(Tilly Ann.)
I must have stayed against that door for a full minute after Mother left.
Still slick. Still aching. Still throbbing with the memory of fingers that had no right being there.
I had never hated anyone as much as I hated Chase Dubois in that moment. Never wanted anyone just as much in my life.
An hour later, I was a princess again.
Corseted dress. Pinned hair. The absence of cum on my body.
I walked into the receiving room early, intending to find the darkest corner and establish residence there for the entirety of the wretched introduction.
That's when I heard it. The squeak of wheels on wood.
I turned.
It was Chase. Rolling toward me like he hadn't spent the past hour ruining my life.
My body betrayed me instantly—cheeks flushing, pulse hammering, thighs pressing together.
"Don't talk to me," I snapped. "Stay away from me."
He stared at me, like he wasn't expecting to see me in my own house. Fucking cunt.
"Okay," he said quietly, looking around for a nice corner to pack his probably stolen wheelchair.
I watched him blatantly.
No smirk. No jab. Just... okay.
He ignored me.
And so, I tried to ignore him back. I really did.
But my eyes kept drifting to the chair. To his face that looked somehow different. To the exhaustion carved into his face like he hadn't slept in years.
"Wheelchair?" The word came out before I could stop myself. "Is there really any line you won't cross? Any part of you that's decent, or are you all rotten foundation and disgusting whore?"
He looked at me. Irritation flickered in his eyes. Good. I wanted him irritated. I wanted to elicit a feeling from him. Any feeling whatsoever. It wasn't fair he was just sitting there looking unaffected when I almost fucking fucked Marge Bunti while she was giving me a bath a hour ago on account of him and his stupid fingers!
"Does people in a chair offend you, or is that disgust reserved just for me?"
"Only for you," I shot back. Then, because I couldn't help myself: "Why are you in the damn chair? Get up before my parents comes in!"
Then I thought of something and smiled. "Or don't. Maybe they will call off the stupid engagement on the account of you being a arse!"
He looked up at me, angry lines crossing his forehead "I need it!. My legs don't work like they used to."
"They seemed to work perfectly fine two hours ago when you defiled me in my father's storeroom!" I shot back.
He turned around fast. Too fast "I did what?!" He shot back at me. "Defiled you?"
"Maybe defile isn't the right word to use but you left me after..." I searched the right word "fingering me without putting me in order and jumped out of the window"
"Fingering you?" He looked at his hands. It was like he was working two brainstem trying figure out what the hell I was saying.
I slowed down and watched him.
He looked different. The predatory grace was gone. The charming smile was nowhere to be found. His eyes were guarded now. Cold. He looked emptied out.
"Fuck. You are Matilda" he murmured under his breath. But I heard it.
"You don't remember." It wasn't a question. It was my mind exploding.
It was my senses and my whole body, it was every fucking thing I told myself about Chase Dubois coming true. He was a whore. A rake. A fucking cunt. A man child. And apparently, an amnesiac!
"YOU DON'T REMEMBER ME?!" I screeched at him.
"Of course, I do." He said, not able to hold my gaze. "Of course, I do. You are Matilda. My future wife who I finger fucked in the storeroom. I know you"
I stared at him. If look could kill. He would be in tiny pieces.
He ran a hand through his hair. I noticed the tremor in his fingers and refused to care.
"You finger-fucked me an hour ago, and you don't remember?"
"I remember." He murmured under his breath. His voice softening "I remember. Why wouldn't I remember you, Matilda?"
That damn name again. Matilda.
Not Tilly. Not even Temmy. Matilda. Like I was a stranger.
Like I was nothing.
I blinked. He wasn't serious. This can't be happening.
God help me, I was about to commit bloody murder.
"But, In my defense," he said, and the casualness of his voice made me want to scream, "someone with my kind of face and rank has finger-fucked a whole lot of girls since arriving in Ze. You don't expect me to remember them all, do you?"
A muscle ticked in my jaw.
That was what he thought of me. One of many. Interchangeable. Forgettable.
"Fuck" He murmured. "I didn't mean that—"
"Let me be clear," I said, my voice dangerously quiet. "I don't care about the storeroom. I don't care about your fingers or your mouth or anything else you think you did to me. What I care about is that you have spent eight years making my life miserable, and you can't even bother to remember my name—"
"Matilda—"
"You've made my life hell since we were ten. First inTroita Moonhill. You kissed my ladies' maids. Three of them licked your boots. You asked if I wanted a turn. You called me Temmy Winchester like it was a joke."
Something flickered across his face. Guilt maybe? I didn't care.
"You have been the bane of my existence since I was a child, Alpha Chase. Fucked me with your fingers and discarded me like nothing—"
He cut me off.
"You're angry about a lot of things, Matilda" he said finally. "But I don't think the storeroom is one of them."
His eyes had the same burning feeling like mine. Mine was hatred. What was his? I couldn't care less.
I stepped toward him. Close enough to hurt him if I wanted to.
"You're right. I'm angry because you took something from me. Not my virginity—I still have that, technically. You took my choice. You and your father and my father decided my future without asking me. And now I'm supposed to smile and curtsey and marry you? You are not a fucking prize, Chase Dubois!"
"I KNOW" Those two quiet words were practically a scream. It made me look at him. Really looked at him. "I'm sorry Matilda. I'm so so sorry"
"Too fucking late."
I turned my back on him. Headed for the door.
"Where are you going?"
"To tell my mother the wedding is off."
"She won't listen."
"Then I'll tell my father. Or the Alpha King. Or whoever the hell I need to tell until someone listens."
"Tilly—"
"Don't." I whirled back around. "Don't say my name like you have any right to it. You want to marry me? Fine. But know this, Chase Dubois. I will make your life a living hell. I will contradict you in public. I will embarrass you at every dinner. I will be the worst wife you have ever imagined. And when you finally beg for mercy, I will remind you that you could have walked away today. But you didn't."
He held my gaze. Something shifted in his expression—not fear. Not anger. Something else.
"Noted" he said quietly. It was the finality in his voice. It undid me.
From the hallway, my mother's voice rang out: "Tilly? Alpha Kale is here. Where are you?"
I straightened my dress. Lifted my chin.
"Coming, Mama."
I didn't look at him again.
But I felt his eyes on my back the whole way to the door.