Christy (Knights Wrath MC #7)

PROLOGUE

Christy

A little over twelve years ago.

I know you aren’t supposed to hate your father, but I do. I really, really hate him. The kind of hate that means I don’t think I could ever not hate him. He’s a human version of the devil himself. I might only be twelve, but I’m not dumb, even if he thinks so.

He’s banging all around the house, but he doesn’t know about my hiding spot.

I discovered it a few years ago, and I haven’t told anyone about it.

My older brothers would rat me out, and my older sister doesn’t come home anymore since she was married off and left the mountain with him.

I’m the youngest now. I had a little brother, but he died when he was a baby.

Mama said it was something called SIDS and that it wasn’t anything Father did.

That might be true, but I know he did something to Mama. He doesn’t know, but I knew she was trying to figure out a way to leave when she magically didn’t wake up one morning. Father would never have accepted that she would leave him. He needs to be in control all the time.

On the list of things that Father is annoyed that he can’t control is that I’m a bad daughter for lots of things, but mainly because I speak up that I don’t want to marry one of these jerks up here.

I know Joseph won’t make me one of his wives because he doesn’t like me.

I might be a little accident-prone. I also might have spilled a pot of coffee on him when I was ten.

I told Father it was an accident. It wasn’t, but no one else is brave enough to do it.

Joseph chalked it up to me being a dumb child who can’t stop tripping everywhere.

It was so hard not to laugh at him when I did it.

A pan crashes into the sink, bringing me back to now.

“Christy! Damn it! Where the hell are you? Supper needs to be on the table!” I know that tone all too well.

I get myself out of my hiding spot and stumble over my two feet as I head to the door leading to the hallway.

I hurry through it and down the hall. “I’m right here.

I started supper earlier, and it will be ready on time. It’s in the slow cooker.”

I duck as a metal coffee mug flies over my head.

“Tonight needs to be a nice dinner. Your brother is bringing his betrothed over. Your soup beans will not do!” I stare at my dad because this is the first time he’s mentioned it.

Plus, I don’t know how to cook many things, especially nothing fancy.

“We have a stocked fridge and pantry. Maybe she should cook so Brother knows whether he’ll have food to eat when they are married.

I make beans every Monday.” To be honest, we may have a stocked fridge and pantry, but nothing in them is fancy.

When Joseph sends someone to town to get staples we need that we can’t get off the land, it’s nothing extravagant.

It’s bread, sugar, dried beans, cheese, and some spices.

Oh, and the multiple gallons of ice cream Joseph requires.

He eats a big bowl every day, while some of our people have never had a chance to even try it.

Father huffs and tosses another mug into the sink this time.

“Maybe she will actually know what she’s doing.

I don’t know how any man is going to accept your stupid, ugly ass as a wife.

Your mother would be ashamed that she birthed someone with such defects.

I’m surprised Joseph hasn’t banished you yet.

” I wish he would. I’m only waiting till I’m fifteen, then I’m going to do what Mama wasn’t able to do and escape this place.

I’m waiting until my birthday because I’ve heard that no place will hire you till you’re fifteen.

At least that’s what I remember both Mama and Sophie, my older sister, saying.

Sophie left when she was seventeen. They left two days after Joseph declared that she and her husband were married. That’s everything up here. If Joseph declares it, it is so. He’s a grumpy old man who keeps taking more girls for wives and wonders why some of them run away.

The only person I trust up here is Mary.

She’s only eleven, but she’s like me. Most of the time, nobody notices us, and we aren’t the ones the men seem to like.

Well, except for her father. My father is bad and awful, but hers is evil.

The kind that makes you want to run away whenever you see him coming in your direction.

I’m going to make the biscuits I always make with the beans.

Father acts as if I should’ve been born knowing how to do things.

But Mom passed when I was almost nine and hadn’t taught me the harder stuff to make.

I overheard that Father’s looking for a new wife.

Maybe if he gets one, he won’t yell so much because I won’t be stuck making dinner.

I think Father isn’t a favorite of Joseph’s because if he were, he would’ve been married again by now.

Mary’s mom disappeared when she was five, and Joseph had a wife picked out for her father less than a year later.

That wife is only seventeen, but Mary and I both think she’s going to try to run away when she can.

She used to talk about it in school when we were allowed to go.

Last year, Joseph decided that girls only need to go to school till we’re eight.

Even if we want to go and learn, he’s said no female up here needs that much knowledge.

I think it’s because the last three older girls who did well in school all ran away as soon as Joseph told them he had picked out a husband for them.

I get the flour out and am about to start measuring it out when Father yells again. “Christy! Get in here and clean this shit up!” I don’t know what he’s talking about. The house is spotless. I head out of the kitchen toward the living room, tripping on the threshold.

I look up at Father, and he’s standing in front of me with his usual angry expression on his face.

“What needs to be cleaned up? I just cleaned this room this morning.” Father does one of the things that bugs me the most, way more than his yelling.

He points his finger right in my face. It makes me want to bite it off so he can’t do it again, but I know that only works in books.

He points and shakes his finger in my face.

“All these fucking books. Joseph said you don’t need any more schooling, so I don’t know why you keep getting these books out. Reading ain’t ever helped anyone.”

This is another reason I hate my dad. He doesn’t like me reading.

Who was ever hurt because I read a book about someone falling in love or a recipe for cookies?

Because I can’t keep my mouth shut ever, and can’t just say, “Yes, Father,” and carry on, I reply like the smartass I am.

“Some of these are cookbooks, so I can make different things. You were just complaining about my cooking.” He glares at me like he does anytime he looks at me.

I think it’s partly because I look like Mama and not at all like him.

The only thing I got from him was the color of my hair, but everything else is pure Mama.

Father huffs and goes to walk out the door.

“You'd better get along with your brother’s promised one. This is an important match. As soon as they’re married, your new sister is going to move in.

You'd better work on watching that mouth of yours, or I’m going to have to deal with you.

Better yet, I’ll send you to Joseph to have him deal with you.

” I will run as far as I have to if he tries to send me to Joseph.

Nothing, and I mean nothing, good happens when a girl is sent to Joseph.