Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 54814 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54814 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
“Are you going to behave?” he asked.
She nodded, unable to summon any actual words.
“Okay. I’m going to untie you and let you come out, but if you try the shit you did earlier, I promise you that you won’t come out as unscathed as you did this time. Got it?”
“Yes,” she told him, her voice sounding tiny and pathetic. He, no doubt, knew he’d won.
Fergus undid the knots in the rope and helped her up off the bed. She was surprisingly weak kneed and leaned against him, despite her fear. He looked down at her hands and scowled.
“Come on. Let’s get the tweezers and get these thorns out before they fester. I’ll put some antiseptic on them.”
Despite his earlier anger and his curt tone when he’d entered the room, he seemed to have softened a bit when he saw that she was hurt. She followed him back to the living room and took a seat on the sofa where he pointed. He walked to the kitchen and unlocked a drawer, returning with a pair of tweezers, a paper towel, and a handful of what looked like alcohol swabs. He sat down beside her and took her hands in his, slowly pulling the thorns out and dabbing the wounds with the alcohol pads.
She didn’t say a word, still far too stunned to even formulate a thought. She wasn’t sure if she even should ask him questions. What if she made him angry again? She’d thought that he perhaps had a soft side given the way he seemed to just let her defiance slide, but she knew now that not only was he a truly brutal man, but something she had never encountered or heard of in her entire life.
“I know you are still shocked by what you saw out there. Do you want me to explain it to you?”
She nodded her head up and down, feeling like a little child full of curiosity and yet fearful of what she might find if she dared asked questions.
“I told you that my family is from Dublin. The truth is we had to leave because we were in danger. Endangered animals if you will,” he chuckled, but Eimear didn’t feel amused. “Our family comes from an incredibly old clan in Ireland. We have the ability to shift into a bear when necessary. There’s really nothing more to tell than that.”
“Does it hurt?” she finally ventured. “It looked...it looked...”
“Disgusting? Horrible? It doesn’t hurt, not like you’d think. There is some discomfort as the bone structure rearranges and the changes happen, but it’s like a series of cramps that seize and then release. It happens so quick that you hardly have time to feel the pain before it’s over.”
“Your whole family then. They’re all bears.”
“Yes.”
“Are there others? Is Ciaron a bear?”
“Ciaron? No. He’s hardly even a man, much less a bear.”
“Why has no one ever seen one of you before. How can you just turn into a bear and no one knows or notices? How do you know I won’t tell people when I leave here?”
“Do you think they’d believe you?” he asked.
“Probably not, but no one has ever gotten proof?”
“Have you ever seen definitive proof that Bigfoot exists?” he shrugged.
Her eyes widened, “Bigfoot exists?” she gasped.
He laughed. “I have no idea. I’ve never seen a Bigfoot, but you’d never seen a bear before today, so who is to say he isn’t real?”
She realized he was teasing her and frowned. She felt so out of sorts. She considered that he might be telling her this because she’d be unable to tell anyone. He’d made her send a video to Ciaron, but she didn’t know why. What did that mean?
“Are you going to kill me?” she asked quietly.
“I don’t have any intention of killing you. That’s not to say I won’t if you try any more shit with me, but I’d prefer not to have to do that to you. I am going to kill your fiancé, though.”
She realized that she felt a certain numbness at this revelation. Only two days ago, she had been in love with Ciaron. He’d been her happily ever after. Now, he made her sick to her stomach, and whatever he got was what he deserved, as far as she was concerned.
“I thought you needed him to get the women and children back?”
“I do, but if he doesn’t see reason soon, I’ll have to go to Plan B.”
“And Plan B is to kill him?”
“Yes, but first, I will make him wish he was dead. If I’m lucky, he’ll give me what I want from him before he meets his maker.”
Eimear looked down at her hands, examining the angry red marks left behind by the thorns.
“Does that make you sad, Eimear?” he asked, his voice surprisingly gentle.
“I don’t know how I feel. It’s so hard to sort out my feelings. I know he is a bad man, but I loved him. It’s a lot to wrap my head around. It’s been a busy couple of days. My husband-to-be is the head of a crime family and a cheater. I’ve been kidnapped, chased by a bear who turned out to be the man who kidnapped me, and my hands hurt.”