All of them, even Charlotte, believed that she had been too frightened to stay home by herself and had required that Will bring her with him. She tried to gently correct their assumptions, but she could tell they did not believe her, and she did not dare speak badly about Will anywhere, especially to his friends and family.

She hoped to talk to him tonight at bedtime. He was always soft and pleased with her after sex, and she hoped she could convince him to be rational then.

But when he came into the bedroom and saw she was naked, his eyes widened. "You seriously wanna have sex tonight?" he asked incredulously.

Elizabeth was confused. They had had sex every night since she came to live with him, even on the days she had her period. "I thought –"

"Fuck no, darlin'. You went through an ordeal today. I'll just hold you tonight."

She was grateful for his solicitude, but still determined to discuss the issue at hand. Once he had gotten into bed and she had her nightgown back on, he took her into his arms. She had to admit she liked it. Maybe he would listen to her now. She took a deep breath and began.

"Will, I think I'll be all right staying at home by myself tomorrow. It's laundry day, and I won't be able to –"

"No."

What?

No?

That was all he said?

Just no?

She tried to keep her tone mild and sweet. "But, Will, it was an isolated incident. I told you it was the guy we've seen on our walks back from your parents' house. It won't happen ag–"

"Elizabeth, I said no. I'm responsible for protecting you. We won't discuss it again."

Elizabeth felt stunned, and more than that, hurt. She had grown more comfortable with Will in the last two months. She had let down her guard, come to believe that maybe they really were true partners. That she was more to him.

But clearly she had been fooling herself. Will did not want her to be independent in any way. He wanted her relying on him for everything. He wanted that calm, sweet, compliant woman she had been for him from the beginning. That helpless woman.

She felt rage simmer in her veins at his treatment of her, but she quashed it. She could not afford to make him angry. He still had all the power here, which he had just made abundantly clear. If she angered him, he could kick her out without a second thought and she would die, starving and alone.

She wanted to pull out of his arms, but instead lay there stiffly until he fell asleep. Then she rolled over and put her back to him. He had never just held her in bed before, and she would have enjoyed it if he hadn't just made perfectly clear exactly what her role was to him.

Author's Note: A lot of you have mentioned the manner in which Will speaks. In terms of that, I wasn't trying to show that he was uneducated, but that he has an accent. This story takes place in the South in America, so I was attempting to show a thick Southern accent. If you have any suggestions on how I can do that without making him sound uneducated, please let me know through PM. I am not an expert on accents. Thanks again for reading and for all your kind reviews!