Bitter Vows (Crimson Falls 1)

I scan the pages of the terms and conditions. Every word, each sentence, sends ice through my veins. My father signed my life, my hand in marriage, over to Lycan Shaw. There’s no reasoning behind it, just that he thinks it’s better for me in the long run. The words safe and secure are underlined a few times in thick black ink.

I read it and reread it, but nothing makes sense.

Dad wants me to marry a man who’s possibly twice my age. Someone I have only ever met once at dinner a few nights ago—a man who stole me from the forest and brought me to a gilded prison.

When I glance up at the room once more, I take in each detail, every corner, each item. Every inch of this bedroom has been created especially for me, from the mirror with the carving of Little Red Riding Hood and the wolf, to the bedding that is in my favorite color.

The door flies open, and standing on the threshold is the man who bought me from my father. His expression is calm, but his tense posture has the hair on the back of my neck prickling.

“What is this?” I ask him, throwing the contract onto the bed before making my way toward him. Anger surges through me as his mouth tips slightly. “I asked you a fucking question, Mr. Shaw,” I mutter, spitting his name with as much venom as I can conjure. “I’m not a fucking possession you can barter with like that. I’m a woman, a person. What kind of man buys a woman from her father?”

He doesn’t react; he merely watches me, intrigue dancing in his gaze. His nonreaction only sends my rage into a spiral. My gut twists as he regards me with cold indifference, the smirk on his handsome face turning upward.

“Talk to me!” My fists pound against his chest, but I only get one hit in before his hands grip my wrists. A deep rumble vibrates through his chest as he pushes me back until my ass hits the edge of the mattress.

Lycan leans in, his tall frame cocooning me as he stops inches from where I’m bending backward painfully. I know if I were to lean back further, I’d end up pinned between him and the mattress where I slept last night, my hands still in his hold as he pushes them to my sides. He takes this opportunity to kick my feet apart before stepping in between my legs, causing me to tumble onto the soft comforter. The hardness of his desire presses against my core, forcing heat to sizzle between my legs at the contact.

“If you ever lift your hands at me again,” he speaks, calm, clear, and threatening, “I will bend you over and whip you with my belt until you’re bleeding all over my pristine carpets. Am I understood?”

There’s not a hint of anger in his voice, but his eyes, they’re expressive, burning like open flames as they pierce me. The depths steal me into their darkness the closer he gets. His lips brush along mine, and as angry as I am at him, I can’t deny my body trembles under his.

The power he exudes sends heat blazing to my cheeks, and my stomach tumbles and twists with a need for him to move, for him to press harder against my center.

What the fuck is wrong with you, Scarlett?

I hiss when he tightens his hold on my wrists, the harshness of his fingers pressing hard against my smooth skin, and I’m sure there’ll be bruises, not from the bindings, but from his touch.

“Get the fuck off me.” My words are meant to sting, but instead, Lycan chuckles at my outburst. “I’m serious.” He doesn’t move, and even though my rage is burning a blaze through me, I can’t stop my body from responding to him.

“So am I.” There is no doubt in my mind that he will whip me, and he will enjoy every moment of my torture. He pushes away from me, and an unwarranted whimper of agony escapes my lips. “Are you hungry?”

“What?” The query pops out of my mouth with shock drenching the word. My mouth gapes at him, my eyes wide, confusion settling in my chest.

“I don’t like repeating myself,” he throws back easily, his grin making him seem younger than what I can only guess is about forty years.

“No. I’m not. I want answers.” I don’t want to sound like a petulant child, but I know I do. I can hear it in my voice. It annoys me that he does this to me. I’m not this girl. One who acts like an immature teenager, but something about Lycan Shaw makes me feel young.

Lycan stays silent for a long while before he sighs. “Your father fucked up,” he speaks, turning his back on me as he moves to the vanity. His fingers trail over the smooth surface before he glances at the window as if seeing something in the murkiness outside. “He did things that were…” He pauses for a long moment, and my mind whirs with something Dad would’ve done, and I want to scream. “Illegal.” He doesn’t look at me as he tells me this, and I wonder what my father could’ve done that was so bad. He’s always been a good man. At least to me, he’s been a good father. “He has secrets only I know, and that’s why he’ll repay me with your hand.”