Page 47 of Between Dusk and Dawn

Hatred bubbled within me, a visceral emotion fueled by betrayal and manipulation. "Your purpose? What sick, twisted purpose could this possibly serve?"

His eyes gleamed with an unsettling satisfaction. "I need you with me. I need a wife. I told you that yesterday. It is simple, Madison."

None of this was fucking simple. I was married. I was in the last year of school—oh my God, school.

I was in full-blown tears as I dropped to the floor. My vision blurred and my lungs threatened to collapse. "You told me yesterday that if the circumstances were different you would marry me. I took that into consideration."

He was speaking to me the way a mother would scold a toddler. It was juvenile, and I stood and slapped him across the chest, only to be met by the sting of my own hand against thehardness of his abs. "I never agreed to this. The circumstances aren't different. Your family hates me."

Feeling overwhelmed, I ran toward the door, and he called out for me, but I ripped the door open, off its hinges, and let the cold air sink deep into my lungs. I stumbled down the steps, realizing even though it was midafternoon, there was darkness because of the thickness of the pines above us.

My ears rang and I dropped to my knees in the cold, wet mud. "Come inside, you are going to freeze."

I snapped my head in his direction. "Now you care about how I might feel about this situation?"

He closed his eyes, inhaling as if this was troubling him. I emitted a low groan. "What are we supposed to do now? Am I supposed to just come with you? School? Please. I love school." My voice was cracking and tears flowed freely.

"I will arrange all your classes to be finished online. For now, you are to come to Dansport and live in my house where we will need to figure out how to announce that I am already married."

"No. I am not coming back with you. You may have forced me to do something I was never going to have a choice in, but I will not willingly come with you." He closed the distance between us.

"You don’t understand, Muse. You have no choice. I will take you kicking and screaming, but you are coming back with me." I closed my eyes. This was my reality, my new life, and I wanted nothing to do with it. I wanted nothing to do with Walsh Solis.

"Ember is going to hate you when she finds out." I didn't even want him to answer or try to make an excuse for that, so I just cried, sinking in the mud beneath me. "Why me?"

I took a deep breath, looking up at him. "Because it had to be you. Because it was always you. It was always going to be you. Because for once in my life, I needed to be selfish and make you mine."

"I don't understand what you want from me. If this is your way of continuing to punish me for what I did?—"

"It’s not." His voice softened.

"Your dad is going to be upset you didn't marry that girl. You were supposed to balance the scales, Walsh, not put them in your favor. I was willing to let you go. It has been over four years, and we only hooked up one time. Why couldn’t you justlet me go?" I shouted the last few words. Desperation clung to me as I unleashed all the hatred I had in every single bone in my body toward him.

He walked behind me and lifted me into his arms bridal style. I was making his shirt, and mine, a complete mess.

He whispered in my ear as he brought me back into the warmth of the cabin, "You'll understand soon. For now, accept the reality—I am your husband. Deny it, fight it, it won't change the fact that we're bound by vows."

As the weight of his words settled, a festering hatred took root within me. He had taken away my choice just as my parents had done when I was a child. They were never there to protect me, save me, or help me. No, the two people who were supposed to love me the most, hurt me in a shady way. Just as Walsh was.

Chapter Sixteen

"Iam not coming with you," I screamed, pushing against his chest. Once he put me down in the cabin, I opened the freezer, grateful there was some vodka inside. I popped off the cap and chugged from the bottle.

Yes, it was midafternoon and I was chugging hard alcohol, but I needed to numb the pain. My world and everything I had worked for was getting further out of reach.

"I want to finish school," I whined. I glanced where the door was, noticing the cold air still filtering the otherwise warm cabin. Walsh was standing there with it open, watching me as I continued to pound the booze, waiting for the numbness to hit.

"You will, Muse. I swear it." His face was softer than earlier. For a moment, I thought that maybe he felt bad for what he’d done.

"I’m staying here. You can go back to Dansport. I am going to finish school and then?—"

"No. You’re coming with me, and we leave in an hour."

"No. I am staying here." I pouted, throwing my arms across my chest in a protective stance.

"Your bags are packed. The car is waiting for us. We are leaving." I looked down at the bottle, then back up at him. Iwanted to melt into the earth and somehow disappear. This was my worst nightmare.

What made it worse was that I had no one to talk to about this. I had no friends. I had no family left. I was alone in this world, and the one person who claimed I could rely on him was never mine to rely on.

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