Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
“Why? She seems small and biddable enough?”
“She’s got more animal in her than any of us.”
“Not more than me.”
“More than you and then some,” he says, enjoying frustrating me. He is a fool. “Trust me, what emerges from that one when you mate her is not going to be small or biddable. You have in your possession one of the old blood.”
“Old blood?”
“Siberian original,” he says. “She looks like a mutt, but she’s…”
“If you say another word, I will rip your throat out.”
“You are from slower, warmer climes, Mr. de Lune. And yes, you have your reputation for aggression and passion, but believe me, that female you have tucked up in your vehicle is going to make you regret the moment you ever laid eyes on her.”
He pauses, as if he knows he should not say what he is about to say, but men like him always talk. It would kill them to know that there was a parting shot they could have taken and yet did not.
“Your impatience may very well prove to be your undoing. You should have waited for another auction to run. We have many sweet, pretty young orphans, mothers and fathers destroyed in various tragic ways. You have paid the most for the worst, and, sir…”
He pauses dramatically.
“There will be no returns.”
I turn and I get in the car.
My mate is cowering in the far corner, feral and terrified. I wish I could offer her some comfort, but thanks to that asshole’s crude comments, she is now very aware I could be the worst-case scenario she feared.
I can still smell her arousal, but it is mixed with anguish, and it turns my stomach.
She is my mate. She should not fear me. Ever.
She asked me to save the others, but it is not possible. None of the girls will escape what fate has in store for them tonight. None of us ever really escape our fate.
I let her have her moment. Her fear won’t be assuaged by words. It will be tempered by actions. I am not going to hurt her. I will not hurt her.
“Come here,” I say, reaching for her neck. “Let me get that cheap silver thing off you.”
She allows me to remove it. I open the window and toss it out, hoping that the gesture of freedom will help her feel better about her predicament. I am, in some respects, a hypocrite. I am not here to set her free. Not entirely. I am here to claim her in a new way, one that will see her made into a creature she does not know exists inside her as yet.
“Let’s go,” I tell the driver. “To the station, quick as possible.”
“Yes, Maître,” he responds, sending the car into the night, away from the scene of all these crimes.
I cannot take my eyes off my mate. She is the most beautiful creature in the world. Every line of her face, every curve of her body, every breath she takes enchants me.
The dress they put her in—I have the sense she would not have chosen such a thing for herself—is too short. Not in an alluring way, simply in a way it was clearly cut for a shorter woman. The waist is too high, the hem too short and tattered. There are scratches along her legs.
“What happened to your legs?”
“I tried to run,” she said. “Before it happened. I got caught in the brambles. My mistake. I should have gone through the river. They wouldn’t have been able to scent me then.”
“You knew there was an auction?”
“They tell us it is a ball. They tell us we will meet handsome suitors, maybe the loves of our lives. But we’re really just slaves.”
“You’re not going to be my slave.”
“You bought me, beat me, and are taking me…”
“Home. I am taking you home.”
She gives me a dark look.
“How did you know about the auction?” I ask her. “The others didn’t know?”
“I was in trouble again,” she says. “They sent me to see the director. He wasn’t there, so I was in the director’s office. I started looking around and I found the files. I tried to tell the others, but they didn’t believe me. They never listened to me. Not since they put me on the pills.”
“The pills?”
She falls silent, and the fact that we are two strangers who do not know anything about each other begins to assert itself in the rear of my car.
I am discovering a lot about her with these questions. I know she is independent, rebellious, smart. I know she does not play by the rules or respect authority. I know she is prepared to suffer for freedom. I know she is a wild thing yet to be unleashed.
“What else do you know?”
She shrugs. It could be that she doesn’t want to overplay her hand, but I don’t think so.