Wrongfully Claimed

Chapter Thirteen

                       Aurora

"Well, what's it going to be?" Ryder asked again, his voice becoming stern with her now, which told her he wasn't going to back down from this. "Will you do me the honour of becomin' my wife?"

Aurora pulled away from him, trying to fight him off her, but that only made him want to hold onto her tighter. It psychically pained her every time he touched her.

"Sit, down, we ain't done here," he said in a demanding voice, raising every hair on her back in alarm at his tone.

"What about your son?" Aurora asked him, wishing he would just take the hint and leave her alone. "He must be awake by now. Shouldn't we go inside and check on him?"

He took in a deep breath and she could see he was starting to become annoyed with her, by the way he was looking at her and rolling his eyes in frustration. She could see patience wasn't his middle name.

"Sebastian knows his way around the house," he rasped." He'll be just fine. But we ain't leavin' here until you give me an answer."

She could tell just by looking at him, that he meant every word and he wasn't going to let her off that easily.

"C'mon, it ain't like you got any better prospects goin' for ya outside this house, "he had the audacity to say to her. "I will give you a wonderful life here, Aurora. A life where you will never have to work or worry about anythin' ever again. I'll pay for everythin' and make sure you have the fairy tale wedding you deserve."

Aurora cleared her throat, trying to avoid bursting into laughter at how crazy all this sounded in her head. The way he said that, made it sound as if he were her knight in shining armour or something.

When would he ever stop this insanity and come to his senses once and for all, by waking up to the fact that she didn't want to be with him and he had no right keeping her there like he did?

After several gruelling minutes, all they did was just sit there staring out at the horizon together, neither of them saying a word to each other now.

Even if it was only for a short while, Aurora managed to direct her attention to the beauty around her. She took in the breathtaking Tennessee sunset rising up to greet her, the skies painted pretty, purples, pinks and oranges, all meshed into one array of bold, vivid colours with not even a cloud visible in sight.

It made her sad looking over at the horizon as the realisation dawned on her that her father was out there somewhere, going out of his mind with worry, from never knowing whether she was alive or not.

She didn't know why, but she had also been thinking about her ex-boyfriend Christian a lot these last few days.

She imagined he must have been tearing the whole of Tennessee apart, looking for her, convinced something bad had happened to her.

Not sure of how much more she could take, Aurora finally, tore her eyes off the sunset, to look at him, restraining herself from bursting into tears again.

"Why don't you just get rid me of me?" she sobbed, digging her fingernails into her palms while she crumbled into a million little pieces on his lap.

" You obviously raped and killed all those other girls too, so why not just kill me and dispose of me too! You have already raped me countless times, so why not just put an end to my misery and finish me, once and for all!"

Aurora cried and she cried and she cried, begging for him to put an end to her misery, to the point where she started hyperventilating.

He stopped her, by covering her mouth while he grabbed her, yanking her back in his arms so that her head was pressed right up against his taut chest. It was as if he were trying to hold the pieces of what was left of her together to keep her from falling apart.