2. Riley
I tryto blink my eyes open and can’t, and I feel like I should be panicking about that, but I can’t seem to do that, either. Everything feels muffled and distant, but it’s not until someone lifts me—out of a car?—and starts carrying me somewhere that I realize I’ve been drugged.
There are muffled voices around me, and I don’t recognize any of them. I push through the fog and try to remember where the fuck I am, and finally manage to blink my eyes open only to wish I hadn’t.
Austin McKenna. Leader of the West Point gang. The man who took my sister in payment for our father’s debts. The enemy who’s at war with the three men I love. And the monster whom I promised to marry today.
My skin feels like a thousand ants are crawling over it, and my eyelids each weigh a thousand pounds. I give in and let them drift closed again, and for a moment, I’m almost grateful for the way whatever that motherfucker drugged me with is muffling the world around me.
It was hard as hell to leave the Reaper’s house with Chloe this morning, knowing I’d be leaving them behind forever. Signing all those papers to claim my inheritance from the Sutherland estate was surreal. But West Point lying in wait for us afterward is something I wish I could forget.
When they pinned us down in that alley, I saw the truth in my men’s faces. Neither Maddoc, Dante, nor Logan had any intention of backing down.
And that would have gotten them killed.
“Where do you want her, boss?” the goon carrying me asks, the question breaking through the drugged fog I’m stuck in.
I shove against his chest, struggling to get loose even though I’m not sure my legs are ready to hold me yet.
It doesn’t matter. I’m the one who voluntarily offered myself up to Austin, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat to save my sister and my men.
But that just means that it’s up to me to get myself out of this now.
“Shit, she’s awake,” the goon holding me grunts, his fingers digging into my flesh as he hauls me into a tighter hold.
Someone laughs. “The feisty ones are fun.”
“Fuck you,” I rasp, ramming an elbow into my captor’s ribs and twisting away as much as I can.
The men around me just laugh, and one of them loops something around my ankles, binding them together, while the goon holding me lowers my feet to the ground, groping me along the way.
Then they tie my hands too.
I’m still too weak from the drugs to stand, and I hate being right about that almost as much as I hate the feeling of helplessness as they let me slide to the floor at their feet.
I blink up at them. Four men. All blurry. Then one leans down, his face looming into focus above mine.
It’s Austin.
He’s smiling, and it turns my stomach.
“Riley Sutherland,” he says, his smug, possessive gaze making my skin crawl in a way that has nothing to do with the drugs.
“Sutton,” I correct him in a hoarse whisper. “I’m Riley Sutton.”
Not that I’m proud to carry Frank’s name, but if this fucker is going to gloat, he needs to get it right.
Something ugly flares in his eyes, but his smile only gets wider. “Good to know. It’s the details that matter, isn’t it? Otherwise, our marriage wouldn’t be real.”
I glare up at him, wrapping my anger around me like a shield to hold off the panic those words bring. “It will never be real.”
He reaches down and strokes my cheek in a disgusting parody of affection.
I jerk my head away, and he laughs.
“I think what you meant to say was until death do us part,” the smug bastard says. “After all, you’re the one who proposed to me. And as much as I would have enjoyed spilling a little more Reaper blood in that alley, I do appreciate how easy you made it on us. I’ll even forgive you for all the time we wasted chasing after your little sister before we figured out that you were the one getting all the Sutherland money.”
He moves closer. Close enough that if I wasn’t so fucking weak I could headbutt him in the balls.
I flex my arms, pulling against whatever it is they tied me with as I imagine doing it, but even that makes my muscles feel shaky. I glare at him instead of crying, and he leans down until I can feel his breath on my face.
“Maddoc Gray is a fucking idiot.”
His men laugh on cue, and I bite my tongue to keep from spitting out how much better of a man Maddoc is than him.
I can’t. Not while I’m weak and at West Point’s mercy like this.
But I can tell Austin reads it on my face anyway by the way his smug smile suddenly drops, a flash of rage breaking through as he reaches for my face again.
This time, he digs his fingers into my chin so I can’t jerk away.
“He had you living with him for what, weeks? Months? And all that time he thought you were fucking worthless... or else only worth fucking.”
I refuse to give him the reaction he’s looking for, and he drops his hand and straightens up, throwing his arms out like he’s putting on a show for his minions. “We figured it out, though. It’s why we were there to snatch you as soon as you signed that shit that made you actually worth something. You don’t think that makes Gray an idiot? He had his chance to get his hands on all that Sutherland money you just inherited, but now I’m gonna be the one to benefit.”
One of his goons grumbles something under his breath, and Austin’s eyes flash with that sadistic rage that lives inside him again before he quickly masks it and grins magnanimously at his men. “I mean, West Point will benefit. West Point… and all of Halston.”
They all laugh, and I fucking hate the smug way he gloats. But that’s not important. Nothing he says is important. The only thing that matters is that I got them to drive away without hurting Chloe or the Reapers.
West Point had too much firepower, and we had no way out of that alley. All the people who matter to me would likely have died if I hadn’t voluntarily come with Austin… and I’d do it again in a heartbeat, no matter what hateful things he tries to taunt me with now.
I think of the calm facade Maddoc always projects to his crew, the blank mask Logan wears like a shield, the way Dante disguises his killer instincts behind warmth and charm. I remember having each one of them inside me, and I use that to pull my own armor on, drawing on everything they mean to me.
Austin narrows his eyes at me, but this time, I don’t give him anything.
“Pick her up,” he snaps to his goons, turning away and stalking across the room.
The guy who carried me in here yanks me roughly to my feet, holding me steady as my legs try to crumple again. I hate that I appreciate it, but I do. There’s no fucking way I want to let myself look weak right now, even if those damn drugs they gave me mean it’s still true.
I blink a few times in an effort to get the room to come into clearer focus as I try to remember how long it took Chloe to shake off the effects of the drugs they used on her after we got her back from that West Point safe house.
Actually, that doesn’t matter. And not just because I don’t know how long I was unconscious, but because Austin heads my way again, but this time, I can see clearly enough to make out the guy he brings with him.
More importantly, I can see the distinctive collar around his neck.
He’s a fucking priest.
“Ready to say some vows, baby?” Austin asks, rubbing his hands together like some kind of cartoon villain.
I press my lips together tightly, knowing I can’t say no even though my stomach flips at the thought of pledging anything to this man. But I knew this was the end game. It shouldn’t feel like such a shock even if I didn’t realize it would happen this fast, because of course Austin isn’t going to waste any time. All he wants is my inheritance, and marrying me is how he’ll gain access to it.
The priest doesn’t even look at me, and he sure as shit doesn’t pull out a bible. “This is your fiancée, Mr. McKenna?”
“This is her,” Austin says with a sadistic grin, tunneling his fingers through the back of my hair and digging them into my scalp as he yanks me forward. “Let’s get on with it.”
The priest glances down at the paper he’s holding. A marriage certificate. “Do you take Riley Suth—”
“Sutton,” Austin cuts in, snatching the certificate from his hands and glaring at one of his minions. “Pen?”
The guy fumbles one out of a pocket and hands it over. Austin scribbles a quick correction on the form, then thrusts it back at the priest. “Yeah, Father. I take Riley Sutton to be my wife.” He smirks, then winks at me. “Your turn now, baby.”
My stomach clenches tight and I glare at him, my heart trying to pound its way through my chest.
“And you, Ms. Sutton?” the priest asks me in a flat voice, not making any effort at all to pretend this “ceremony” has anything to do with love or what I actually want. “Do you take Austin McKenna as your lawfully married husband?”
He stares at me, waiting for my response, and I know what I have to do, but my tongue locks up.
The West Point goon holding me upright yanks on my arms, making my shoulders scream with pain. “Boss is waiting, bitch,” he growls in my ear.
“How romantic,” I snark before I can stop myself, my nerves getting the best of me.
I half expect one of them to hurt me for it, but Austin just grins and steps in closer, gripping my chin again. Something hard digs into my stomach. He holds my gaze with that sadistic smile that I don’t want to admit terrifies me, and ice water seeps into my veins.
If it was his cock, I’d be disgusted, but it’s not—it’s a gun.
A reminder that no matter how hard it is to make myself say the words he wants to hear, I have no choice.
“Say it,” Austin demands, his bruising grip making my jaw ache. “Tell the good Father that you want to be my wife. That you accept me as your lawful husband. That you fucking begged me for this back in that alley.”
He pushes the barrel of the gun deeper into my navel, and I force the words out.
“I do.”
The words scrape my throat raw.
Austin’s eyes flare with a sick heat. The fucker is getting off on this.
“You do what?” that fucking sadist asks, taunting me.
“I… accept you as my husband.”
He doesn’t take his eyes off me as he snaps another order at the priest. “That’s what you needed, isn’t it, Father? We’re married now?”
The man nods. “Yes, Mr. McKenna. I now pronounce you husband and wife. I just need your witnesses to sign the certificate and then it will be official.”
Austin waves the priest off with his gun hand, then shoves the weapon into his waistband as two of his men follow the priest across the room to seal my fate.
Austin fists my hair, yanking it hard enough to make my eyes water as he forces my head back. Since the dickhead still holding my arms doesn’t let go, I’m sandwiched between the two of them when Austin tightens his grip on my jaw and slams his mouth over mine, kissing me hard enough that his teeth cut into my lips and I taste blood.
My skin crawls, and I gag. I can’t help it.
Austin abruptly releases me, licking my blood off his lips with a predatory smile. “You heard him, wifey. We’re married now. What’s yours is now mine.”
I want to tell him to fuck off, but my legs wobble when he steps away, and I blink back the hot sting of tears instead. Austin’s goon tightens his grip on my arms, holding me up, and I want to fight him, but it’s impossible. I can barely stand on my own.
Austin gives me a slow once over, then sneers and turns away. “Lock her up. I’ve got shit to do.”
He turns and strides away without a backward glance, and his minions drag me through the sparsely furnished house and toss me into a windowless room the size of a shoebox that has three thick, steel locks installed on the door. It also has a narrow bed with a thin mattress, and nothing else.
“Are you going to take these off?” I ask the asshole who gropes my tits as he shoves me down on the bed, holding up my bound wrists.
“Boss didn’t tell me to,” he says with a lascivious leer, “but if you wanna be extra nice to me, I can ask.”
I glare up at him. “You mean, you’ll ask my husband?”
The word almost makes me vomit in my mouth, but it does the job. He grumbles something and backs off without molesting me any further, stomping out of the room and throwing all three of the locks.
Without untying me.