Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 60965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 305(@200wpm)___ 244(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 305(@200wpm)___ 244(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
He won’t look at me; he merely stares at the ground in complete silence. All the while I’m shattered, and with every minute that passes I feel the broken pieces more and more.
My body is restless and my eyes burn with a desperate need to cry, but I have nothing left.
I try to scoot my exhausted body up the bed to soothe my sore arms, but the rope tied around my wrists tightens with the sudden pull, chafing me. I wince and suck in a breath through clenched teeth; my shoulders are screaming in pain.
Hours have passed since I found out the truth. Hours spent restrained to this bed. When I wouldn’t stop screaming and fighting him, clawing at him and trying to escape his strong grip, he tied me up.
It’s been only minutes since he’s come back into the room, though. Minutes since he’s opened that door and let his eyes rest on me. I’m pathetic, weak and completely at his mercy. Captive to a man I loved who hid a secret so dark and corrupt it’s ruined me. I’ll never be the same. There’s no way to recover.
Ticktock. Ticktock.
It’s only been minutes since he lowered himself into the chair without speaking a word to me, I remind myself. He sits in a chair I brought from my home to his. A chair I’d cried countless tears in after my husband died.
And yet he says nothing. It’s the silence that kills me.
“I hate you.” The words slowly scrape their way up my sore throat. They’re barely audible, since my voice is so raspy and weak from all the screaming.
He slowly lifts his head, his corded muscles rippling. For the first time since I’ve been with Mason, after months spent falling in love with him, I feel real agony. The small involuntary shudder my body makes proves there’s a bit of fear present too.
The sharp lines of his jaw look more intense in the dim light, the shadows only making them seem more severe. His steel gray eyes are like daggers as he captures my gaze.
I can’t breathe; I can’t look away. I hate him for what he did then and I hate him for how he’s making me feel now.
“You don’t,” he says and his voice is rough and deep. He sounds stronger than before. But it’s a lie. All lies.
I do. I hate him more than I could ever express.
Finally, I gasp for air rather than crying any more tears, breaking his gaze to stare up at the ceiling. Even that minor movement makes the raw wounds at my wrists hurt. I try to hide it, though.
I gave this man everything. How could I have been so foolish? “I hate you more than you’ll ever know,” I murmur to the ceiling in an eerily calm voice although my heart is anything but.
The creaking of the floorboards grabs my attention, and my gaze whips to Mason as he stands. Goosebumps spread slowly over every inch of my skin as he rises.
His muscular frame seems so much larger in this moment, and a hint of a lethal concoction gives a low stir in the pit of my stomach. He’s always been dominating and intimidating, but this is something darker… something more.
I have nothing to protect me, not even a sheet. He stripped the linens off the bed before tying me up and I was left in only the underwear and baggy, thin cotton T-shirt I slipped on this morning. The chill is getting to me.
The bed dips and groans as he places a knee on it only inches away from me. I would struggle to pull away, but I’m stuck here. Both of us know that.
“I love you, Jules,” he murmurs and his words are a mix of strangled pain and determination. He’s a broken man with a tortured soul.
I don’t know how I could possibly look at a man who’s done this to me and feel any kind of sorrow for him, but I do.
I’ve met men before who’ve been wound tight, waiting to go off like a bomb. They were always constantly on edge and ready for a fight at a moment’s notice. Mason’s not like that. Instead he’s like thread loosely wrapped around a spindle, nothing but a mess of tangles. It’s not soft string; this thread’s sharp to the touch and there’s no hope at unraveling it without cutting yourself.
I never knew how deeply he’d wounded me. I had no idea that while I was busy mending myself and leaning on him for support, he was watching me bleed out, saying nothing. The closer he got, the deeper the inevitable betrayal, but that didn’t stop him. He had so many chances to tell me what he’d done.
I let my head drop to look him in the eyes. It makes my heart swell with an unbearable pain to have him so close to me. To see how injured he is, but knowing it’s nothing compared to what he’s done to me.