Married To The Mad Vampire Lord-Chapter 125: The demon_Part 2

Take me back to my husband’s house, please..."

She stood before him, trembling from the cold and his words. She had nothing to say to him. It was best they part ways—nothing further, nothing more to say. frёeωebɳovel.com

He had just made it easy for her to live on without guilt.

Instead of accepting her decision to go back home, he watched her like she was crazy, or like she had spoken in a foreign language, and to her absolute disbelief and hurt, he threw his head back and laughed. He laughed until tears shimmered down his eyes, and then he regarded her with eyes that looked nothing like what she was used to seeing in him, making her lower her gaze and clench her fists against her drenched, dirty robe.

"You must be really out of your mind to think I will send you back to him. It’s either you come with me or walk all the way back to your mad husband. And just so you know, we are on the path that leads to the borders, far away from him," came his snarl, causing Belle to jerk her head up to look at him.

She did not allow herself to cry for the man she had lost, because to her now, the Jamie she knew was no more. This person was a stranger to her, and a stranger she shall forget forever once this was over.

She nodded her head and said, "Very well then. I hope you have a safe journey ahead. Goodbye." She turned away from him and began to walk, despite the unbearable pain in her body, but the pain in her body was nothing compared to the one in her heart.

However, she barely took four steps away from him when he grabbed her wrist and hurled her back against him.

"Are you insane?! You would rather walk all the way back than come with me? Do I mean so little to you now that you are a damned duchess to a mad—"

"You can insult my morals, think of me however you please, Jamie, but refrain from calling my husband a madman! He is no madman, and from what I see now, he has more sense than you do. Let go of my hand. You disgust me!" She yanked her hand back from his grip so hard she nearly stumbled backward.

She turned to leave again, without bothering to see the hurt on his face, because she defended Rohan. She would rather walk a hundred miles than go with him to wherever he planned to take her.

She didn’t get far before he caught up to her again, and this time roughly grabbed her arm. It was the same arm she had bruised when she threw herself off the wagon, and his harsh grip dug into the tender spot, making her grimace and cringe in silent pain.

"You’re hurting my arm. Let go!" she cried out as he began dragging her back toward the wagon, which she belatedly recognized. It was the same old wagon he had inherited from his late father, who had once been a hired coachman, transporting baby cows and horses across distant lands.

If he heard her cry of pain, he gave no sign. He didn’t loosen his grip, didn’t stop. He kept dragging her without pause.

Belle used what little strength she had left to resist him, planting her feet and dropping her weight to the ground in defiance, refusing to walk. She collapsed backward onto her backside, hoping to stop him, but even that didn’t work. His strength overpowered her. He kept pulling, and her knees scraped and bruised against the coarse, rocky ground, leaving trails of blood.

"Why can’t you just accept it and move on with your life?! I’m married now!" she screamed, her voice cracking as she fought against him. She wasn’t just exhausted from being drugged—she had also fallen from a moving wagon. Her whole body ached, and he was making it worse than she could bear.

"If you haven’t realized it yet, Isabelle, I’m not the kind of man who gives up on what I want, what I believe is mine," Jamie growled. "You’re not thinking straight right now, but once we reach our ranch, you’ll remember. You’ll see that you still love me, and the life we promised to build together with our little family."

Belle let out a moan of pain when her leg struck a boulder. "If that’s who you are now, and how you think... then I’m afraid I don’t know you at all. The man I used to love would never hurt me, never force me like this! Let me go!" she cried, struggling harder.

In one swift motion, Jamie lifted her from the ground and dumped her back into the rear of the wagon. She scrambled up immediately, trying to flee, but he shoved her back inside with a force that made her stumble.

"Stay inside, damn you!" he barked. "I’m doing this for your own good! You’ll only end up hurting yourself more—your knees are bleeding, for God’s sake!"

He held her down by the shoulders, forcing her to stay seated. But Belle fought like a wildcat. She scratched at his face, pushed at his chest, clawed at his arms in a desperate frenzy to free herself.

Jamie’s patience finally snapped.

Everything he had been through just to reach this point, to be with her again, had twisted him into someone even he could no longer recognize. The man he once was had eroded under the weight of desperation to be with her, leaving behind someone unstable—short-tempered and volatile.

When she still wouldn’t stop, when her resistance pushed him beyond the edge, he did the unthinkable.

He raised his hand and struck her, hard, across the face.

Belle went still instantly, frozen in shock. Her body fell back in disbelief. She tasted blood on her tongue and felt pain on her cheek, but the pain in her heart was so intense she could barely believe he had hit her. He had slapped her...

"You see what you made me do to you? I told you to stop it. You..."

Jamie’s words trailed off as a sudden gush of wind swept through the air, lifting dust off the ground. It was strong enough to almost knock him off balance, and as he turned slowly, his eyes narrowed at the source—but his narrowed eyes widened slightly at the sight he met behind him and the flapping mighty wings that caused the dust to stir.

Each flap stirred the earth and sent wind rolling across the field, and slowly the winged person’s feet descended to the ground. The moon was behind the person and made him into a dark silhouette, a shadow whose face couldn’t be seen—but Jamie sensed the shift in the air and knew from those mighty wings that it wasn’t a human.

Only a fallen angel could possess such dark, mighty wings. The hair on his arms stood up, and a cold sweat broke out on his skin as he stared into the eyes of the demon from hell, now glaring so intensely at him he wished he had never lived to see this day. Such eyes—so dark and deadly—could never belong to a human, nor to any creature he knew of, but to one he had only heard of.

The mad vampire.

Jamie’s heart sank, and he took a frightened step back.

"You are going to fucking regret this, Merchant!" came the deep voice of the demon before him, and before Jamie knew what was going on, his neck had been gripped by a hand like steel.