Chapter 33
“Ariella”
I feel the sweat trickle down my brow as my chest heaves up and down, ley wind howls outside but inside this rest is like a
furnace
As he thrusts faster and faster into me, my senses are so beyond he that tears start to fill my eyes.
“Fuck! Ariella,” he pants as he continues. “You’re so fucking tigh
“Ah “I moan, barely able to hold on to my breath. “Ah-1 Please
I don’t know how it’s even possible, but he picks up his speed even more.
“Ah-Ibeg. “P-Please..”
“F**k!” he growls, “Say you’re mine!”
I can’t think. My body is no longer mine. My thoughts are no longer mine. My words are no longer mine. I cry obediently. “I’m I’m yours.”
“F**k, Ariella!” He orders. “Come for me! Now!
“Ah-1 cry in pleasure. My eyes roll back as bliss of pleasure beyond what words can describe takes over my body.
He collapses on me, panting but still kissing me. “Goddess, you’re so f**g gorgeous!”
He pulls me into his arms and I roll over to rest my chin on his chest, gazing up at him while tracing circles upon his skin. In this moment, we were just two people, not a king nor a princess. Not a buyer and a breeder.
And right now it remains that way.
“Kiss me,” he orders.
I obey.
I lean up to kiss him, shedding the blanket from my shoulders. I pause when I notice his eyes shift to the brand upon my arm. A strange expression replaces the blissful one he is wearing.
Suddenly, a cold realization settles in.
Is that all I am to him, truly, at the end of all of this? How many times has he said it now? That I belonged to him. He w referring to this brand all that time.
Reality strikes once again and the spell is broken. I quickly cover the mark and sit up, pulling the blanket so that most of my skin is covered
“You shouldn’t be ashamed,” he says firmly, his arms covering me. “You’re mine. There’s nothing you should hide from me.” Ah, that’s right. How can I forget! To him, I’m just a property he owns. The passion fades, and my heart starts to feel cold. “And why shouldn’t ” I shoot back. “It’s only a reminder of what some people think of me, you included. The mark that signifies that I am fit for nothing more than to be a broodmare?”
Ethan just looks at me without saying anything for a moment. I scoff, turning away from him, prying my face out of his
hands.
1/4
Chapter 35
than
How can I be with someone that thinks of me as nothing more an something to far wurde To be bought with my and
marked with iron
“That brand shows you are mine” las voice is icy, his grip on mightens, “It is not a disgrace”
I blow out, exasperated. How can I expect him to understand?
“Tell me something then, I pull away from him and turn my entire hody to face him, wrapping the blanket around me completely, “How serions were you when you proposed the engagement to me in exchange for land
“Deathly serious,” Erhan answers immediately, “I take political negotiations with the utmost seriousness.”
“Then you meant it when you suggested the engagement?”
“I have never been clearer on that point,” Ethan says, his voice firm.
“Then why have you not once mentioned marriage to me in the time that we have spent together?” I point out. “There has been no talk of dates, proceedings or ceremonies, I have only lingered around the halls of your palace”
Ethan looks confused for a moment, his brow furrowed as he stares at me like he’s trying to work something out. “It is about the timing of it all. We will marry when we get married.”
“Then give me a date,” I demand, but Ethan does not respond.
I scoff bitterly. “You never intended to marry me, did you?”
It all became clear now, Ethan is not the type to mince his words Whatever he says, he means literally. “It was only meant to be an engagement… and then you’d just keep me there, as the breeder you see me as.”
Ethan sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “That’s not the case. I already told you we’ll get married. Besides, what is the difference between whether we get married or not? You will be treated like a queen”
I glare at him, his arrogance and insolence souring the sweet moments we shared only an hour ago.
“But I won’t be a queen, will I?”
“You will. It just takes time. Also, it doesn’t really matter what you are, because you’re mine. You will be protected day and night. You will be given everything that your heart desires and more,” he answers after a moment like it’s the simplest thing in the world. “I don’t understand what’s so difficult for you to grasp here.”
My jaw drops open in shock. Did he seriously just speak to me like that? What does he know about what my heart desires? “You’re unbelievable, I huff, turning away from him.
I lay down on my side of the bed, and wrap the blanket all over me, pulling myself out of his grasp.
“Ariella,” Ethan begins, but before he can say another word more and before I can even cut him off, his phone rings, stopping us both.
“Ethan”
My phone rings next to me, and I quickly grab it. Kyle won’t call me unless it’s important. I pick up the call but wait until I’m out of the tent before I answer.
I look at Ariella’s form one more time in the tent, her back turned to me, before I speak into my phone,
“What?!” 1 snarl into the receiver.
Chapter da
This is easily the worst time for him to have called.
“Alpha,” Kyle’s voice drones “Two things; first of all, your guests from Crystal River are becoming restless. They are very anxious to see their sister whom they thought would be here.”
Shit. Tell them to be patient for just a little longer we’ll be hot soon. What is the other thing?”
“It’s about the mole in the Palace. Kyle says hitterly
I grind my teeth. Judging from your tone, I take it it’s not good fews”
“I interrogates all the staff residents at the Palace as you instructed” Kyle says, clearing his voice just as he did. He would have used some more unscrupulous methods, but it is necessary to find a mole. The staff will get over it. “Everyone had an alibi, a solid story that checked them out before and after and the entire time.”
“We need to know who leaked information, not just if they were involved,” I remind him.
Kyle sighs on the other end.
I
“You know that can’t be cleared completely,” he says again. “But am ninety-nine percent sure that they’re not responsible.”
I know you didn’t call me just to tell me you have nothing.” 1 growl at him.
The line is silent for a moment before I hear Kyle take a deep breath.
“We might need to consider another possibility,” Kyle says eventually. “You’re not going to like it but…we have to consider the possibility that C**a might have been involved.”
I don’t answer.
She’s the only one with enough knowledge about the event since she planned it and barely told anyone other than the drivers who only knew that morning, and the one s*** that helped her get ready and brought a dress to Ariella. And me and you
He is making sense. But this is hard to accept.
“I don’t know.” I tell him eventually. “Ca**a is just a child. A delusional, spiteful and selfish child, but she’s not violent of dangerous. I don’t think she could have done that. Even planned it.”
“No,” Kyle says again. “She isn’t violent or dangerous. But she does have dangerous influences in her life, her half-sister Lilith
for one.
I have not spent much time in Lilith’s company, but knowing her reputation she is capable of this kind of brutality.
But would **a have gone along with something like this under the influence of her sister, someone whom she idolizes? Maybe, I have to admit.
If she is guilty, then she will have to be punished. I will have to hand it down.
1 instruct Kyle. “See what you can find. But do not confront her even if you find her to be guilty without a doubt..I need to do that myself”
Lend the call. And then sit down on the nearest rock.
I knew keeping Ariella with me isn’t going to be easy. Putting aside those old f***ts from the council bugging me on a daily basis to get rid of Ariella, the girl just seems to have the ability to attract trouble and danger to her, Marcus, Lilith. And now C**a, too,
A part of me wants to just stay on this Mountain with her.
Chapter 331
I know that’s impossible.-
I sigh and head back into the tent, finding Ariella already asleep,
Tomorrow, this will all end, and we will have to go back to the Pa
But I still have tonight.