Page 11 of Theirs to Tempt: The Marriage Claim

Though Lucian raises a brow, he doesn’t argue.

“How?” I demand, unleashing my anger. “How did this happen? My father doesn’t gamble. He builds things. He helps people. Small landlords, single mothers—people the banks abandoned. I’ve watched him do it my whole life. So tell me, exactly how did four point eight million in markers accumulate?”

His beautiful, predatory lips curve in that controlled half smile I remember too well, the one that once promised I would thank them later while my heart lay shattered on cool stone.

“The details of the debt are between your father and us. What matters now is the resolution. Your agreement isn’t required for the markers to transfer, but we prefer you walk down the aisle to us with your eyes wide open.”

My agreement isn’t required?

They’d force me to marry them?

I blink, stunned.

This kind of thing doesn’t happen in this day and age.

Can’t happen.

But Lucian is still speaking, as if he hasn’t ripped my entire world apart beneath me a second time.

“The wedding to me and Caleb will happen within a month. A private ceremony here in Houston, your father present to give you away. Before that, you’ll move into our penthouse.”

My father makes a small, broken sound, and my mother’s face flashes behind my eyes—her gentle smile during our last video chat, the way she still calls me her brilliant girl even when her voice grows thready.

But the thought of her treatments stopping, of watching her fade the same way she started to four years ago, sends ice threading through my veins.

“No.” I step back. “I can’t. I won’t.”

My tone and sharp movement draw the eyes of nearby guests whose conversations falter.

Let them fucking stare. Let the whole ballroom witness this. “I will not be collateral for you monsters.”

Though the dangerous man’s jaw tightens, Lucian’s gaze never wavers.

Instead of responding with fury, he smiles. “Oh, but you will, Sophie. You will.”

I turn toward the doors and begin to run.

The pins in my chignon slip loose, and several strands of hair fall across my heated cheeks.

My father calls my name once, soft and pleading, but I do not slow.

When I finally exit the hotel, cool night air hits my bare arms.

Desperately I fumble for my phone. I need a car to put distance between me and the men who just tried to buy my future the way my father once bought second chances for strangers.

My breath comes in short, ragged bursts as I rush down the curving driveway.

Tears burn at the corners of my eyes, but I blink them back hard, jaw clenched against the sob that wants to rise.

For years, I’ve carried the scar of my shattered fairy tale. Now the same men want to own me outright, using my mother’s life as a tool to fold me into their world of polished dominance.

I won’t let them. I won’t.

The ride app pings with a driver three minutes away, and I hug my arms around myself against the sudden chill that has nothing to do with the temperature.

My father’s pale, defeated face haunts me. And my mother. She can’t possibly realize what he’s done.

All of it collides inside me as I wait at the curb, pulse hammering.