Page 90 of Purchased

The dungeon is bigger than I expected it to be. The stone walls are lit with what look like torches, but are electric, and there’s a UV lamp to ward off rickets. I’m well set up with a king-sized bed covered in velvet brocade and all the creature comforts of a medieval captive.

I was surprised when he brought me down here, but I didn’t beg. Didn’t cry. I should probably have seen this coming, but I guess I thought Armand’s patience was pretty much endless. Turns out it wasn’t.

Perhaps I should be panicking, but I got used to being locked up a long time ago. I could waste time feeling betrayed, but I know I pushed him to his limits. So maybe this is fair.

Armand comes down the stairs, his shirt open almost all the way to his waist, chest bared. His legs are clad in tight black pants, his hair is pushed back from his head in a dark mane.

It’s one of those moments where I look at him and realize how incredibly hot he is. Not just attractive, but truly dominant, actually made for this role. He has a tray in his hands, silver-covered plates on top of it.

I am sitting cross-legged on the bed, as he approaches, setting the dinner down on a side table.

His eyes are darker down here. There’s not enough light to reflect the moon, so they are a kind of deep gray.

He doesn’t say anything, and neither do I. We just look at one another in aso it has come to thissort of way.

“We’re going to be married,” he says, finally breaking the silence.

I cock my head to the side. “Is that your proposal?”

He fixes me with a firm stare, his chest rippling as he removes one of the silver lids to reveal a plate with bloody steak on it. My mouth waters.

“You forfeited your right to a proposal and the chance to choose when you decided to murder five men. You will marry me. I have decided.”

He’s sexy when he’s finally had enough.

“And where will we be married? In the corner by the bed, or… are you going to keep me down here forever?”

“I’m going to keep you down here until I can trust you. When will that be, Beatrix?”

He starts cutting into the steak. There is not a plate for him and a plate for me, there is just one between us. I watch him, wondering what the game is now. He cuts a piece and offers it to me at the end of the fork.

No freedom for me. No utensils either.

He feeds me steak one bite at a time.

It’s sensual, being his captive. He is careful with me. Considerate. The punishment is the confinement, I think. Though there may be more coming.

“You’re mine,” he says. “My perfect little problem. And when you are my wife…”

“Everything will still be the same,” I say. “I’ll still be who I am. And these walls won’t hold me forever.”

“I’ve decided I’m going to tame you,” he says. “All creatures can be tamed given enough time.”

I laugh. “It’s one thing to keep me captive, Armand. I understand that. But you can’t change who I am, or what I am. They tried that already. They beat me. They hurt me. They drugged me. They lied to me. If you can’t beat the wildness out of a pup, you can’t beat it out of me.”

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he says. “I’m going to love you so ferociously there is nothing left in you but love. Are you still hungry?”

I shake my head. I’ve eaten enough.

He is yet to have his fill.

Without question, without invitation, simply taking me as he wants to take me, Armand picks me up and pins me against the wall, my hands above my head, wrists in shackles, because this truly is a dungeon, sanitized as it may be. Arousal flows between my thighs. I want to be fucked. I want him to take me, to mate me. I want to be his.

I don’t care that I am captive, because I know that I will always be his prisoner, one way or another. I’ve been his since the moment he looked at me and threw ten million dollars at the worst man I’ve ever met to take me without question.

His teeth run down the side of my neck, bite lightly, nip and tease as his big hands trace my curves all the way down to my hips, then my thighs. He grips and spreads them, and I know what comes next. His eyes on mine, my sex wet for him, waiting for him to do what he has to do.

Because I, unlike him, will never deny him the true expression of his nature.

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