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)
Beast doesn’t move. Doesn’t show any compassion. Instead, he charges forward with laying down the law.
His law.
“You will be my wife.” He says it so matter-of-factly at first I think I misheard him.
“Excuse me?”
“You will be my wife.”
His words sink in, and my mouth drops open.
“I will not,” I finally snap.
But he ignores me.
“You will be my wife. In return, the debt will be repaid and you will want for nothing. You can spend your days how you please. But at night, you will return to my room and sleep there.” His dark eyes find mine. “With me.”
I stare at him. Absolutely dumbfounded.
“Are you insane?” I feel like I’m stuck in a weird dream and any minute I’m going to wake up in my bed back at the little house on Le Prince Street and realize I’m late for work. “You must be crazy if you think I’ll do any of that. You’re barking up the wrong tree, mister. I’m not doing shit around here. I won’t marry you. And I most certainly won’t be sleeping next to you. What is this, the middle ages? I know we’re in a castle and everything is all very medievalish, but this is the twenty-first century, and I am not doing one more thing until I know where my uncle is, got it?”
I cross my arms to drive home the point.
Beast barely contains his patience. His big hands flex open and closed at his sides, like he’s just restraining himself from locking those big fingers around my throat and throttling me. Or at the very least, smothering his palm across my face so I stop talking.
A shiver trickles down my spine. This man could crush me like a pea with one swing of his fist.
“Look around you, does it look like you have a choice?” He leans closer. “You have nowhere to run, little one.”
I glance around. He’s right. My options are very limited. But it doesn’t mean I won’t try to fight my way out of this. My feet move without me even thinking about trying to escape. One minute I’m standing there, the next I’m running for the door
Unfortunately, Beast reaches it before me and with a growl, he lifts me up and throws me over his shoulder and stomps out of the room. His boots are heavy against the stone floor as he carries me down a long hallway and across a vast cobblestone foyer leading to a winding stone staircase.
“Put me down!” My voice echoes through the cavernous chambers leading off the foyer. “Put me down now!”
But Beast ignores me and keeps stomping up the stairs.
“Goddamn you!” I yell. “Somebody help me…please.”
But there is nobody around to help me. Or if there is, they’re not brave enough to stop this from happening.
At the top of the sweeping staircase, he turns right and walks a few more yards before he stops in front of a large wooden door. He opens it and steps us inside, before kicking the door closed behind him.
He puts me down, and my instincts take over. I kick him in the shin but he barely reacts. So I shove him in the chest and start beating him with my fists. Almost effortlessly, he holds me at arm’s length until I calm down.
“You need to understand what is happening,” he says, his voice deep and low. “Your uncle owes me and my club a great deal of money.”
I attempt to make another break for it. But he’s too quick for me and catches me around the waist. His arm is impossibly strong and thick with muscle, his body a solid wall against me. I am no match for his strength. He lifts me up and hauls me across the room toward the bed.
“Fighting me will only make this worse…for you.”
I kick and I scream, but he effortlessly controls me as if I am nothing more than a tiny mouse.
“Not to mention an exhausting exercise for the both of us,” he growls.
He throws me onto the ginormous four-post bed, his muscular body covering mine as he ties my wrists to the bedhead with the golden rope from the curtains. My pulse rages in my neck. The heat in his eyes sears my skin like a burning, hot caress.
“Let me go, you psychopath.” I grit my teeth and tug on the ties binding me. “Untie me or I swear to God—"
“Or what?” He hovers above me, pushed up on his big arms, his long hair caressing my skin as he stares down at me. His gaze skims over the small rose tattoo on the inside of my wrist and amusement tugs at his full lips. “Tell me, little one, what terrible fate awaits me?”
My heart pounding, I look up at him. “What are you going to do to me?”
When he doesn’t answer, my anger bubbles to the surface.