Chapter 6

Burke's POV

(~BURKE~)

This is not what he bargained for. He wanted a docile maid, who would do what he wanted, would be so petrified by him that she would never ask about his face, let alone want to find out, who he could take to bed occasionally. Emma wasn't what he had bargained for.

When she first showed up, even terrified as she was, she had stood up to him. She was so curious about everything. Including his nightmare of a face. And he didn't know what it was, but for some reason, he knew he could never take her to bed. Especially not in fear.

Why was it, that Emma was everything he didn't want, but he wouldn't change her if he could?

And her nightmare. Good lord. She was screaming so loudly, he thought for sure she was being attacked by a wild beast. He was so shaken by her terrified screams, he had rushed straight into her room without even thinking to don the mask.

Burke groaned as he remembered her gentle fingers on his horrid face

Fingers that beautiful, should never come into contact with something so unsavory. Yes, that was how he thought of his face. Horrid, unsavory, despicable, grotesque. It was a depressing disposition, but at least he didn't delude himself.

He thought about all this on his walk to dinner.

Emma, and all the maids and stable hands ate meals with him. There would be no point in anything else, seeing as how he was the only person in the castle who wasn't staff. Besides meals would be quite lonely without the friendly chatter going on around him, which, he never took part in.

He walked into the dining hall, and there was Emma, bending over to reach something underneath the large oak table, giving him a wonderful view of the lovely rump he had beaten so many times. He did feel bad about that.

It may be hard to understand, but for Burke, punishing someone else had always been like punishing himself. In a twisted way. You see, since he was little he had always hated to see people in pain, and had watched his father beat up various w****s. (not using the word in an offensive way, but they really were real w****s.)

He caught himself staring at her upturned bottom and quickly jerked his gaze away. It met with a pair of unwavering steel blue ones that sparkled with mirth.

Gwen.

She was the closest thing to a mother he ever had outside of the womb.

Before his father had died, she served him, and had since she was a young girl. She practically raised Burke. His mother died giving birth to him. His father had always hated him so much for it. But it wasn't something he had control over.

While Burke was growing his father never laid a hand on him. Never spoke a word to him either. His father was cold and aloof, and as mean as they come. On his 13th birthday his father spoke his very first words to him.

"How can you celebrate the day you were born, when it's also the day you killed your mother?"

And then he had dragged him to the stables and beat him within an inch of his life with a riding crop.

He snapped out of his dismal thoughts and quickly took his place at the head of the table.

Throughout the meal, he watched Emma. Discreetly of course.

He loved the way her eyes would light up with laughter. But he hated the rather good looking stable hand she was talking to for putting it there. And hated himself for hating the stable hand.

He was supposed to be detached. Cold. With Emma, he could never manage that. And he hated it.

He constantly had to suppress unhinged feelings running rampant in his mixed up brain.

Since he was 13, he had never had an issue with being cold. Except for with Gwen. But he didn't want to be cold to Gwen. She was the one and only person he let see the real side of him.

The scared, insecure, pitiful man that he really was.

He thanked the lord everyday that she didn't hate him for it.