Bitter Vows: A Twisted Arranged Marriage Romance (Crimson Falls Duet Book 1)

by Dani René

  “Darius is here, and he needs to be taken care of as soon as possible.”

  Silence greets me. I’m certain Kahn is in shock at my response. If I had to be honest, I am too. Holding someone’s life in your hands is a powerful feeling. Something that takes hold and doesn’t let go. Not easily anyway.

  “I’ll make sure the guys are on the flight.”

  “Thank you.” I hang up before tapping out a message to the pilot. Once my men get here, we can map out a plan. There's a lot to do with only a week to go before the ball and at least a month before my marriage to Scarlett. Especially getting her ready and onboard.

  That’s going to be my toughest challenge yet.

  11

  Scarlett

  When I open my eyes, I shoot up from the comfortable, form-hugging mattress to find I’m no longer bound. Instinctively, I glance at my wrists to find a hint of the bindings that kept me prisoner. I’m not sure how much time has passed. I must’ve been exhausted that I fell asleep while bound to the goddamned bed.

  Lycan Shaw is a monster, but I need answers. I push off the bed, feeling the softness of the carpet underfoot, and for a moment, my toes dig into the thick wool. The curtains hang open, and I notice it’s still dark out. Surely the sun is coming up soon.

  Pacing the room, I stop when I hear a sound outside in the garden a story down, and I notice Lycan stalking from the house toward the property line. The shadow I saw earlier is gone, but it doesn’t make sense that he’s out there when he didn’t want me going home. I wonder if the staff knows I’m missing, or if Gran has called the house and they’ve informed her I’m not there.

  I didn’t see Estelle or Gray when I walked out last night. They must know I’m no longer in the house. The staff must’ve heard me scream. Surely, they’ll come to find me.

  A shot rings in the air, causing me to jump back from the window. I suck in a shocked breath and hold it, listening for more volatile sounds, but silence greets me. I exhale and find my lungs struggle to pull in more air as my heart thumps at my ribs.

  I should’ve run when I could, when he released me, but there’s something about Lycan Shaw that intrigues me. Why would he save me and then keep me prisoner?

  I turn back to the bed to find something lying on the nightstand I didn’t see earlier. Lycan’s earlier words ring in my mind as I pick up the creamy, thick paper folded into a rectangle. “Everything will be answered when you get to your room.” Ripping open the envelope, I pull out the letter that’s been folded three times over. The handwriting is familiar, and I recognize it instantly. It’s my father’s scrawl, signed at the bottom of what looks like a contract.

  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.”

  “I don’t understand. Why not arrest him?” I push to my feet, needing to stand for this, or at least I think I need to be. “Lycan?” Lycan’s steps fall softly on the carpet as he takes two strides toward the window while keeping his back to me. For a moment, he stands there silently, and I wonder if he’ll answer.

  His hand threads through his dark hair, a lock falling into a shimmering eye as he gazes at me over his shoulder. “Your father is a smart man, but I’m smarter. He wanted more than he could hold onto, including your mother. He thought secrets would remain hidden forever, but he fu
cked with the wrong person.”

  My curiosity wins out as he trickles information to me, and I lap it up like a puppy needing sustenance. I take a couple of tentative steps toward him. “What do you mean?”

  “He stole from me,” Lycan says, his profile half shadowed as he regards the window, his focus on the outside instead of me. “And now I’ve taken from him.” That’s when he turns to look at me. His one hand landing on the edge of the wooden vanity, his knuckles turning white, and I wonder briefly if he’s reigning in his desire to be near me.

  “You can’t steal me. This isn’t some archaic eye for an eye belief,” I bite out, forgetting that this man holds all the power. But then again, I have control as well. He can’t do anything to me if I don’t want him to. He wouldn’t force me. He can’t.

  “Those questions racing through your pretty little head right now, they’re pointless,” he tells me in his smooth baritone, a hint of an accent brightening his words, making them seem lyrical. “Because I can do anything I want, to anyone I want, at any time I want.” This time, he turns toward me fully, showing off his height, broadness, and dominance. The control and power that follow him like perfume grip my chest squeeze the breath from my lungs, and I can’t find the response I need and crave.

  “Don’t treat me like a child.”

  He chuckles before stepping away from the soft, silver illumination streaming into the bedroom from the moon outside. “Then don’t act like one,” Lycan counters seriously. He leans against the vanity, and for a moment, I see him as the wolf, but something internally, my gut, tells me he’s not. “I’m not the bad guy here.”

  “You bought me from my father. I think that makes you the asshole.”

  “If you continue to curse like that, I’m going to be forced to take you under hand and show you how naughty girls are treated,” he bites out, those jade orbs flaring with danger as he pins me in place with a stare.

  “Oh?” I challenge. “What? Are you going to spank me, asshole?” I have no clue what I’m doing, why I’m taunting him like this, but a second later, before I have time to apologize, his body is looming over me, his one hand gripping both of mine as he spins us around, shoving me against the smooth wooden surface he was just leaning against. My butt sticks out toward him, which only makes me blush. Thankfully, I’m still wearing shorts, and I’m not naked in front of a man who bought me.

  His hand comes down in a loud, harsh swat against one cheek of my bottom, and then the other. Alternating between the two, he spanks me hard, painfully, causing the sting to trickle its way over my skin.

  Embarrassment floods my mind.

  My cheeks hot and red, and my panties… those are soaked from the assault.

  12

  Lycan

  Her body trembles under my hold. The gentle curves of her frame have my erection thickening with the need to slide into her heat. To hear her cry out. Soft whimpers free themselves from her pouted lips, and I can’t help but smile at her. Our reflection in the mirror shows my dominance, but it’s her submission in this moment that has my cock rock-hard.

  “Are you going to act like a petulant child, or can I release you now?” I ask, trailing my fingertips over her spine, reveling in her reaction to me. A moan of deep pleasure escapes her when I reach the juncture between her thighs. Heat spills easily from the apex of her figure as I taunt her pussy over the thin layers of the soft, cotton shorts that hide what I crave.

  “Please,” Scarlett pleads, but I’m not sure what she’s asking for. More of the same or for me to release her from my hold. “Please, Lycan.”

  Leaning in, I engulf her with my body, keeping her in place, allowing my lips to trail over the shell of her ear before I ask, “What, little red? Tell me what this pretty pussy craves.” The command is gentle, a caress of words along her smooth, porcelain flesh.

  “I… I can’t marry you,” she whimpers as my finger continues to taunt her. “I—I don’t want to be arm candy for an asshole who doesn’t love me.” A tear slips free from her long lashes, and as it trickles down her flushed cheek, I lap it up, tasting the salty emotion as it spills from her eyes.

  “You’re not arm candy,” I tell her because it’s the truth. She’s so much more than that. “If you think for one moment I’m going to let you go, to walk out of my life…” I inhale a deep breath to keep calm. “Then you’re sorely mistaken. You are mine. I own you now, and you will submit to me. Perhaps not tonight, but soon.” I press down on her clit, sending her over the edge, and her keening cry is music to my ears.

  I watch her ride the wave of her release for a long while before I step back, finally releasing her from the confines of my body. Scarlett straightens, her glassy eyes flicking to mine. Heat, confusion, and a hint of anger swirl in her gaze. But the shame that colors her cheeks has me wanting to see more of it in her expression.

  “Why did you do that?” Her words are croaky, her body still shivering from the intensity of what just happened. My cock, on the other hand, feels like steel against my zipper. “Why?”

  “Because I like to make pretty girls cry,” I respond. “And because you are mine. My little red. And nobody is going to take you away from me.”

  She straightens her shoulders, tilting her chin in challenge as her eyes narrow. “What if I want to walk away from you?”

  “Learn about your father’s transgressions before you make your choice. There are always a lesser of two evils in this world.” I shrug, shoving my hands in my pockets before I continue. “And your choice should come from knowing all the information.”

  “Then tell me,” she pleads, tears filling her lashes, threatening to fall. She looks so beautiful on the verge of breaking down, and I want so badly to pin her to the wooden vanity and claim her, mark her as mine.

  “Give me a week,” I request. “Should you feel the need to leave after, I’ll rethink the terms of the contract.”

  Her eyes widen farther, those glossy orbs holding me hostage, and for a moment, I allow her to ponder what I’ve just said. Then she mouths, “A whole week?”

  Nodding slowly, I focus on keeping my expression calm, collected, and not allowing the desire that’s burning its way through every inch of my body to show. She doesn’t need to know I’m on the verge of fucking her until she’s screaming the roof down. “While you’re in my house, you will not touch yourself. Every orgasm you have while you’re here, and trust me, there will be many, are mine to give you. I own you, Scarlett; it’s written on that contract.”

  “You can’t own someone. If I’m not willing to give you something, you can’t take it,” she sasses, crossing her arms, but I don’t miss the tremble in her hands.

  A smirk curls my lips, and I raise a dark brow at her in a challenge. If she thinks I’m a good man who won’t take what I want, then she’s mistaken.

  “Right? You wouldn’t…” Her words filter into nothing, the silence deafening when she realizes I’m no gentleman.

  Taking a step toward her, I notice her attempt at moving away, but she’s now pinned between me and the smooth wood of the vanity. She’s small, only reaching my chest, so she has to tip her head back to look me in the eye.

  There’s a hint of fear, but it’s mingled with curiosity. When I close the distance between my mouth and hers, I notice desire dancing in her eyes, but the moment she blinks, it’s gone.

  “Don’t underestimate me.” I keep my voice calm. My composure is hanging by a thread when her tongue darts out, wetting her plump lips. “When I sign a contract, when I agree to anything, I don’t break that promise. You will say your vows in a month, and when you sign your name, it will be Shaw, not Bardot. On your twenty-first birthday, you will be my wife.”

  Another emotion dances across her expression before she asks, “And if I refuse?”

  “There is no choice in the matter. Whatever you do, wherever you go, you are mine. And I take care of my belongings. Now, I want you to sleep. When the sun has risen on this day, we’ll talk more.” I step
back, needing the space because I’m so close to ripping her clothes off and seeing what I now own. Turning on my heel, I make it to the door before I hear a soft whimper. She’s crying, but tears don’t afford her mercy. They only make my dick hard.

  “Will I ever see my family again?” Her question has me stalling, the door ajar, and my one foot over the threshold. When I glance over my shoulder, I see her, the girl under the strong façade she tries to portray, and it only makes me want her more.

  “We’ll talk in the morning.” I shut the door behind me, knowing that if I were to have stayed in that room for a moment longer, I would’ve taken everything that belongs to me. Twisting the golden key in the lock, I leave her to mull over her situation.

  I have things to do.

  A brother to kill.

  And a priest to call.

  13

  Scarlett

  I spent the night tossing and turning. Dreams of a big bad wolf invaded my mind and took hold of me. All I saw behind my lids was a large predator following me through the woods as I tried to get home.

  At one point, I actually believed I was out in the cold with the enormous gray wolf following me, but when my eyes snap open in shock, I shiver but find myself alone in the immaculate room that Lycan confirmed is mine.

  The rising sun is slowly brightening the deep purple sky beyond the curtains, which in turn illuminates my bedroom. I have to be honest; the bed was comfortable even though I didn’t get a lot of sleep. I’m sure I would have had a great evening if I wasn’t being kept captive in a mansion owned by the man who’s convinced he’s going to marry me.

  My mind still cannot fathom how my father could have signed over my life to someone like this. Did he know Lycan long before he agreed to this preposterous contract? I wonder how long the two men who clearly want to rule my life knew each other before Lycan requested this bullshit. I’m not marrying him. And he doesn’t realize how much I’ll fight back, because if he thinks otherwise, he is misleading himself.