Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 282(@300wpm)
“Very well,” Moncrieff frowned down at me. “Girl—do you swear that only your own brothers came near you the whole time Don Diego held the three of you captive?”
“Yes, I swear it,” I said and for once I was able to tell the truth. Of course, if my husband-to-be had any idea of how close I’d gotten to Gabriel and Christopher, he would have been outraged. But that was a piece of information I intended to take to my grave.
“All right then,” Moncrieff muttered. “I guess there’s no choice but to believe you.” He pointed one knobby finger at me. “But I swear to you, girl—if I come to take my husbandly rights on our wedding night and you aren’t tight and unused, you’ll be sorry! I know a virgin pussy when I feel one wrapped around my cock—I’ll know then if you’re lying.”
His words made me want to throw up. I supposed I ought to feel grateful that the Alpha, Garen, hadn’t noticed that I wasn’t virgin tight anymore—maybe because he’d been in wolf form and had been more preoccupied with how I smelled than how I looked.
I didn’t say anything to Moncrieff because there was nothing to say. I wasn’t going to protest my innocence any more—it would only make him angrier. He was still staring at me, raking me with his cold blue eyes.
“You’re not even the type of girl I usually like,” he remarked in that loud, rough voice of his. “You looked younger on the computer chat your father set up.”
“I’m eighteen,” I said, unable to keep my mouth shut any longer. “If that’s too old for you, why don’t you send me back home?”
“Mouthy little bitch!” Moncrieff growled. “I can’t do that—a deal in the Were world is final after the goods have exchanged hands. Don’t you know that?”
“I haven’t been in the Were world that long,” I said. “I only found out I had Were blood six or seven months ago.”
“That’s right—your father said your mother had you on blockers to keep your Royal blood hidden.” He eyed me distastefully again, his gaze lingering for a moment on my breasts. “It’s a pity she couldn’t keep you on them,” he remarked. “Maybe then you wouldn’t have grown such huge, unsightly tits.”
I really felt like him criticizing my body was too much. He was a nasty old man with tufts of hair growing out of his ears and nose and he was complaining because my breasts were too big? Give me a break!
Gabriel and Christopher loved my breasts, I couldn’t help thinking, and suddenly my eyes were stinging with tears yet again. I was so tired of crying that night but so many awful things had happened to me that I couldn’t seem to help it.
“Don’t start blubbering, girl!” Moncrieff snapped. “You’ll do, I suppose. But you’d better give me a male heir with Royal Blood!”
Just as if I could choose to get pregnant and also pick the sex of the baby once I did! I said nothing to him—there was nothing to say. But I was already planning to run away from this horrible place.
I had to—if I didn’t, my husband-to-be would kill me on our wedding night once he found out I was no longer the virgin he had paid for.
THIRTY-ONE
But all my planning came to nothing. That was because when I got up the next day and made my way down to breakfast, I saw that there were armed guards everywhere.
I wasn’t sure if this was normal for Moncrieff’s house or if they were just preparing in case Don Diego decided to take revenge for the death of his men and the burning of his cartel’s house, but either way the result was the same—escape was almost impossible.
At least the camera and its footage hadn’t been found. Lupio had probably been killed along with all the other guards and the camera and its incriminating evidence had been burned up inside the house.
That was cold comfort though. I was trapped here with no way to escape and my wedding day loomed closer and closer, like a freight train barreling down on me while I was tied to the tracks.
For a while I held out hope that my stepbrothers might come and try to rescue me. Hadn’t Christopher said they had Claimed me? Hadn’t Gabriel admitted we had formed a kind of bond and there was no going back after what we’d all done together?
But as the days slipped into weeks with no sign of my stepbrothers, I began to give up hope. There was nothing to do all day but sit in the pink and white little girl’s room and read the little girl books and let Crenshella braid my hair.
I asked if I could go for a walk once—hoping against hope that I might see some way to escape—but what I saw only reinforced the idea that there was no getting away. Armed guards were posted all around the perimeter of Moncrieff’s estate and we were out in the country, far from any semblance of civilization.