by Leela Ash
Greyson took her hand and squeezed it comfortingly as they walked away, and Molly released a long, deep breath.
“That went well!” she said cheerfully.
Greyson cast her a sidelong look, and Molly’s smile faltered. It was clear they were both thinking the same thing. They were eager to get the hell out of there.
“So those were your parents, huh?” Molly said, ducking into the car where Byron was waiting. Greyson sighed and nodded. “They seem nice.”
Greyson couldn’t help but let the deep chuckle escape his lips. Soon, they were on the road, and Molly’s deep blue eyes were peering at him.
“I’m sorry I made you endure that. It’s just, they’ve been on me about this ceremony thing ever since I was a kid. It was about the most important thing in the world to them. They want to keep the power in the family.”
Molly nodded. “I understand. My family is eager to meet you too. But I know that probably won’t happen.”
She laughed lightly, but Greyson could tell it was a fact that bothered her significantly. She didn’t want to let on to him just how much they meant to her, maybe because some little bit of her was aware of his deep jealousy and possessiveness. Either way, he tried to make light of the comment. He was curious about her family too, if he was going to be honest with himself. Just what had his father found out about her that Greyson didn’t know himself? It was maddening.
“I don’t like it that my father knows more about you than I do,” Greyson said grumpily, glaring out the window.
“Maybe if we would have spoken more when I asked you to, you would know more about me,” Molly said quietly. “I’m an open book. I just want to understand you and my place in all of this. That’s all.”
Greyson scowled out the window. Why was she making it sound like it was his fault? The timing was all wrong, that was all. He could hardly change the way fate laid things out before them now, could he?
But Molly said nothing more, and Greyson couldn’t tell what she could possibly be thinking.
“Well, either way, this is where we’re at right now. Tell me, what is it that my father is hanging over my head? I need to know.”
Molly grimaced. “It’s kind of a long story, honestly, and I don’t really know all of the details.”
“That’s all right,” Greyson said with a heavy sigh. “I just want to know. It’s important.”
Molly furrowed her brow and looked away.
“I’ll tell you, but not here. Is that all right?”
Greyson glowered out the window. He wanted to make her talk. The wolf was furious about the idea of Molly withholding information from him when he wanted to know it now. But when he whirled around and opened his mouth to tear into her, he stopped suddenly. Molly’s face was wrought with pain, and she seemed to be doing everything she could to keep her composure in front of him.
“Fine,” he grumbled. “But right after lunch, we are going to have a talk.”
“I’ve been waiting for that,” Molly said, pushing her pain away and smiling sweetly.
Why did every little thing she said manage to make him feel like an asshole? Greyson turned away guiltily, his mind lost in thought. If his father knew something about Molly that he didn’t, why didn’t he just come right out and say it? Or was it bad enough that he was holding onto it in case he ever needed to blackmail his new daughter-in-law? Greyson wouldn’t put it past him. The man was a piece of work.
By the time they got back to the estate, Greyson took off inside the house without bothering to open the door for Molly. She was clearly unfazed by it, probably never having had a man open a door for her in her life, but Greyson still managed to be irritated by the fact. She had kept something important from him, and if his father decided to act on what he knew before Greyson found out what it was, how was he going to protect Molly or her precious little family from the man’s wrath? Surely, he didn’t like the idea of his son marrying a human, whether she was a virgin or not. Shifter blood had to be pure, after all.
Greyson fumed as he sat down heavily at the dining room table, waiting impatiently for his lunch to be served. Molly took her place and looked down at the table in front of her until Baron came in with plates of food for both of them. She picked at it as Greyson ate furiously, anxious to hear Molly’s story.
Then, finally, once his stomach was full and he was ready to confront her, Molly stood first.
“Are you ready?” she asked.
Greyson was surprised by her forwardness and nodded dumbly.
“Good. Let’s go somewhere a little bit more private. I can talk about it there.”
And with that, they walked from the dining room, with Greyson feeling like the utter asshole that he was sure he was.
12.
“Wow, I didn’t know about this room,” Molly said, looking around at the beautiful blue couches and full glass doors in awe.
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Greyson said, opening the glass doors and leading her out onto the balcony at the top of his huge, sprawling home. The view was breathtaking. “You can see all of Stonybrooke here.”
“It’s incredible,” Molly agreed.
Greyson pulled out a chair for her at the glass table and disappeared for a moment back in the house before emerging with two wine glasses and a chilled bottle of champagne. He poured them both a glass and finally took his seat beside her.
They sipped at the glasses for a moment before Molly finally took a deep breath. It wouldn’t kill Greyson to know how she had managed to end up a mail order bride. It might change the way he viewed her, whether for better or for worse, she wouldn’t know until it happened, but she valued honesty.
“My father has some rather bad luck,” Molly began. Greyson grew quiet, his dark eyes watching her closely. She wished he wasn’t so obnoxiously attractive. It was unnerving. “He was having some trouble with the business…people who were plagiarizing his ideas. One man in particular, Terry Ramsey, was setting up this elaborate scheme, complete with a lawsuit, to make my father look terrible.”
“I know of Mr. Ramsey,” Greyson said quietly. “They say he took off a few months ago with no word to anybody. People assume he just packed his things and took off. God knows he had all the money in the world to do it with.”
Molly nodded. “Except that he didn’t just take off. Terry had stolen one of my father’s inventions and decided to patent it before my father had a chance. He had a team of lawyers ready to take my father for everything he was worth and claiming that he had stolen Terry’s work.”
Just the thought of it made Molly’s blood boil, and she gritted her teeth.
“My father is a sweet, hard-working man. He built his company from the ground up because he is brilliant and he puts his all into making his dream a reality. For a man like Terry to just…”
Greyson raised his eyebrow tiredly at her and Molly’s face burned with embarrassment. She had gotten off-topic.
“Well, anyway, my father and brother went to Terry’s estate one night to confront him about it after he had received the court summons in the mail. It was completely outrageous. That man had all the money in the world to do as he wanted with, and he was selfishly going after more because my father was an easy target and he saw the potential of my father’s invention.
“Now, I don’t know exactly what happened that night, but Terry was killed. There was some kind of altercation, and when my father was speeding out of there, Terry ended up under the wheels. My father was devastated, and my brother was clearly shaken up about it. But nobody told us that Terry had been killed. We just thought that the whole confrontation had ended horribly.”
“And it did,” Greyson said. “For Terry Ramsey.”
Molly glared up at Greyson, and he cracked a smile.
“I’m sorry,” he said, though his eyes demonstrated nothing but mirth. “This isn’t a laughing matter.”
“Well, my father didn’t know what to do, and he owed extravagant court costs to Ramsey’s lawyer, and wit
h the bad publicity generated from Terry’s claims, the business lost more and more money, until my father’s debt was quite extravagant. When Ramsey was killed, my father only had one place to turn…”
“Jeffers,” Greyson growled.
Molly nodded.
“My father begged him for his help. He not only helped it to appear that Ramsey had disappeared, but loaned my father all the money he needed to get squared off with the bank.”
“Sounds like quite a mess,” Greyson said quietly, his dark eyes intent upon her.
“Especially when it came time to collect. My father had been convinced that sales would pick up again and he would be able to pay Jeffers back by his deadline, but when that didn’t happen…”
“Your father sold you to Jeffers?” Greyson exclaimed.
“No! I volunteered myself. If I didn’t, then my father and brother both would have their lives ruined over all of this. It isn’t worth it.”
“So you’d rather ruin your life for them?” Greyson asked, clearly incredulous.
“Nobody can say so far that I’ve ruined my life,” Molly said defiantly. “There was a possibility that everything would work out for the best this way. For all of us.”
“Has anybody ever told you that your unfailing optimism makes you very vulnerable to the darker things in life?” Greyson asked. His tone wasn’t menacing but concerned, and Molly laughed quietly.
“My sister worries about that all the time. It used to get on her nerves when I would try to find the good things about everything. She didn’t think it was right for someone not to get sad or grumpy over stupid things sometimes.”
“It’s odd,” Greyson agreed, the hint of a smile creasing his lips. “You are quite a unique individual.”
Molly’s face burned and she looked away from him and shrugged. “It’s not that I don’t get sad or grumpy. I just try to look at the grand scheme of things, you know? Some things just aren’t worth getting upset about. It’s a waste of time when you could be accomplishing other things.”
“I know all about that,” Greyson said with a sigh. “My research has always taken the front seat for me.”
“I thought you might understand,” Molly said with a quiet laugh. “I think it’s so admirable what you’re attempting to do.”
“Well, if I defy my father and choose not to take my position in the family business, then the truth might come out about your family. That seems dangerous, don’t you think? He can blackmail us.”
Molly considered this, frowning deeply.
“I hadn’t thought of that,” she said. Maybe it would be better not to get in the way of the Bleuth family’s business practices. But if Greyson was forced into it just for her sake, then surely they would end up resenting each other for the rest of their lives. Then who knew what might happen? Besides, it seemed cruel to have one man give up his dream so that she could protect her family. She had done all of this for their sake, as it was. When would enough be enough?
“I know your family means a lot to you,” Greyson said, a hint of bitterness in his voice. “And getting away from my family means a lot to me. Does that makes sense?”
Molly nodded. “I would never ask you to make sacrifices on my account. I wish there was some easy way out of this.”
“There’s no such thing as an easy way out of a problem,” Greyson said, shaking his head. “That’s foolish thinking. What you have to do is find the loophole. The solution that works best for you. And never give up.”
“You’re right,” Molly said, looking into Greyson’s handsome face. He smiled at her then, a radiant smile that lit up his face and almost caused Molly to get lost in his eyes. “Something will work out. We’ll just have to work together to make sure of it.”
Greyson hesitated before nodding firmly.
“Yes. I’ll make my dreams a reality. And I’m sure that no matter what happens, your family will be fine.”
But there was doubt in his voice and resignation in his eyes, and Molly knew suddenly that he was just saying that to make her feel better. Spoiled rich men like Greyson didn’t compromise. He would probably throw Molly and her family under a bus to get what he wanted to get. The realization left a sour feeling in her stomach, and Greyson suddenly frowned.
“Are you all right?” he asked, standing abruptly and reaching out to her. “Can I get you some water?”
Molly stood too, fixing a resolute smile upon him. “No, thank you. I should probably go and get some rest. There is a lot that we will need to do to prepare for the wedding, after all. It’s best to put our best face forward.”
Greyson’s lips were tight, and he nodded. “Right. I hope you feel better soon.”
Sure he did. As if he actually cared one iota about Molly or how she felt. The sad fact of the matter was that she was there for his convenience, and had been all this time. She felt sick knowing she had surrendered her body to him, even if he had managed to spare her virginity in the heat of the moment. But he hadn’t done that because she had asked him to. She was sure he had only held back because of the stupid Serah ceremony he had bought her for.
Talking about the whole, dreary situation out loud had really made Molly feel terrible about it all. There was no way of telling what was going to happen. She had basically sold the rest of her life to a man she knew nothing about, who had done nothing but treat her like an inconvenience from the second she set foot in his home until now. And he would probably continue to treat her like an inconvenience until she was gone.
Molly pushed into her bedroom and fell onto the bed, exhausted by all of the turns the day had already taken. And it was barely 3:00pm yet. She was just going to take a shower and get some rest. Then, maybe, she would be able to figure a way out of this mess.
13.
Greyson’s eyes followed Molly until she had disappeared out of the room, and he turned his gaze back over to the skyline of Stonybrooke. There were hundreds of people living there who thought that the Bleuths were looking out for them. Who thought that they were on their side.
But the fact was that his father had been overcharging them, subtly, more and more, for the land on which they lived. It had been his parents who had brought the idea of real estate and financial gain to the shifter community, borrowing it from ventures into the human cities and poisoning shifter culture with so-called “progress.” And it had been his family that was almost single-handedly responsible for the economic structure of the town. Sure, it was all shifters who lived there, rarely any humans, but it had the distinct look and feel of a human settlement.
That had everything to do with the Bleuths, who had found a way to put themselves on top of the pack without needing to have alpha blood running through their veins. It was a dirty trick, if Greyson was going to be honest, and he had always resented the way his father, and grandfather, and great-grandfather, had conducted themselves. Everything his father had tried to teach him went against everything he believed. He didn’t want to take advantage of the rest of the pack. He wanted to carry them forward on the winds of the future, not let them stay stuck behind in the stone-ages.
Greyson’s thoughts rolled back to Molly, and his breath caught in his throat as he remembered the sensual feeling of her hot body closing around his fingers, the soft, maddening gasps that fell from her lips as he satisfied the cruel pangs of desire that seemed to bring her great agony. It had been another kind of agony entirely to help the girl through those feelings without letting the wolf gain control of the situation, but he had been feeling bitter enough at himself to manage to take control.
The wolf had been leading things with Molly for far too long. She was just a vulnerable human, after all. She didn’t deserve to be lashed out at without even the simplest understanding of shifter life. The wolf wanted to have his way, and got it, for the most part. But Greyson was done letting it have its way with Molly. She needed protection, from the rest of the world and, if necessary, from himself as well. And as her husband to be, it was up to Greyson to ma
ke sure she received that protection at all costs.
“Master Bleuth?”
Greyson was snapped out of his thoughts by the voice of Baron, who smiled kindly at him and offered him the telephone. “It’s the council, sir. They need to have your details for the Serah Ceremony.”
“Of course,” Greyson said, taking the phone from Baron. “Thank you.”
“Mr. Bleuth?”
The deep voice of the elder in charge warbled out of the receiver, and Greyson smiled despite himself. He had always been quite a funny little man, an oddity and amusement to Greyson as he had grown. Now that he was a man of importance himself, he received personal calls from the man from time to time about council business.
“Hello, Blarney.”
“Good to speak to you again,” Blarney said. Greyson could practically hear the man nod his head impulsively, as he did any time he greeted someone or spoke of important matters. The man was really getting up there in age, and somehow, it made Greyson feel more warmly toward him. As if he should treasure the time he had left with the man before he was gone from his life completely.
“Likewise,” Greyson said, trying not to remember the same word being spoken in Molly’s voice. She sure had conducted herself well with his overbearing parents. He had forgotten to praise her for it. The conversation had taken quite the unexpected turn.
“As you know, Greyson, the Serah ceremony is set to commence in exactly six days’ time. Six being a sacred number, we are receiving the details on the pairings today. Your mother called this morning with news that she had met with you and your chosen mate this afternoon. Is that correct?”
“Yes, sir,” Greyson said, wishing he could speak with more conviction. The wolf had chosen Molly. There was no doubt about that. But she hadn’t exactly chosen him back. It made him feel a little bit uncomfortable to speak about his relationship with Molly to anybody. Especially considering they barely had one.
“And what is your chosen one’s name, son?”
