Page 37 of Hunted Vengeance

The mysterious man comes in the evenings with food and water, gives them to me, and then camps out on the couch before he leaves in the morning. I haven’t asked his name, and he hasn’t even looked me in the eyes.

I’m okay with all of that. I don’t want to make small talk with anyone. Not with a single person, especially not with someone who is close to Malcolm. I’d rather sit in silence for the rest of my life than talk to anyone who is associated with Malcolm.

The fact that I’m going to be married to that man in a few days makes me feel absolutely sick to my stomach. I’m still not sure what he wants with me or why he chose me as his wife. I don’t think that he really cares anything about me at all.

He wants to use me, but it’s not for sex the way I thought it would be. It’s for something more, something sinister, and I can’t let my mind go to what it could be. I don’t want to believe that that kind of evil lives in this world.

But it does.

As I sit on the edge of a bed in a remote cabin wearing a padlocked collar chained to a headboard, I know deep in my soul that Malcolm is pure evil, likely sired by the Devil himself. And if he wasn’t, then he sold his soul to the Devil because there is nothing behind his eyes that even gives an inkling of him being an actual human.

I’ve stopped crying about my situation and the fact that my short life as Merrick’s wife is now completely over as of about two weeks ago. I have no tears left to cry. I can’t help but wonder what will actually become of me because I know that this man doesn’t really want me, and judging by the collar and chain, I’m nothing more than an animal to him—a pet. And not in a sexy way, either. More like a burden that he’s saddled with. Granted, he chose to be saddled with me, but only because he’s got an ulterior motive.

Chapter Sixteen

MERRICK

Wedding day.

I had Lucille hold off on completely ruining Adriano for now. I decided to proceed with caution, mainly because Boden called me and reminded me to do that. If it wasn’t for that gentle reminder, a.k.a. demand, I would have told Lucille to pull the goddamn trigger and bury Adriano immediately.

A few days ago, I called in my partners, my brothers, for help, and thank fuck they were willing and able to drop everything. Now they’re here with a semi-plan in place to distract and cause chaos so that I can get Colette.

“You want this,” Theron announces.

He’s right. I do want this. It’s not even a question that he has to ask me because I want Colette.

“She’s my wife,” I state.

He chuckles, and I know what he’s going to say before he says it. “She’s not as of yesterday.”

That’s the truth, too. The annulment was filed with the courts and finalized yesterday. Something inside of me shifted when that news hit me. No longer did I own her. No longer was she a bride thrust on me, no matter how much I wanted her the moment I laid eyes on her.

She was no longer this creature that I could pretend was just given to me. I want her now more than I ever did, and the regret that swirls around inside of me is too much to even comprehend.

And that want is what’s driving me to continue this. I could walk away from this whole thing, go back home, and pretend that none of this happened. That the marriage was just a bad dream and nothing more.

I can’t do any of that, though, because Colette has been imprinted on my brain and in my marrow. She is part of me, and being without her has caused a sensation that I don’t quite understand, a mourning feeling inside of me that I didn’t know I was able to feel.

Hell, I didn’t know that I was able to feel anything after the childhood I had, so to have had her, lost her, and feel an unwavering need to get her back is something that I wasn’t even aware could happen.

It’s time to bring her home where she belongs. Whatever we need to build a foundation of a relationship, we can work on when she’s home. And then I can work behind the scenes to absolutely demolish her father and the fucker who thought that he could buy her off the dark web.

She was not for sale, and sheisnot for sale.

Even if I fucked up and didn’t fight for her—Colette is still mine.

She will always be mine.

“Are you ready for this?” Grayson asks.

I am beyond ready mentally, but the plan still needs to be thoroughly gone over. Boden is at the church right now, double-checking everything he can, including any surveillance that Adriano has set up there, so we can bypass it if we need to.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I say, reaching for the loaded gun on the kitchen counter. Sheathing it in the shoulder holster, I grab the other one and sheath it on the other side. Then I shove my phone in my front pocket before I reach for my suit jacket.

The wedding starts in just a few hours, but I want to be set up and in place before Colette arrives. I do not want to be fucking blindsided like I was a few weeks ago when they took her away at a totally different time than they had initially planned.

Hale clears his throat, lifting his hand as if to ask his turn to speak. Jerking my chin in his direction, I can’t help but smirk. “The car is waiting for you downstairs.”

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