Total pages in book: 31
Estimated words: 31800 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 159(@200wpm)___ 127(@250wpm)___ 106(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31800 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 159(@200wpm)___ 127(@250wpm)___ 106(@300wpm)
Scarlette
The truth shall set you free.
These were the words that played over and over in my mind earlier, and my eyes actually start stinging when I recall them now...and how they completely changed everything.
Memories resurface, starting with that awful moment in the conference room when I realize Lykan isn’t able to say he loves me. I was so tempted to cry and just give up. But instead I found myself praying.
Please, please, please.
I remember reading how the Spirit prays for us the things we don’t even know to pray for, and that’s what I ended up holding fast to as I watch Lykan jerk to his feet.
Please please please.
Because somehow, seeing the way he turned ashen when he thought I was still in love with Vaughn...
That hurt me even more, and it’s why I found myself doing things I normally wouldn’t do...like locking a prince inside an en-suite with me even though I knew I could end up beheaded.
(Seriously, though: what is it with my life that I always end up doing things that land my neck on the chopping block?)
But anyway.
Admitting my feelings to Lykan was the scariest thing I’ve ever done in my life, but...
Thank You, Lord.
I’m so, so glad Grandma Jackie reminded me that I had nothing to fear. If not for her timely advice, I would never have found the courage to confess my feelings first, much less hear him say...
I never stopped loving you.
I gaze down at my husband rather dreamily, unable to stop myself from replaying his words in my mind again and again.
I fell for you the moment I saw you.
And even in the times I hurt you...
And even when I forced myself —
OH NO.
Reality gatecrashes my daydreams, and I suddenly find myself confronted by an ugly truth: what happened between Lykan and me might not have stayed between Lykan and me because...because...
A squeak of embarrassment escapes me just as Lykan finishes smoothing my dress down my legs.
“What is it, habibti?”
“What we just did,” I strangle out. “Do you think...I mean...” I know I’m a grown woman and all, so why am I still struggling to say these things? “Do you think...I can’t remember making a sound, and we, um...we didn’t take too much time to...you know.” I look at him hopefully. “So maybe, they wouldn’t realize—”
Lykan’s dark eyes have started to gleam, and my heart sinks.
I’m doomed.
My husband takes my hand as he leads me out of the en-suite, and my worst fears are confirmed as soon as I see Nadir actually holding back a red-faced Vaughn as if restraining him from kicking the door down to rescue me.
“You bastard,” Vaughn snarls.
“That would be you, not me.”
I shoot a look of dismay at Lykan. Rubbing salt on another person’s wound is so not cool, and—
“I apologize,” Lykan suddenly says. “My wife clearly doesn’t appreciate such words, and she’s right not to do so.”
Oh, my heart.
I did not expect him to say that at all, but I think I just fell in love with him all over again.
“She won’t be your wife for long—”
While I...I think I just fell OUT of love with Vaughn all over again because I never knew.
Like, seriously.
I never knew how foolishly stubborn he could be.
“Vaughn, please.” I’m hoping I can reason with him, but he doesn’t even look at me, and I think...that says a lot.
“This isn’t over,” Vaughn bites out. “You’ve obviously taken advantage of her innocence—”
“She gave it to me, actually.”
My horrified gaze swings back to my husband. “Lykan!”
“And more than once, if I may add.”
Whatever happened to him not rubbing salt—
Vaughn looks like he’s about to tear his hair out at any moment. “We...we can still work this out, Scarlette. I think I can forgive you for having sex—”
I can only throw my hands up at this point. Vaughn thinks he needs to forgive me? For what? For being a wife to my husband? Seriously?
“Article Nineteen,” Lykan drawls as he curls an arm around my waist. “Has Arav mentioned that to you?”
The Chief Steward glances at me in surprise. “No Western woman in Sharasan history has submitted to such a law.”
Vaughn’s expression turns suspicious. “What law?”
“Article Nineteen states that a woman possesses the right to refuse the claim even of the king himself if she has verbally surrendered ownership of her body to her husband in front of witnesses.” Lykan looks down at me. “What say you about this, habibti?”
Does he even have to ask?
Heck no!
Whoever’s come up with these laws clearly needs a refresher course on how human trafficking can come about and needs to rewatch the entire trilogy of Taken. Do they think we all have a Liam Neeson who’s gonna look for them, find them, and kill them when things go south?
Yeah, no way.
Nuh uh.
Only someone foolish would agree to such a thing, and so I hear myself say, “You own my body. I surrender it to you willingly and wholeheartedly.”