Page 2

Beth

Six Months Ago

“ Y ou'll marry my business partner, Bradley, in six months,” my father said from where he sat at his antique mahogany desk that had belonged to his great-grandfather. He didn’t even look up from the papers arranged neatly on the gleaming surface in front of him as he made the pronouncement.

He said the words as if this was just another business transaction, another deal signed in ink rather than carved into my flesh and bone.

Ringing filled my ears. “Excuse me? Did you say marry ?” I could barely scrape the word up my throat.

The grandfather clock standing in the corner of his study ticked out a steady, suffocating rhythm as I sat in the chair he'd pointed to when I arrived, trying not to snarl my hands on my lap.

Birds chirped in the gardens beyond the open windows overlooking the sea, and staff members moved through the halls, talking in muted voices.

All normal things in this household. But I felt like the last echoes of my life were raking paths across my skin.

He hadn’t looked at me once since summoning me to this room, not even when he made his stunning statement.

“Don’t be shocked.” His cold gaze finally shifted to me before returning to his papers. “You’re twenty-seven. It’s past time you married. It’s a fine match. Bradley’s a successful man with wealth and considerable influence. He’s been a colleague for many years.”

His silver hair shouted that out. Not that I cared about the age difference. I barely knew him. I certainly didn’t want to marry him.

My father droned on. “He’s agreed to take you as his wife, despite your shortcomings. He’s made me a generous offer, really. Quite lucrative.”

He was selling me to Bradley?

My belly pitched. I knew Bradley—vaguely. He’d come for dinners, sitting at my father’s right while I sat silent, forgotten, at the other end of the long dining room table. He never spoke to me. He never looked at me. Yet he must've, right?

As if on cue, Bradley opened the study door and strolled inside, dressed in a black suit with a red tie that should brighten his appearance. Instead, it reminded me of blood. My virgin blood this man would spill on our marriage bed.

He strolled right over and squatted onto his heels in front of me, separating my clenched hands on my lap and lightly holding them. Squeezing them. Looking into my eyes with a touch of a sneer in his own. His smile came out polite, though slick. “Elizabeth.”

No one ever called me that.

His graying hair had been slicked back with too much gel, and his sharp brown eyes glimmered with something cold and hungry. “Fiancée,” he said with grim satisfaction in his voice. “Soon you'll be my wife. All mine to do with as I please.”

A possession then, passed from my father's hands to this man's.

“You’ll be well cared for, Elizabeth,” he said with a toothy smile. “In time, you’ll see how lucky you are.”

I didn't feel lucky. I felt trapped. “I—I don’t want to marry you.”

Bradley's sneer deepened, and his low voice came out in a growl. “I don't care.”

My father’s hand slammed onto the smooth surface of the desk, the bang making me flinch. “You’ll do this, daughter. Or else.”

Or else he'd lock me up in the dark room in the basement, something he'd done when I'd run away at fifteen.

He caught me too fast. Penned me. After three days, he'd allowed me water and food.

And after a month, he'd let me back out with a stern warning.

In the twelve years since, I hadn't tried to run again .

Now I felt desperate to flee. But I was trapped once more with no hope of ever escaping the latest version of that dark room.

My shoulders curled forward and it was all I could do not to cry.

“This family has given you everything,” Father said, his voice edged with iron. “You will do this for us in exchange. That’s the end of it.”

The final weight dropped into place, shackling me to his will like every other moment of my life.

Bradley stood, brushing nonexistent dust off the shoulder of his crisp suit.

My father rose as well and strode to the door. “I'll leave you two alone to celebrate the wonderful news.” The door snicked closed behind him.

“Come.” Oh, how suave Bradley sounded as he took my hand and forced me to stand. “Let’s get to know each other better.”

I let him lead me through the double French doors and out into the pretty garden. Over to an iron bench where he made me sit close enough beside him our legs brushed together. My throat burned. My spine twitched.

Did I dare leap up and run into the sea? I could swim forever. Find a deserted island and hide in a shack I’d build myself. Fish and hunt and survive. Anything would be better than marrying Bradley.

His hands snapped out, gripping my waist, dragging me back from my island dream. He turned me on the bench to face him before leaning toward me, pressing me against the hard metal armrest, crowding too close, boxing me in with his hands braced on either side of my shoulders.

I gasped but couldn’t break free. It was all I could do to breathe.

“You will be quiet. You will be obedient. And you will deliver me two children,” he said, his breath hot and sour on my cheek. “That’s what I require. That’s what you’ll give.”

Give implied consent, but there’d be no consent in this “agreement”.

My belly gnawed on my spine, and my skin crawled, but I didn’t dare say a thing.

“I know you understand.” His eyes darkened. “Be ready when the time comes, darling .”

Backing away, he rose and strolled toward the study as if nothing had happened.

I remained on the bench, shaking, my fingers pressed to the pulse fluttering frantically in my throat.

I had six months to find a way out of a gilded prison.

Present Day

The snug dress dug into my ribs, making every breath a struggle. That was the point, I guessed. I’d been bought for my appearance—and the wealth my father would bestow on my “doting” husband as soon as the paperwork was signed.

Who needed to breathe when my sole role in life was to marry a man I barely knew and deliver his children? I didn't want to think too hard about what that entailed.

My reflection in the vanity mirror looked odd. Painted lips, black-lined eyes, skin covered with a fake tan and equally fake blush to make me look perfect. Or like a doll. A body that would be displayed rather than lived in.

The women my father hired bustled around me, adjusting, pinning, smoothing my dress as if I wasn’t even inside it.

I didn't have any real bridesmaids. Growing up, I hadn't been allowed to have many friends, so who would I ask?

These had been hired, which, I supposed, made them a bit like me.

They were hired to give me the shine my father and Bradley demanded, like I had been hired to say I do.

I didn't want to say yes, though. But I feared announcing that at the altar would not go well, particularly for me.

Their voices blurred together, but I caught the words radiant and perfect and incredibly lucky more than once, and maybe they'd been paid to say that too.

Not once had they asked if I wanted this.

Why would they? Bradley was attractive enough.

Exceedingly wealthy. Most people wouldn't see beyond that.

“Almost finished,” one of them chirped, giving the bow on the back of my gown a final touch. “You're going to be so happy, dear. He's a fine match.”

A fine match. That’s what my father had said. That’s what they all believed. Because wealth solved everything, right ?

The bracelet on my wrist felt hot, pressing into my skin. I’d worn it for months, ever since I met him , a reminder of the day everything shifted. Two months, and I still felt the memory of his touch. An orc working in this town, and I didn’t even know his name.

“Elizabeth?” Another woman cleared her throat. “You’re not listening.”

“Because my name is Beth.”

They blinked as one before nodding.

I lifted my chin, my polite mask remaining in place. “I need to use the restroom.”

They exchanged glances, and one sighed, flicking her hand toward the door in the back of the cozy room. “Don’t take too long.”

The moment I stepped into the bathroom, the pressure of the walls surrounding me eased.

Only here could I be myself, assuming there was a me buried inside the facade I'd perfected before I turned six.

The window on the back wall barely let in light, but it was enough that I didn't need to flick the switch. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see my painted mask again anyway.

I twisted my bracelet, over and over again until a feeling of calm settled over my bones. I wasn’t sure why I continued to wear it, but I refused to take it off.

Grabbing the small bag I'd left here earlier, I released my first true smile of the day. Just a few things, dear, I'd told Bradley when he asked why I needed a bag. Nothing for you to be concerned about.

Money. I hadn't mentioned that, though there wasn't much, just the few hundred I'd managed to siphon off my father over the past three years.

A pretty nightie. That hurt to say to Bradley.

Comfortable, though appropriate, shoes.

Thankfully, he hadn’t checked.

In reality, I'd stuffed in two pairs of yoga pants and three t-shirts, plus normal underwear.

Identification, and a credit card with a too-low limit, though I doubt I'd be able to use it.

My flip flops. I'd worn them to the barn earlier despite his scowl of disapproval, feeling a wild thrill inside me while I did it.

A small rebellion on my part, but a real one all the same.

With the bag looped over my shoulder, I steeled myself. Then I carefully lifted the window with both hands.

No thinking. Just move.

The sill dug into my belly as I hoisted myself over. My dress caught, and for a wild second, I thought I was trapped, stuck half-in and half-out of the frame. But with a rip, the fabric tore, and I tumbled outside.

The packed dirt along the side of the barn slammed into my chest, and I rolled onto my back. For one amazing moment, I lay there, staring up at the endless sky.

My laugh burst out, a short, breathless thing that came more from shock than anything else.

I did it.

Scrambling up, I grabbed my bag and tore off the ridiculous heels. The warm earth felt amazing under my toes. Wonder surged through my chest .

Since I was running, I donned my flip flops.

With my bag swung over my shoulder, the silly shoes inside to avoid leaving evidence of the crime, I peered around.

A path meandered alongside the barn, heading toward the back of the structure.

To my right lay Main Street where people might see me. The left led to darkness.

I chose the darkness.

My pulse thumping hard in my throat, I bunched up my gown and ran. My flip flops kicked up dirt. The tightness in my ribs didn't matter anymore. I was free, free, free.

I didn’t stop until I’d rounded the end of the barn and streaked across the open area beyond. I found shelter behind a neat row of stagecoaches. Pressing my back against the wooden frame of the one on the end, I dragged in quick breaths, forcing my mind to catch up with my body.

The one good memory from my past flickered through my mind. My first visit here, for a tour of the facilities and to finalize the papers to host our wedding. That day, everything changed.

The orc had been standing near the barn, his green skin catching the afternoon sun, his broad chest bare other than a thick leather strap crossing over it. He was taller than any man I’d seen, more muscular, and almost overwhelming in a tingling way.

When I stumbled, my hand brushing his arm, and my world had tilted.

The oddest feeling had pulsed between us, like an invisible band pulling tight. His dark eyes had locked onto mine, and the air around us seemed to go silent. Even now, I swore the humming beneath my skin I'd felt from the intense way he'd stared down at me then floated through me even now.

In a flash, it was over. Bradley huffed inside the barn. I looked up at the orc one more time, taking in his handsome, rugged features, then stepped inside to join Bradley, pretending nothing had happened.

But everything had , and I’d worn the wide gold bracelet over the area his fingers had touched ever since.

I clutched the bracelet now, my belly on fire.

Did he remember me? Would he recognize me if he saw me now?

I doubted he even knew who I was. Maybe he'd returned to the orc kingdom like many of the orcs that came to the surface a few years ago.

Some had remained after treaties were formed.

Some had even taken jobs and married humans.

But others missed the life they'd had in the caverns far below the ground, where the sun didn't shine, insects lit up the cavern ceilings like stars, and life must be simpler than it was up here.

Shouts echoed around me.

“She’s gone,” someone bellowed from the barn. My chest collapsed. Not just someone. Bradley.

Footsteps pounded on the dirt, moving fast and in all directions.

Panic roared through my veins and my hands shook. I couldn’t let them catch me. Not when I’d made it this far already.

I bolted toward the plain beyond the stagecoaches, my flip flops slapping my heels, and my footsteps pounding the dry earth.

The wedding dress flounced around me, getting heavier with each step.

Dirt clung to the silk, but I barely noticed.

I only wished I'd taken the time to ditch it in the bathroom before fleeing.

No time now.

Orc cattle dotted the landscape ahead, massive green beasts grazing beneath the open night sky. Beyond them, past a series of rolling hills, a forest stretched for miles, thick and dark and easing up the mountains. If I could just get there, I'd be?—

“Find her. Now.” Bradley’s furious voice snapped out, scraping down my spine.

Run faster!

I pushed hard, my lungs screaming, my pulse thundering in my ears.

That's when I tripped and twisted my ankle. I stumbled down into a small ravine.

When I hit the ground and landed hard , my yelp erupted from my throat.