Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 97557 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 488(@200wpm)___ 390(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97557 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 488(@200wpm)___ 390(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
I glare at Aries. What the fuck? In order to annul a marriage we’d both have to agree to divorce, and there’s no way in hell that’s happening. Aries merely shrugs his shoulders at my icy glare.
Elyse looks between us, her eyes growing heavier by the second.
I pull out my phone and text the doctor to meet at my house. No way in hell am I dealing with Aries and then Drew once he returns to the Mill.
"Damnit, would you just sign the fucking paper so I can get you to the doctor. There’s no choice for you to make. Marry me, and you become untouchable; don’t and your father kills you, slowly but surely wearing you down, one brutality after the next.”
It might seem as though I’m giving her a choice but I’m not. I will forge her name on the dotted line if she refuses. I won’t let her fall into her father’s clutches to be used as a pawn on his chess board. I failed her once before, but I won’t again. Nothing will stand in the way of her safety, not even herself.
Her glazed gaze pierces me, and I can see how helpless she feels in making this decision.
To her, she’s lost it all. This is the end.
What she doesn’t know is all she has to do is turn the page, and a new chapter starts. No longer will she hide behind me. Elyse is a queen, and she deserves to stand at my side, not hide in the shadows.
Even after one night together I knew what I wanted, and what would come. I had planned to charm her into submission, not force her, but time ran out. I can’t say I’m completely unhappy with the situation. Taking her as a wife will not be a regret. It’s more the effect it will have on her that concerns me.
Pushing herself up into a sitting position, Elyse reaches for the pen. I try to help her up, but she brushes my hands away. Taking the pen between her fingers, she signs her name across the line, her hand shaking.
It’s terrible, and it’s fucked up.
I know this, but I can’t help but smile with the knowledge she is mine. Forever and always. Mrs. Arturo.
Reaching for her, I smile, “It’s time to go home, wife.”
CHAPTER 7
ELYSE
Ascream rips me from my sleep like no alarm clock ever could. It takes me a minute to realize the awful, anguish filled sound is coming from me. I’m pulled deep into the cavern of emotions as I slowly recall the last twenty four hours in my mind.
The Hunt. Sebastian. Yanov.
A pair of soft hands come to rest against my shoulders, and I can’t tell if the touch is real or my imagination. It doesn’t matter. I shake them off, because the only thing that matters is getting away. From Yanov, Sebastian, my father. Everyone and everything.
I thrash against the person trying to keep me in place, but no amount of thrashing or fighting makes them let go.
After a moment I blink my eyes open, and it becomes clear this wasn’t a nightmare. No, this is reality. The hands on me remain soft, but clasp hard like steel to keep me in place.
"You're going to feel pretty foolish, young lady, once you wake fully," A gentle, soothing voice says.
I blink a few times, trying to place the voice, the soft tone.
"Who...what? Who are you?" I stop struggling for a second.
The man is tall, with shaggy, unkempt hair threaded with gray and glasses almost hanging off the end of his nose. "You've met me before, Elyse. Do you remember?"
There's something clinical, something purposeful about the way he asked the questions.
"Remember?" I think back and then immediately regret it as my head aches, and all I have are blank spaces intermixed with dreams and nightmares.
I fall against the pillow and breathe.
"A little nausea?" the man asks, but he's already adding something to a fluid bag hanging over my head. A bag hanging off the banister of a big, cushy bed.
It takes a second, but more filters in. This is Sebastian's bed. The place I walked away from, and now nothing will be the same again.
Why couldn't I have stayed in bed? None of this...
More comes back to me, Sebastian shooting his grandfather… Was that a dream?... No, a memory. Yanov and his hands on my skin, then his blood. I cover my mouth to stifle a sob. Yanov. I killed him. How? How could I have killed him? Me. I'm not Sebastian. I'm not a killer.
The man comes around and tugs on my hand, and I spot the IV sticking out the top of it. "Just keep this down please, so we can continue to give you the fluids you need."
His voice hits something inside me and I remember. The man who helped me after I was shot, the doctor who came to check on me multiple times while I was recovering.