Sold as the Alpha King’s Breeder

I just had a knot in my stomach

as if something bad was about to happen. I didn’t know why I felt this way; they probably would leave m

e alone until the big day.

It had been over an hour since Theo left the house. When would he be back? Thirty more minutes?

I scoffed at myself. Since when did I rely on him

that much? No, I wasn’t relying on him… it was just that the

situation was sticky right now. I just really didn’t want to deal with Raymond or Hawke when Theo was

not around.

As if my thoughts of the devil had made the devil appear, I looked up to

see Hawke standing in the parlor doorway, a smug look on his

face. My stomach churned. He was the last person on earth I wanted to speak to.

“There you are, gorgeous,” he said in a smarmy tone as he came in without being invited. He sauntere

d over and planted himself on my couch, about two feet from me.

“I bet you were excited to hear the news, weren’t you?”

“What news?” I asked, looking back

at my book. I wasn’t able to concentrate on reading with him there, but I pretended to leave since

that meant he’d leave me alone.

“That we’re to be married, of course. I never

thought I’d be marrying an Alpha’s daughter, but then, when my father told me the depths

that you’ve sunk to recently, I realized that you need me much more than I need

you, in order to pull yourself up out of the gutter.”

He had my attention now. I set my book aside and brushed my hair back

over my shoulders, trying to decide how to

respond to that. Eventually, I said, “I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, come on, Ciana!” he said, smirking at me. “Everyone knows that you’re having sex with your

manservant. But that needs to end now. You and I are betrothed, and I will not have my wife–to–

be sleeping with anyone else, let alone a lowly servant.”

“Hawke, I can assure you, I am not having any sort of romantic relations with my servant.” I swallowed

down the rest of what I wanted to say. If I’d said more, I might have accidentally given Theo away.

“Please! Half the

village saw the two of you having sex in the garden. My father was there.” Hawke shook his head at

me.

“No, that’s not what-”

“Listen, Ciana.” He reached over and took my hand. I tried to pull it away, but his grip was strong.

“You have to stop fucking him, you hear me? Now, I know you’ve got to be happy to be marrying some

one like

me, someone with prestige and position. So stop messing around with him and focus your attention

on me.”

He tried to pull me

into an embrace, but I pushed him away. “Hawke, stop. We haven’t even seen each other in a very

long time. That’s not appropriate!”

His eyes narrowed

slightly, and I thought he might say something else, but he only growled at me. I wished that Theo was t

here, but I had no idea where he had gone.

I would never admit that I wished he was present, but having the prince in the room while this wanna–

be was attempting to claim me for his own might’ve been helpful.

“Where the hell is your servant boy anyway?” Hawke asked me. “I figured the slack-jawed mouth–

breather would be hanging around, gawking at you. Let’s get him in

here. I have some work for him to do. Boy! Boy!” he began to yell, as if

that might summon my alleged servant.

“Leave him alone, Hawke,” I cautioned, but Raymond’s son was incapable of listening. “Stop shouting f

or him. He’s busy.”

“You call for your boy right now!” he continued. “I stepped in dog shit on my way over here.”

He kicked off his loafers, and the smell of dog poop I hadn’t noticed before mingled with

his awful foot odor. “Get him over here so that he can clean them off.”

I wished Theo hadn’t gone too far, but I couldn’t blame him for ignoring all of the commotion in here if h

e could hear it. It was clear that Hawke was imbalanced at the moment, and whether it

was the possibility of marrying an Alpha’s daughter that had him all worked up or something else, I coul

dn’t say. I just wanted him to stop.

“Come in here, boy!” Hawke shouted. “My shitty

shoes need cleaned!” He started to get up off of the couch to chase Theo down, but I put

a hand on his leg to stop him.

“Hawke, please. You can’t order him around. He’s not an

ordinary servant. He only responds to me,” I tried to explain to him.

“Fine. Then you tell him to come in here and clean my shoes,” he insisted.

I shook my head. “Absolutely not.”

“Then you do it!” He picked up his shoes, and the scent of dog manure hit me in the lungs.

“No! Stop! Put them down!”

Hawke glared at me and then tossed them on the floor. “Oh, so I see how you treat your husband!”

“You are not my husband!” I reminded him. I scooted away from him on the couch, preparing to get up,

but his hand reached out and took hold of my wrist. “Let go of me.”

“No! Listen, you stupid bitch!” he

shouted at me. “You’re so ignorant! It’s no wonder the prince didn’t want you. You’re not even that pretty

I got up off of the couch, twisting my wrist to get it out of his grip. My gut was telling me that

this was about to be a fight or flight

situation, and since Hawke was now positioned between me and the only exit, I needed

to come up with a way of making sure he didn’t hurt me.

“Where the fuck are you going, bitch?” he asked me.

I had no idea why Hawke was behaving this way. His eyes were narrowed as he stalked toward me.

He had turned into an animal. I’d known him a long time, and the two of us had

never been friends, but the fact that he was this angry

because I wouldn’t ask Theo to clean his shoes, or clean them myself, made me think

something had happened to this man to make him act so irrationally.

Hawke was still about ten feet away from me when

he snarled, baring his teeth, which had taken the form of wolf fangs. He came at me, and I grabbed a la

off of the shelf near me and hurled it at him.

I’d always been a pretty good shot, and this time, the vase flew free, smashing right into the side of Haw

screeched and held his hand up to his bloody head while he rocked on his feet, losing his balance.

I’d managed to slow him down, but I didn’t know what else I could toss at him, and when he

regained his balance a

moment later and came charging at me again, all I could do was dodge around the room.

He chased me, cutting me off and driving me back in the other direction, away from

the door several times. Eventually, he had me cornered in the back of the room, near a

window, and I contemplated diving through it.

“Guards! Get in here!” he shouted. My eyebrows furrowed. Since when did Hawke control the guards?

Something must’ve happened to make the guards think they had to answer to him because five of them

came pouring in through the door. When I looked at their faces, I realized these weren’t just any ordinary

These were friends of Hawke’s. It was no wonder he was able to get them

to do as he commanded so easily.

But I realized all of them had evil smirks on their faces, their eyes raking over my body in a way that

made every hair on my neck stand on end.

“I think it’s time I taught you a lesson, bitch.” Hawke lunged at me again. This time, his friends moved to

escaping. Two of them took hold of my arms, holding them while he came at me.

His palm screamed across my cheek, whipping my head to the side as my face lit on fire. Before I could

me again. My head shot backward, my skull cracking into the wall.

The world began

to spin and grew fuzzy as I fought to keep my eyes open, but I was beginning to lose consciousness, an

on the wall.

My knees folded in, but the two men kept ahold of me, keeping me upright, and all six of

the men began to laugh.

“Go ahead and lay her down, guys,” Hawke said, and I realized he was unbuttoning his slacks. “I think th

way to teach this whore a lesson is to show her how it feels to be with a real man.”

Fear bubbled up inside of me, but all five of the men were on me now, holding

me down while Hawke unfastened his pants.

I couldn’t kick, I couldn’t punch, and when I tried to scream, all that came out was a hoarse whimper.

“No!” I pleaded with him. “No!”

But Hawke was coming at me, and there was absolutely nothing I could do to save myself.