Total pages in book: 164
Estimated words: 156728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 522(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 522(@300wpm)
“Tim—bah—” She gasped.
He shoved her shoulders down and ripped her dress from collar to hem. Cold air covered her back as he shoved down the silk shorts at her hips.
Daisy scrambled for purchase, feet scraping to push up her legs, but he shoved her head down, forcing her cheekbone to smash against the stone.
“Don’t fucking move.”
She disobeyed, curling her shaking finger over her thumb in the sign of the letter T.
Metal clanked. Fabric rasped. Wiry hair grazed her shaking thighs as hard knees punched into her tensed muscles.
“You’re gonna bleed for what you did back there,” he growled, breath hot at her spine. “And I’m going to enjoy it.”
He wrenched her legs apart.
A sob tore loose. “Tim—”
“Shut up.” He drove her forward and shoved a hand between her thighs—claiming space, taking, forcing.
Daisy shrieked and bucked, but his fist cracked into her again—hard, brutal—this time at the back of her head. Stone smashed her face. White light detonated behind her eyes. Pain lanced through her skull, and blood flooded her mouth, copper-thick.
He hitched her hips higher, fingers biting into flesh. Time stuttered—flashing, jerking, skipping—as his weight pinned her down.
“Timber!” The word ripped from her raw throat, metallic and burning like fire.
Pressure surged as greedy, seeking hands burned her tender flesh. Daisy screamed again, body trembling violently as his suffocating weight crushed into—
“Move one more muscle and I’ll fucking kill you.” The words carved the night clean.
Everything froze so fast her stomach lurched.
Hadrian’s weight vanished, yanked back, leaving her fully exposed. Shaking and unstable, she rolled onto her back, arms snapping up to shield her face as jagged breaths ripped out of her.
* * *
Cold air knifed over her skin, rain needling every bare inch.
“Back up.”
Blinking through the rain, she stared at the shadowed figures. Confused and terrified.
Hadrian. And whoever stood beside him. Something glinted at his temple.
A gun.
Hadrian stood rigid with his fingers spread in surrender, hatred burning through his stare, pants half-fallen at his knees. Fury twisted his features.
Violent tremors shook Daisy’s body hard enough to make her teeth clack as she stared in awe at the man holding the gun to Hadrian’s head.
It was him.
The hunter from the balcony. The one she’d danced with earlier. The one who looked at her like something to devour.
He slid his hand into Hadrian’s jacket and withdrew a second handgun. Daisy’s breath hitched, then fell into a whimpering sob.
His eyes cut to her—steady, brutal calm. “You’re safe.”
No, she wasn’t. And his lie stung worse than the rain pelting her skin.
Her body shook in waves of shock as she shivered in the inescapable cold. Her dress lay in a muddied heap at her feet.
Men in black tactical gear swarmed the garden, dark and faceless. They poured out of the hedges, boots chewing up the wet lawn as they closed in.
Too many. One of them lunged toward Daisy, and she screamed and cowered, holding up her hand defensively.
“Don’t touch her,” the hunter in the emerald tux snapped, voice thick with command.
Everything stilled.
Hadrian glared sideways at the other hunter, hands still up. “What the fuck do you think you’re—”
The gun clicked.
“One more word,” the man said quietly, “and your brains are on the lawn.”
He tossed Hadrian’s confiscated handgun to one of the shadowed figures without looking away.
They weren’t hunters. They were something else. Something powerful and terrifying. Above the law. All six of them moved as one body. Synchronized. Elite. Forceful. And armed.
Her throat had closed to a pinhole as her chest caved in, ribs collapsing like wet paper. Too fast. She needed air, but couldn’t draw a full breath. Heart hammering in her skull, she looked up at them, terrified of whatever they planned to do to her.
She couldn’t think. Couldn’t speak. The sky tilted as shadowed faces swam closer, mouths moving, their words drowning under the roar of blood in her ears.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
She couldn’t.
Her fingers clawed at the slick, unmovable rock slab at her back as white noise swallowed her whole and panic pressed down on her chest like a boot.
What happens now? What will they do—
“Put him with the others.” The hunter shoved Hadrian, and three men surged, slamming Hadrian into the wet lawn and cinching zip ties around his wrists and ankles.
He looked at Daisy and holstered his weapon at the small of his back. His stormy eyes glinted with uncontained rage as he took two determined strides toward her.
Her back pressed against the wet stone as she cowered and blocked her face with raised hands. “No!”
He stopped.
Three men in tactical gear hauled Hadrian up and dragged him from the maze, his protests shredding into the rain. Three men remained behind the hunter, their eyes like knives cutting into her.
Daisy shivered, her full body spasming uncontrollably. Hair plastered to her cheeks. Blood seeped from her temple to her eye, a warm contrast slithering down her raw, frozen skin.