Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 105803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
The thugs shove me toward him, and he grabs me and forces me over the kitchen table. I fight him with everything I have, but he just laughs. “That’s it baby, fight me. It will make this so much sweeter.”
He bends me over the kitchen table and presses my face to the tabletop.
Puts his hands on my hips.
I tell him I will kill him for putting his hands on me.
He laughs, and it’s cold and evil.
He reaches for his zipper, and my heart roars in my chest.
He’s going to rape me.
But out of nowhere, a wild roar stops him. The kitchen window explodes as a giant male form crashes through it, sending glass through the room like an exploding confetti ball.
Beast.
Gaston yanks me upward and spins me around, as the giant takes out the two thugs with ease. I see the flash of a blade, the men drop, and then the Beast stalks toward us.
Gaston throws me at him, and I hit the wall of muscle with a thud and fall to the floor, completely winded. It’s too much for my body and a crawling darkness creeps into my head. But it doesn’t claim me right away. Before I see myself slipping beneath the black sea of nothingness, I watch the Beast lift Gaston up by the throat and repeatedly smash his face into the brick wall until he is a limp and bloody mess.
Beast drops him to the floor and crouches over him. “Consider this me starting something.”
As the last of my breath leaves me, the darkness finally takes me.
CHAPTER 6
BELLE
When I wake, up I’m on a bed somewhere, with a girl sitting next to me, looking down at me.
She has a blonde pixie cut and is wearing big gold hoops in her ears.
“Um… hi?” I say with a wince, struggling to sit up.
The girl leaps into action. “Here, let me help you.” She leans past me to rearrange my pillows, and I’m hit with the tantalizing scent of Patchouli and Ylang-Ylang. She punches the pillows then guides me down so I can settle against them. “You got a nasty bump on your head when you collapsed, so you’ll need to take it easy for a while.”
She’s not lying. My head is pounding.
I bring my hand to my forehead. That’s when I realize I’m chained to the bed. My wrist is bound by an iron shackle and a heavy chain bolted to the floor. “What the fuck?”
“Oh, that’s there for your own good.”
“My own good?”
“On account of your concussion. If you went wandering, you could get hurt. This place is big and there are lots of places you could disappear into. If you hurt yourself, it could take a while to find you.”
“Surely a lock on the door would suffice?”
“Beast said this was the best way. And we always do what Beast says.” Dimples press into her cheeks when she smiles. “Here, let me take care of those for you.”
She produces an intricate iron key from the tiny pair of shorts she’s wearing and unlocks the shackle. It clicks and pops open.
“Thanks,” I say, rubbing my wrist.
She tucks the key back into her shorts and settles on the edge of the bed. “My name is Mya.”
“Belle.”
“I know. You’re the talk of the club since Beast brought you in.”
“I’m in the clubhouse?”
Everyone in St. Boniface knows about the old ruins perched on the hill overlooking the town. Its where the Knights of St. Boniface motorcycle club live and run the town and surrounding counties. At night, you can look out your window from anywhere in town and see the glowing lights in the looming ruins. The castle is as old as the town. Built by a filthy rich founder back in the seventeenth century, it was abandoned and left to ruin when the Spanish flu swept through the town in the early 1900s and claimed the lives of almost everyone who resided there.
Left to rot and ruin in the rain and sun, the Knights purchased it in a mysterious deal when the club emerged out of the shadows of WWI.
“What happened?” I ask, rubbing my aching jaw. It feels like I was hit in the face by a sledgehammer.
“Beast didn’t say much when he brought you here. But that’s typical of our prez. He doesn’t say a lot.”
I frown, trying to peel back the layers of memory. The last thing I remember is Gaston and his men breaking into my house.
I sit up with a rush.
“Uncle Maurice!” My eyes dart to Mya. “Where is my uncle?”
She looks concerned and fear snowballs in my chest.
“I’m sorry, Belle. You’ll have to speak to Beast about that. He didn’t tell me.”
“Then take me to Beast,” I say, trying to climb off the bed. But a wave of nausea hits me and I have to steady myself against the dizziness that crashes into me.