The Virgin and the Beast (Stud Ranch 1)

Dad loved her so much, though, he never saw her for the user that she was. It was somewhat taboo, marrying outside his wealthy WASP circles. Maybe it was love between them at first, I don’t know. He met her when she was waitressing at a bar near Harvard. My grandparents never accepted her—some intruder in their lives from south of the border—but Dad loved her beyond all reason. To him, she would always just be the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in his life, who for a time had chosen him. Even after she left him and went on to become a richer man’s trophy wife. Then she died in a car wreck and became forever enshrined in his memory.

She had that way about her, though. A way of making people love her. The only other person who saw her for the narcissistic, spoiled woman that she was was her older sister Mariana. Not as pretty as my mother, Mariana is still an attractive woman living in Mexico. I was able to visit her a couple of years ago. It was such a relief to finally be able to talk about the real woman I’d known my mother to be. Like I could finally be sure I wasn’t just making it all up in my head. But no, that was how Mariana remembered her, too. She was a kind, calm woman with a passel of children who all seemed to adore her.

It was already too late for me, though. I was the spitting image of my mother, if a shade lighter in skin tone and with a short bob instead of her long hair that she always paid such meticulous care to. And I’d also inherited her aversion to children.

My college friends had babies and I’d visit them from time to time. I felt nothing. No biological ticking clock. No yearning to hold the babies. They screamed a lot and it always got on my nerves.

So, while I might be my mother’s daughter, I always swore I wouldn’t make her mistake. I’d never have kids. Not something I thought too much about because, well, at least until several days ago—virgin.

But now I have to have this stranger’s baby.

Well, fine. Women are surrogates for people all the time. That’s all this is. I have no motherly instincts, obviously. I can barely handle thinking the word baby much less saying it out loud. So yes, I’m just the surrogate for Xavier’s baby. It doesn’t make a difference that the egg making up half the baby happens to be mine. Women also donate their eggs all the time. So what if I’m doing both parts, the donating and the surrogating?

It’s no big deal. At the end of this year, Dad will be safe forever. He’s already starting his new life in whatever island paradise Xavier’s settled him. Yes, he’s upset right now because he doesn’t know what’s happening to me but Xavier said he’d send pictures letting him know I’m okay… I look around me. Well, God, so at this particular moment, I’m not awesome but I’m going to fix all of it.

Just a year of pretending and then I’ll find a way to start over, too.

I can legally change my name.

Move out of New York and go somewhere no one knows me. Maybe Chicago. There are some great ad firms there. I’ll have to start from scratch and yeah, it’ll take a lot of work. But I’m stubborn and—

My stomach cramps with hunger.

Right. I’ve got more immediate problems.

If Xavier keeps to the same schedule he did the other days, he shouldn’t have gone in for dinner yet. Whether he’ll hear me is another matter. I open my mouth and yell at the top of my lungs. “Master? Master! May I please have dinner?” Maybe he has a camera on me out here, too?

The sun is dropping near the horizon even though it’s probably another hour before sunset. But I suddenly can’t wait another second.

And lucky me, Xavier comes ambling around the house toward me just a few minutes later. He’s in his work gear, giant hat and all, like I caught him mid-cowboying. What the hell does a cowboy do all day anyway, other than, I don’t know, feed animals?

Internally I roll my eyes. Right now, the only animal I care about him feeding is me.

He doesn’t seem surprised that I’m finally giving in. His expression is the same calm, placid one he usually has. Like this is all business as usual.

God, has he done this sort of thing before? The thought makes my stomach sour. But no, he obviously hasn’t done exactly this thing before, because there aren’t any kids running around the place. Then heat flushes my neck—what, am I weirdly excited to be special in this fucked-up dude’s world? I shake my head at myself.

The chain-link door swings open and he steps in, gaze zeroed in on my soggy form.

I want to snap out something snarky like, enjoying the view? But instead, I bite my tongue and lower my lashes. “May I have dinner, Master?” Ugh, the words feel like acid on my tongue, but I manage not to gag on them. Barely.

I keep my gaze averted, but it’s difficult, especially when Xavier doesn’t say anything in return. After what feels like an endless silence I finally hear his heavy steps coming toward me over the soggy hay.

His large hand drops underneath my chin and he lifts my face up toward his. He searches my eyes. “You’ll accept food from my hand like a good pet?”

Don’t react, don’t react, don’t react.

I nod and apparently do a good enough job of not showing that what I really feel like doing is punching him in the balls. The hand underneath my chin pushes a lock of hair behind my ear. He continues to caress around the back of my neck where he squeezes in a gentle massage. Then he pulls me in against his chest, continuing to rub my back in soothing circles.

“Good girl,” he murmurs. “Shh, that’s my good girl.”

And absurdly, the gentle touch after the uncomfortable, stressful, and occasionally terrifying days outside makes me want to cry and cling to him.

The fact that his warm body feels like safety is super screwed up. I know that, logically.

My body on the other hand? God, all I want to do is curl up against him.

This is how Stolkholm syndrome starts screams some rational part of my brain.