Bella French turned the page of her book, completely and utterly riveted by the story unfolding on the pages before her. As she let the printed words paint a vivid picture in her mind, she finds herself in a 14th-century castle in Ireland.
She is being courted by a marquess, dressed in a fancy gown as she twirls around a big ballroom.. Bella could almost imagine it. A big, strong man in his dressy clothes. He is so breathtakingly handsome with his perfect face and his flawless manners. She is almost falling in love with him.
“You know if you keep your nose buried in books, people are going to think that you are weird.” Comes a voice from above her.
“I don't care what people have to say about me, so..” She tells him, going back to her book.
“You need to stop living in a fantasy world!” He says, right before he snatches the book from her hand.
“Give it back to me, Gus!” Bella tells him quietly, reaching for the book which he dangles over her head. She is sitting on the floor, with her knees drawn up to her chest and he is looming over her. She stands no chance of reaching the book like this but still, she reaches.
“Please.” She adds, trying a different approach with him.
“Why do you always have to be reading? Don't you ever get tired of all the words? It doesn't even have pictures in it.” Gus tells her, flipping through the book.
He lost her place in the book, which is something that she truly hates. The book has nearly six hundred pages and she would have to comb through them to find where she was at. That made her angry and loosened her tongue.
“Of course, it doesn't have pictures. Some of us that can actually read past a second-grade level actually enjoy the words and do not need pictures to tell the story. It requires being able to read.. I am sure that a neanderthal like you would have no idea what that it is like.” She snaps at him, pushing to her feet angrily.
As he is staring at her slack-jawed because of her insult, she snatches the book from his hand and clutches it tightly to her chest. “I would thank you not to touch my stuff again.”
“Dude, you talk so weird!” He comments with a shake of his head.
“Then please keep away from me. I am weird and I own it. I would hate for that affliction to rub off on the quarterback and the team captain. You might become weird too and lose your status as King of the school.” Bella tells him, turning away to gather her things.
Now that her blissful solitude has been ruined, she has no reason to stay here any longer. Besides, she has to get to class anyways. But as she bends down to pick up her bag, his hand catches her arm, halting her.
“Every king needs a queen and I have chosen you. Would you like to go to the homecoming dance with me this weekend?” He asks her and she shakes her head before he is even done speaking.
“No.”
“Bella..” Gus says, stopping here. “You have been here for almost a month and you have no friends. I just want to be your friend.”
Judging by all the lustful looks he shoots her throughout the day and how his gaze always seems to wander down to her chest if they happen to talk for longer than three minutes, she truly doubts that friendship is all that he wants from her.
“I don't really want friends. I want to ride out the rest of my senior year in peace and then I want to get the hell out of this town.” Bella says. She moves past him, wanting to get to class and to end this conversation.
He moves his body in front of her, blocking her way. “Bella- You can have no friends while still letting me-”
“What will it take to get you to leave me alone?” Bella eventually cries out, after trying once more to get around him only to have him block her path again.
“A date.” He says quickly. “To the dance. One evening of you getting to know me and I will leave you alone if that is what you really want. But I hope to change your mind.”
“I highly doubt that you will, but whatever. Do you promise to leave me alone- completely alone – after that? If I agree to this...”
“I promise to leave you alone if that is what you want after our date. But once you have been out with a real man-”
“Okay, you are starting to sound a little rape-ish, so you need to dial that back,” Bella tells him, with a roll of her eyes.
Although the very last thing that she wants to do is go on a date with him, the most annoying oaf that she has ever had the misfortune to meet, if it gets him to leave her alone, then it might be worth considering. So consider it she does.
And she comes up with a sinister little plan of her own.
Bella vows to make him so incredibly miserable on their date that he will not want to even lay eyes on her again, let alone speak to her. Suddenly finding something to smile about, she feels a grin splitting her face.
“You know what, Gus? I think I will go to the dance with you.”
“You are agreeing to go on a date with me?” Gus asks, smart enough to seem like he can barely believe the sudden change of heart that she had.
“Yep. Just this once, though. Afterward, you have to keep your promise that you will leave me alone.” Bella reminds him of the deal that he offered her and he nods.
“Okay.”
“Fine.” She walks away from him, with her bag and book clutched to her.
“I will pick you up at five o'clock on Saturday!” Gus calls out to her.
“I won't be ready until six!”
“How was school today?”
Bella looks up at her father as he comes into the room, holding a blood-stained white rag to his hand. “Dad, what did you do? Did you cut yourself? Is it deep?” Bella drops her book and jumps to her feet, startling the small dog sleeping in her lap. She rushes over to the sink to check his wound.
“Aw, it's nothing. Barely a scratch.” Maury tells her, pulling his hand back.
“Yeah, your 'scratches' usually require stitches. Let me see it.” Bella tells him, holding her hand out palm up and waiting for him to give her his hand. “I will see for myself it is 'just a scratch'.”
With a sigh, Maury hands her his hand and she unwraps it. He has a long bloody gash in between his thumb and pointer finger that jags across his palm. “Geez, Dad.”
“It is not at all as bad as it looks.” He says with a shrug. He watches her as she dips down below the sink and pulls out the first aid kit. She knows him so well, that she has them tucked away throughout the house.
Shutting the cabinet beneath the kitchen sink, she opens the first aid box and digs around through it. Her tiny black-coated schipperke dances around her feet in excitement, thinking that he is getting a treat.
"Go lay down, Spook."
The dog moves over to the couch and lays down on the floor. Bella pulls out a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, antiseptic ointment, gauze, and tape from the kit. Bella cleans the wound thoroughly and looks at him.
“It could probably do with a stitch or two, but it isn't necessary. I can clean it well, glue it and wrap it.” Bella tells him and he nods.
“I trust you, baby girl.”
So she does just that. Maury watches her and mentions, “So you never answered my question, how was school?”
“School was school. I learned some stuff, I read some stuff. Got asked on a date. I accepted. Typical day.” Bella says, wrapping the roll of gauze around his hand. She spreads his fingers to get a better wrapping, then secures it with the tape.
“Woah, wait a second. You agreed to go on a date? With an actual boy?” Maury asked, looking surprised.
“No, I agreed to go with a horse.” She says sarcastically. Although it would be more fitting to call him a donkey because Gus is a complete jackass.
“Wow. Horse, boy, girl.. doesn't matter. I am impressed either way.” He says, moving away from the counter as she cleans up the mess. “So, when is this date?”
“Saturday night. We are going to the school dance.”
“What?!” Maury gives her an incredulous look. “A date and a dance? What happened to my antisocial daughter who hates social gatherings and said that high school dances are for people who need to make memories of 'the good times' to get them through the rest of their mediocre lives?”
“I stand by that,” Bella tells him, with a shrug. “I just- I can't explain it. But don't think that this suddenly means I am going to join the homecoming court or be named prom queen. This is a one-time deal and then I will never socialize with kids from my school again.”
“Never say never,” Maury says and she grunts.
“Oh, I am saying never.”
Maury chuckles before he kisses her on the top of her head and heads back out to his workshop. He has turned their two-car garage into his own private workshop where he spends almost all of his time. He is a scientist, who has worked on projects all of her life but over the last year, he has been more obsessed than usual. She figures that he must be working on something huge.
She blames that obsession for the reason that he suddenly packed them up and moved them away from the only home that she has ever known. The house that she grew up in. The one that reminded her of her mother.
He moved them to this weird, small town that she hates. The people are strange. They have these weird legends that they live by. Like the woods behind her house. They call it the 'Forbidden Forest' like it is a freaking Harry Potter book. No one goes in them.
The trees behind her house stretch on for miles and miles, a line of trees as far as the eye can see. But people say that there is a mansion, somewhere through the perpetual darkness and the spooky trees. The people around the town also claim that it is haunted. That a monster lives in those woods and he kills anyone that goes in them.
She personally thinks that the town is full of kooks and crazies, but what does she know? Maybe there is some serial killer living in the trees behind her house. That would be the icing on the cake.
While Bella is already in the kitchen, she decides to go ahead and make supper. Since it is turning cold outside, she wants something warm and hearty. Getting out vegetables, she decides to make vegetable soup. She can make a big pot of it and they can eat the leftovers for a few days.
After she has the meal cooked and she has eaten a bowl, she puts the rest away, save for the bowl she makes for her father. She makes him a grilled cheese and a glass of tea, then carries the food on a tray to him. She places it on the small table outside the door that leads to the garage, knocks a pattern on the door and then walks away, with Spook at her heels.
She spends the rest of her night in her room, reading her book, with Spook cuddled up to her in bed. She absently strokes his fur as she gets lost in the scenes unfolding on the page. But as she puts her book away, she thinks about what she is going to wear to the dance on Saturday.
As much as she tries to hide it, she is still as girl and she sometimes acts like one. Like right now as she worries about what to wear on a date that she does not even want to go on to a dance that she does not even want to go to.
Bella has a few dresses in the back of her closet, but she has not worn them in forever. They probably don't even fit her any longer. But she refuses to go and buy a dress, just to go on a date that she does not even want to go on. She will not give Gus the satisfaction.
She will have to make do with something from her closet or she will go in a pair of jeans. If Gus does not like that then he can leave her at home and she can spend the evening reading Evelina by Fanny Burney or The Professor by Charlotte Brontë.
Bella doesn't care.
She just wants to get the night over with.
But she secretly hopes that she has a dress to wear.
Bella looks in the mirror and sighs, her reflection mimicking the action. The girl staring back at her looks like a stranger. Bella curled her hair, pulling back the top of her hair into a loose knot at the back of her head, creating a casual half-updo. With a light layer of makeup, her reflection looks pretty but unhappy. Bella can not muster up a smile for even herself, she is so dreading this evening. But her father is happy. He has been worried about her since they moved her because he was afraid that she wouldn't know anyone and would retreat further into herself. His wish was that she make friends and he sees this as that coming true. She does not want to disappoint him by te
“Spook!” Bella shouts, looking around although she can barely see anything. Suddenly a hand grabs her and she lets out a startled shout. “Agh!” “It's just me, Bella. Come on, we have to get back! I have to put out the fire.” Maury tells her, pulling on her hand. He tries to drag her back with him but she fights his hold, drawing him to a standstill. “No, Daddy, I can't. I have to get Spook!” She looks around frantically, hoping for a sight of the dog. “He is all I have left!”
Bella opens her eyes, but she can barely see through the darkness. Since the moment that she traded her life for her father's freedom, she has feared the worst. She has expected it at any moment. Death. When the large figure came towards her, she thought that was the moment when she would meet her demise. But he simply ran towards her and she fainted. When she came to moments later, she was being carried like a sack of flour over what she assumed was a shoulder. The man marched through the trees and bushes, without regard for himself or her. Her skin was covered in bloody scrapes and stinging scratc
Bella wakes up a while later to a room full of blue light. Morning is dawning and she has no idea how long she was asleep, but it does not feel like very long. Her head aches and her eyes burn. It could be because of her crying jag, which left her with a stuffy nose and a tear-streaked face. Making her way slowly to the bathroom, she takes care of nature's business. Looking at herself in the mirror, she is taken aback by how hideous she looks. Not that she is a vain person who cares about how she looks. She is not worried that she doesn't look model quality beautiful first thing in the morning. What worries her is
Bella watches Adam warily as he stands there across the room, looking at her evenly. He seems to be sizing her up and Bella gets the distinct impression that he finds her to be lacking in some way. He seems like he is considering saying something, but thinks better of it, which is why Bella is shocked when he speaks. But she is most shocked by his words. “You and Lumi seem really comfortable together. I almost thought that I had interrupted a moment between the two of you.” “Um, you did,” Bella tells him, lifting
Why am I still standing here? Adam Prince wonders as he stands inside the door watching the girl before him. Isabella Janette French. Bella. The idiot girl who gave up her life in exchange for her father's life. She is his prisoner, his captive. She belongs to Adam now. Her life is meant to be one of punishment and torment. He wanted to cause her pain and make her life a living hell for daring to trespass on his land. For defying his wishes and bothering him.
Bella refused to eat the lunch that was sent up to her for two reasons. First, she was not sure about it after the threats that Adam had made earlier. For the second reason, her stomach was still cramping from the breakfast she had eaten. Where she had not eaten for what could possibly have been days, her stomach had not handled the heavy breakfast that she had gobbled down. Adam had left just in time because mere seconds after the door had slammed in his wake, her stomach had knotted up and she had rushed to the bathroom, where she had spent most of the morning with the agonizing pains. She had a coughing spell that had left h
Bella wakes up the next morning to the sun streaming in through the partially parted curtains to fall on her face and warm her skin. She lies there for a moment just enjoying the feel of it and loving the feeling on her face. It is like the sun is caressing her face. This is her favorite time of the morning usually, when the warmth hits her. Since she has been in this room, she stays so cold. The room is nice, but the window is old and allows in just the smallest draft that freezes her. The thin old wool blanket spread across the full bed just is not enough to keep her warm. But this morning she fin
Greer sits up in bed, gasping for breath. Liam is beside her whispering, “Shh... shh.. it's okay, baby, it was just a nightmare.” Greer looks around, seeing the children safe beside her, before she looks at Liam, beside her in nothing but his boxers. Lyle isn't here and neither is Shera. It was just a dream. She is breathing heavy from fear but she is trying to calm herself down. Liam wraps his arms around her and pulls her into his warm, bare chest. Hunter is against the wall like always and Gemma is in the middle between them. Greer picks the baby up into her arms and moves her over so that she and Liam can lay down. She looked at him, “Lie with me, please.” He nods his head and adjusts himself on the bed, so that he is laying down beside of her. She lays back in his arms with her head in the crook of his shoulder. Her breath fans his chest. Gemma is beside Hunter, sleeping peacefully, so Greer turns over to face Liam. Her hand is resting on his flat stomach, her legs tangle
“What?” “You heard me. Do you want to stay here with me forever?” Liam asks her needing to know if that is something she can even imagine before he tells her everything. “I, um-” “Yes or no, baby. There is no right or wrong answer here.” Liam says. “If you want us to-” Greer knows the exact answer that she wants to give him she just does not think that she is brave enough. She has never been one that can just put herself out there. She always has to hold a little of herself back so that if she gets hurt, at least it isn't every part of her that gets damaged. She still has something to go on. But Liam is asking her for everything. If she answers him truthfully then she will be handing him her whole heart. And that terrifies her. “This is not about what I want, Greer. This is about what you want. You are the only one that gets to make decisions for you and the children. I will not try to pressure you into anything you don't want. If you don't want to stay forever, that does not
Time flies by as they sat there, playing together as, well, a family. They weren't a family though, he has to keep telling himself. He glances at his watch, “It's time for us to get ready. I'll watch the kids while you take a shower.” Greer nods and leaves the room. He looks at Hunter playing with the toys and the little boy looks back at him with a smile. Liam smiles back at the kid. The boy just needs positive male attention. Somebody with a Y chromosome to love him instead of scare him. Greer had done her best, but how could a teenager be expected to raise a child in a small bedroom, without any form of help? He looks at Hunter, then at Gemma in his lap and was, not for the first time, totally in awe of Greer. Greer was a survivor, there was no doubting that. She could handle anything life threw at her and clearly come out on top. He knows that she is scared of Lyle. She is worried about him and Shera showing up, but Brody wants her to have faith in him. Could she trust him t
Greer wakes up a few hours later when it is still very early morning. Now is the perfect time to go while the baby is still asleep. She was beginning to sleep through the night, not wanting bottles at all hours. Greer figures that the routine and stability that they found in this pack house contributed greatly to that but she pushes that thought away. Yeah, life is good here but they will just have to make a better life somewhere else, she tells herself. Greer rolls out of the bed, trying not to disturb the children. She doesn't want to wake them until they are leaving. She goes to the armoire, pulling out the bags she had carried her stuff in before. She opens it and begins stuffing clothes in it. She pulls out the stroller and props it against the bed. She stuffs all the baby's sleepers in there and Hunter's clothes as well before she grabs her warm shirts. She looks at the dresses Liam had bought; he had given them to her as a surprise a few days ago. Greer feels like crying.
They about their day and she tries her best to act normally. Tomorrow afternoon is when Belinda was due to return and Greer has made up her mind that she is leaving in the morning. Maybe with her gone, they will choose to let Belinda keep thinking that she was dead. If she has finally made her peace with it, then there is no use upsetting the apple cart now. She knows that Hunter will be so upset. He loves Liam and the house; loves what seemed like a real home and family. Yet, it isn't their home and they aren't a part of Liam's family. It will be horrible leaving, especially since she is pretty sure that she had fallen in love with Liam. But she has to go. She kept to herself as Liam's family was there. She talked and was polite, but any chance she got to excuse herself for a moment, she took it. She went to the bathroom five times while they were there, just because she needed to take a breath and to tell herself that she was not part of them. Even if they made her feel like s
It does not take them long to go through the store and get everything on Adam's list. Within twenty minutes they are finished and back in his truck. Ten minutes of shopping and ten minutes of him talking to the beautiful girl that stopped him at the door. Greer figures that she was a girlfriend before and wants to be again, judging by all the possessive 'hands off, he belongs to me' looks that the girl was giving her. Greer has questions about her but she does not ask them. She has no right to. After Liam says goodbye to the girl, they go to the truck. Greer feels good because the whole time they were talking to the obviously interested girl, Liam never left her out. He kept his hand on her back the whole time, he included her in the conversation by asking her questions about whatever subject they were discussing. But her favorite part was when he had slung his arm around her shoulders and said, “Come on, honey. We have to get back to the kids. Dad and Hunter will be driving Mom
Greer watches Liam as he cuddles Gemma close and kisses her hair. He carries her to his mom, handing her over when Bella holds out her arms. Adam comes over to inform Liam that the whole family is coming over for supper and that he needs them to run to the store in town and pick up a few things. Adam turns to Greer, “I need you to ride with him and make sure he gets everything. Don't worry about to kiddos, they are fine here. We will take good care of them. Becca should be home in a few minutes, she just went to visit some friends that she missed while we were gone but when she gets back, she will drag out all kinds of toys for him. She goes crazy over kids.” Greer smiles at the alpha, but inside she is very aprehensive about leaving the children with anyone but especially people they don't know. Yet about the time that she opens her mouth to decline is the same time that Hunter comes over to Adam and tugs on his shirt. “Yeah, buddy?” Adam asks the child with a big smile. “Liam
Greer improves substantially over the next week and a half. Liam makes her take her medicines on time and keeps a drink constantly in front of her, forcing her to drink. Eventually her werewolf healing must have been slighly activated by being in a pack and with his burgeoning alpha aura, because she is healed completely and she has more strength than she ever has before. Besides all that, her senses are sharper. Each day she can see and hear better than before. Ebony had filed the petition with the human courtsand they were suppose to hear something today. Ebony was confident in the ruling though. Greer not so much. If she wasn't granted guardianship then Shera could come and get the kids whenever she wanted. Greer knows herself well enough to know that she'd do something desperately crazy before she let Lyle and Shera get the kids. Not wanting to dwell on it, she had tried to keep her mind off the ruling for the last few days. It only worked about thirty-seven point two percent
The boy had heard the man's steps on the landing, so he invited him into the room. Liam enters the room, clearly about to say something, but just then he sees her and he just stops in the doorway where he proceeds to stare at her with his mouth ajar. Once he seems to realize that he is standing their like an imbecile with his mouth hanging open, he shakes himself, “I'm sorry. I didn't know you were, um, not dressed.” “It's quite alright. You were invited into the room,” Greer shoots Hunter a mock glare, then smiles at him as the little boy grins at her, unabashed. Liam watches the by-play between the siblings but he can not focus on the exchange. The only thing on his mind is how the sigh of her has caught his attention. Greer stands beside the shower with only a damp towel covering her. Liam watches as drops of water cut paths across her skin and he wishes that he could replace that drop of liquid with his finger tips. That the soft pads of his fingers could brush her skin in