Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 103878 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 519(@200wpm)___ 416(@250wpm)___ 346(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103878 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 519(@200wpm)___ 416(@250wpm)___ 346(@300wpm)
She shakes her head and pulls away from me. I reach a hand out to steady her when she pushes to her feet, but she flinches. So I let her. I'll give her as much space as I can, as long as she doesn't hurt herself.
“Now, lass, you'll be a bit wobbly on your feet. You need to sit down and listen to me. Alright?” But I don't pursue her. Not yet. There's no need to push her.
Bianca shakes her head and backs toward the door, her beautiful eyes wide and wet, her fair skin even paler in the dim light.
Every muscle in my body screams to close the distance. To cage her against that door with my body. To show her she can't run from me.
But I don't. I force myself to stay still, my hands clenched at my sides, knuckles white. The same hands that have broken bones and ended lives, shaking because I won't let myself touch her. Not yet. Not until she understands.
She's still wearing that gorgeous dress, bridal white and innocent, with an old-fashioned touch of lace at her neckline. I watched her put it on this morning through her bedroom window. I watched her smile at herself in the mirror, like she had something to look forward to.
She has no idea what I saved her from tonight, and it will probably take a while before she learns the truth.
“Bianca.” My voice is quiet but firm. This doesn't come naturally to me. Why does it take so much goddamn effort to be gentle?
Her hand reaches for the doorknob.
“Stop.” It comes out harsher than I intended. Can't fucking help it. Even though I want to be gentle with her, every instinct in me is to grab her. To hold her. To shake her and make her understand that I did this for her own damn good.
“Let me go!”
“Now, lass, I can't do that. If you listen, I can—”
“You're out of your mind. You took me. You drugged me and took me!” Her voice rises, panic threading through each word. “What are you going to do with me?” She chokes on the words. “Please don't hurt me.” Her pleading breaks my heart into little bits.
She thinks I've brought her here to assault her. Of course she does. Why wouldn't she? I'm twice her size and thirteen years older.
“I won't hurt you.” I try again. “Sit.”
“Sit? You kidnapped me. Do you understand that? You'll go to jail for this! You took me.”
I walk slowly closer, keeping my voice low and calm. “I know what I did.”
“Then let me go,” she says, shaking. The desperation in her voice nearly breaks me.
I step toward her. Just one more step, and she flinches as if I raised a hand to her.
Fuck. The sound that escapes my throat is barely human. Like I'd ever hurt her. Like I haven't spent six years keeping every other bastard from so much as breathing wrong in her direction. Like I didn't once break a man's fucking jaw for being rude to her in class.
Probably best she doesn't know that.
Like I haven't spent six years of my life putting everything on the line, making sure no one and nothing else ever could.
“I can't do that.” I stop and force myself to stay still, even though I want to close the distance between us. “Come sit down, Bianca, and we'll talk about this.”
“Talk about this?” Her laugh is brittle, edged with something like hysteria. “You drugged me. You threw me in a car, and you brought me to—” She looks around frantically. “Where even are we?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“Safe.” She's breathing too fast now, her chest rising and falling rapidly beneath that innocent dress. “You think this is safe? You think I feel safe with you?”
She should feel safer with me than anywhere else in the world because there's nowhere she’s safer than with me. But I can't tell her that when she's looking at me like I'm the villain in her fairy tale.
“You'll see,” I say quietly. “Eventually.”
“I have a fiancé,” she says, trying to sound brave, almost defiant. “Marcus is going to find me. He's going to—”
“Marcus Crowning is the reason you're fucking here, and he would do fuck all to save you.”
That stops her. For a second, confusion flickers across her face, chasing away some of the fear. “Are you one of his enemies?” she asks.
“Oh, you could say that.”
She's so fucking beautiful it hurts to look at her. Pale skin, dark hair cascading around her shoulders, red lips parting in shock. How beautiful. A princess in a world full of monsters.
“What do you mean?” she says.
“If you sit down, we'll have a reasonable conversation.”
“No.” She strains against the cuffs, and I see the steel beneath the softness. Good. She'll need that. “Tell me right now. What does Marcus have to do with this?”