Fighting Fate

by Scarlett Finn

  She didn’t delay in grabbing it out of her locks and tossing it to the pebbles at her feet. Pulling on the helmet, she got on the back of the bike and wrapped her arms around him. In the hot, humid air of the day the seat was hot under her ass, but she tucked her skirt under her thighs and hung onto him again.

  The bike roared to life and the deep vibrations of it racked through her body, warming and arousing her in ways that she hadn’t expected, but there wasn’t time to explore that now. Holding herself even closer to him, she closed her eyes as they sped away from the mansion toward a back gate that she didn’t know existed.

  Her closed eyes weren’t a sign of fear, it was relief that poured itself through her now. Not just relief that she was free from her prison, but relief that Dax had come to understand the depth of his feelings for her because now they could be together and make what they had real.

  They rode for less than an hour then Dax pulled off the highway and took them through residential streets to a storage area. He parked the bike and unlocked a garage while she stood eagerly anticipating what might be inside.

  ‘Are you ok?’ he asked her before he opened the door.

  Her grin burst wider. ‘Yes, Dax, I’m… God, I’ve never felt like this.’

  Straightening up, he frowned. ‘Felt like what?’

  ‘So… exhilarated and high and… it’s like… to finally be free and to be with you—‘

  ‘I told you that you’re not free,’ he said, approaching to take hold of her and spin her around so that she was flat to the outer wall of the storage unit.

  ‘Oh all that stuff about being your prisoner, it’s just foreplay, tough guy. I want to be with you and I don’t feel like a hostage with you. This is what I wanted all along. I wanted us to be together, and now we can be.’ Sliding her hands up his chest, she was about to beckon a kiss when he spoke again.

  ‘You haven’t asked about the rest of my plan.’

  ‘Plan?’ she asked, loosening from her projected action. ‘I thought the plan was to get out of there and we did that.’

  ‘It’s not that easy,’ he said. ‘We have to…’

  ‘Have to what?’

  He backed off and opened the garage door to show that there was a car inside, among other things. Wheeling his bike past the car he stowed it at the back of the garage, covering it with a tarp then retrieving a backpack and a sports bag from a metal cabinet not too far from the bike. He tossed both into the trunk of the car, then got in and drove the car out of the garage, where he stopped.

  ‘Get in,’ he said, leaving the car to lock up the garage again.

  ‘Do you have a plan?’ she asked, having assumed that they would just leave the state and the Starks behind.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘My plan is to make sure that they can’t follow through with their plan.’

  ‘Ok,’ she said, sliding into the car, grateful to see that there was a bag of food and water on the seat and shades on the dashboard. ‘I thought that we already did that by leaving that house?’

  ‘No,’ he said as he got back into the car and showed her a key.

  ‘What’s that?’ she asked, retrieving a sandwich from the bag and unwrapping it. She hadn’t eaten anything since this morning and she hadn’t been particularly hungry then, now she was famished.

  ‘The key to get back into that storage unit if you ever need to. No one else knows that this place exists, so if I’m not around you’ll find everything in there that you’ll need to disappear.’

  She didn’t much like the sound of that, him not being around, but she watched him put the key into his wallet and stuff it into his back pocket. Taking off from the storage compound, they got back on the interstate and she munched away on her sandwich, happy to finish it and one of the bottles of water before she spoke again.

  ‘I’m ready,’ she said, stowing her trash in the door compartment.

  ‘Ready for what?’

  ‘For you to tell me the plan. So out with it, what’s the plan? Why isn’t leaving there enough?’

  ‘Because I don’t plan to stay gone,’ Dax said. ‘We’re gonna go back.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Tomorrow, maybe the next day.’

  ‘What? Are you serious? No! I am not going back there.’ If she could jump out of the car and run now then she probably would.

  ‘Yeah, you are,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to run forever and after we show Mauri that we’re serious about this, he’ll understand. He wouldn’t get it if he thought it was just about sex, that might make him angry, make him think that we were playing for sport, you know? You won’t have to worry about going back to the mansion, I’ll be taking care of this. I’ll go over there myself and show him that this isn’t a fling. I’m not cross-eyed over a dumb tramp that I’ll forget about next week.’

  ‘No! I don’t want you to go there either. If you do that and he’s pissed at you, god knows what he’ll do.’

  ‘I’ve been a part of his family for twenty years, Minx. I’ll make him see sense.’

  ‘You couldn’t make him see it this morning. Either he vetoed us being together or you didn’t tell him at all, but what makes you think that the situation will be any different in a day or two? If you needed more time—‘

  ‘There was no more time,’ he said. ‘Trystan is coming back to California tomorrow, Mauri planned to have you both pick up the marriage certificate as soon as possible and be married by the weekend. Why do you think there was a sudden rush with the dress?’

  Considering this, a chill went through her. Married by the weekend, to the man who had tried to violate her, to the man who had insisted she be the one to go through this ordeal just because she had disrespected him. Dax had come to retrieve her just in time. Now that she understood the urgency gratitude overwhelmed her.

  ‘But you think that the situation will be different in a couple of days, why? Won’t Trystan be mad? Mauri might not listen to reason and Trystan could rile his father more. We could end up with more trouble—‘

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Dax said.

  ‘How can you say that?’

  ‘Because by then he’ll have no choice. He’ll have to accept that we’re together and that you’re mine. He won’t be able to do anything to keep us apart, he’ll know we’re serious.’

  ‘How do you plan to prove that to him?’ she asked. ‘And where are we going now? What’s the point in leaving if we’re just going back?’

  ‘We have something to do.’

  ‘Ok,’ she said, settling back against the seat. There was nothing she could do to defy him, and if he had a plan that he was sure would work then there was no point in arguing in opposition of it. Dax knew the Stark’s better than she did and her alternative was to go back to that mansion and marry Trystan. ‘What is this important thing that we just have to do?’

  ‘There’s only one way to guarantee that Trystan can’t marry you.’

  ‘What’s that?’ she asked, thankful that he’d found a silver bullet.

  ‘You have to be married already, before he gets the chance.’

  ‘I have to be married,’ she said, not sure that she had heard him right. ‘Dax, what is it that we’re going to do?’

  ‘We’re getting married.’

  If lightening had struck her then, or aliens had landed, Ivy couldn’t have been more surprised. Sitting up, she fixed her eyes on him, but he was happy to remain looking at the road ahead as though he hadn’t said such a shocking thing.

  ‘We’re what?’

  ‘It makes sense,’ he said. ‘I don’t plan on letting you go, and if you’re married to me then they can’t force you to marry him.’

  Logic wasn’t the number one reason for most people when they got married. Then again, most men didn’t propose in the way he just had either. ‘We’re getting married?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Just like that, we’re getting married?’

  ‘Why not?’ he asked. ‘You got a better offer on the table?�
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  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re twenty-nine, you must have sewn your wild oats by now.’

  ‘Dax!’ she scolded and was then lost for words.

  ‘You agreed to do what I told you to do. I said before we left the mansion that you would be under my command and I meant it. You’re going to marry me. You don’t have a choice in the matter.’

  She couldn’t decipher if his cool manner was arrogance or dominance. His suggestion – which wasn’t really a suggestion at all – didn’t offend or repulse her, in fact it made a lot of sense. But before she could agree to it, she did need to be sure of one thing.

  ‘Do you love me, Dax?’ she asked, now he did glance away from the road to face her, but she couldn’t make up much of his eyes that were shielded behind his own shades.

  ‘After everything I just did, you have to ask me that?’

  ‘I want to hear the words. I need to hear your answer,’ she said, just as she’d been taught to vocalise her answers in the beach house, she needed to hear him admit it aloud.

  ‘I wouldn’t have risked losing everything I have if I didn’t,’ he said.

  ‘That’s not saying it. That’s implying it. I’ve known you for two months, Dax Harrow, and I know that there’s nothing you’re afraid of. So if you can’t say three silly little words—‘

  ‘God damn it, babygirl, of course I love you!’

  Satisfied, her lips curled and her hands settled in her lap. ‘You’re such a romantic, Dax,’ she teased. ‘I’d never have pegged you as the mushy type.’

  ‘Shut your mouth and get over here,’ he said, opening his arm to her.

  She slid across the seat and kissed his jaw, then his cheek, prompting him to turn his head and steal a lip kiss too. Then she rested her head against his torso and his arm settled around her.

  ‘We have a few hours until we hit Vegas, get some sleep if you want to. You’ll want to be fresh when we get there.’

  ‘Won’t you want to sleep?’ she asked, nuzzling closer. ‘I can drive some of the way if you want me to.’

  ‘It’s not that far,’ he said. ‘I can handle it. You handle the wedding night.’

  Which meant he wanted her to do the work in bed tonight, but after all that he’d done for her today she had no trouble accommodating him.

  ‘Ok,’ she said, turning her face into his body and closing her eyes, which were still covered by shades. ‘But if you need me to keep you awake, let me know.’

  ‘I will,’ he said.

  She listened to him inhale her hair and her smile crept up again. This morning she had woken up with a glowing hope that had faded as the day got older. Ivy could never have imagined that her day could turn out this way.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Vegas was just the same, it was the only constantly-changing, exactly the same city that she had ever experienced. While the buildings and the attractions transformed, that buzz that existed in the air as you moved down The Strip was always the same.

  Dax had parked at a hotel and checked them in under a pseudo-name, he’d then given her ten minutes to get freshened up. She tried to tempt him into the shower with her, but he’d been insistent that they’d have time once the deed was done.

  Either he was nervous and getting cold feet, so he wanted it over with, or he was really eager to have them bound together. Picking up the marriage licence took no time at all, Dax had everything that they needed, including her ID, which she guessed he must have brought – or maybe stolen – from the Stark place.

  He’d quizzed her on whether or not it was genuine, or if she was using an alias, but she assured him that she wasn’t. He was the one involved in criminal activity, not her, so if anyone had a right to suspect the other was using a false name, it was her. Except Dax made such a big deal about this being completely legitimate that she couldn’t really doubt him.

  They went to a little white chapel advertising that it had a drive-thru window. The night was bright with neon, the city alive with possibility. Droves of people came here hoping to win the jackpot, Ivy was probably the only person in the whole state of Nevada who felt like she’d brought her jackpot with her.

  Ivy reached for the front door handle of the chapel, but Dax caught her hand and drew her away from the entrance. In the shadow of the awning above, he pushed her to the wall and rested an arm at the side of her head. His own bowed head gave her cause for worry.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked. If he had decided that he no longer wanted her then she might be forced to go back to the Starks’, back to Trystan. ‘Dax?’ Cupping his face, she brought his stooped form up enough for him to meet her eyes.

  ‘I need you to say yes,’ he murmured.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I… I did something stupid, before I came to get you at Mauri’s.’

  ‘Something stupid?’ she asked. ‘What did you do?’

  ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time, but… now I’m embarrassed to admit that I did it.’ He got on the defensive. ‘And I’m not the type of guy to be embarrassed, I mean fuck the world. I don’t give a shit what anyone thinks—‘

  ‘What was her name?’ Ivy whispered, sick at the thought of him touching another woman. ‘Where did you meet her? Did you go looking to get laid or did it just happen by accident?’

  Warring emotions overcame her because technically, until today, they hadn’t been together. Except at the beach house he had admitted that he cared for her and she had wanted them to have a future. She wasn’t sure that she had the right to be sick and angry, but she didn’t know if she could erase the images of him being intimate with another woman imprinted on her mind.

  He frowned. ‘What?’

  ‘Was it after you were with me last night?’ she asked. ‘I know that we weren’t together, together, but—‘

  She stopped talking when he sank down in front of her and she saw him fumble with something in his inside pocket. Unsure what it was, she was about to ask when he popped open a box and showed her a single solitaire diamond ring.

  ‘I bought you a goddamn ring, Minx, I didn’t fuck around on you.’

  ‘You bought me a ring,’ she said, trying not to swoon because his scowl told her that he wasn’t happy about this humiliation, so she covered her mouth with both hands to conceal her soppy grin. ‘Oh, baby.’

  ‘Just say yes or no so that we can get this shit over with,’ he grumbled, lowering his attention to the ground and she knew he was worried that someone would come upon them and he would be caught in this humiliating position.

  For all of his stomping and strutting, he did respect her, and this act proved that to her. ‘I say yes,’ she said. ‘Yes, yes, yes.’

  There might be something cliché about Vegas, but at the same time it was the place that they met. He took the ring out of the box and handed it to her as he stood so that she could slide it on herself. It looked like he was about to toss the box away, so she salvaged it before he could, then leapt up into his arms and kissed him.

  That intimate action might have been naïve, because it took only half a beat for him to have her pressed to the chapel wall. Crouching, he ran a hand down her thigh and lifted it up to coil her limb around his hips. There was a busy street just behind him, and they were at the main entrance to a no doubt frequently used establishment. Their passion for each other had been contained for too long and her kiss had been enough to reawaken his want.

  ‘Let’s get this done,’ he said, backing off but keeping hold of her hips. ‘Once this is done, that’s it, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said again, admiring the ring on her hand. ‘Let’s get married, Dax.’

  ‘Then no one can take you away from me.’

  It seemed that that was his biggest fear. He took her into the chapel as she considered the gravity of what he had just said. None of the details mattered to her so she let Dax deal with it all. All that mattered to her was that he hadn’t let go of her hand and his determination to do this hadn’t wavered.

&n
bsp; Once they were joined in matrimony there was no way that Mauri could make her marry Trystan, so not only was Dax protecting their love, but he was protecting her as well. This could cost him dearly, but he’d made the choice, just as she’d told him he would have to. Dax had chosen her and she had to make sure that he never regretted his decision.

  The wedding was quick, their eyes and hands remained locked throughout the ceremony, and when it came time to say “I do” neither of them hesitated. This was it. They were now man and wife; she was Mrs. Ivy Harrow.

  Tonight she had learned that romance wasn’t completely lost on Dax, though tradition certainly was. As was proven when he opened their hotel room door and strode in, preoccupied by other things that were on his mind. Ivy didn’t step over the threshold, she just caught the door before it closed then cleared her throat.

  Dax glanced back, still stuffing the key card back into his wallet. ‘What?’ he asked.

  ‘You’re supposed to lift me up.’

  ‘Why?’ he asked, tossing his wallet onto a side table. ‘What’s wrong with you?’

  ‘There is nothing wrong with me,’ she said, torn between losing her patience and laughing. ‘It’s tradition.’

  ‘What’s tradition?’

  ‘That the groom carries the bride over the threshold. Really, Dax, you’re not off to the best start with your husband duties.’

  ‘No?’ he asked, swaggering back to her. ‘Maybe I’ll gain points when I perform other duties.’

  Crouching down, he tossed her over his shoulder and hoisted her into the hotel room in the most un-traditional pose possible. But when he threw her down on the bed and kicked off his shoes, she decided that she couldn’t care less about tradition, at least none other than the consummation part.

  ‘Maybe I plan to play hard to get,’ she teased.

  ‘You don’t have a choice when it comes to putting out,’ he said, yanking his tee-shirt off over his head.

  ‘I don’t?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Because we’re married now?’