AURORA MOON
The fire burned bright and hot, the flames encircling the beaten and bound woman.
Flesh bruised. Eyes blackened. Bones cracked. Ropes so tight around wrists and ankles, the circulation had been cut off.
Aurora Moon was dying.
Slowly.
Painfully.
Betrayal tasted as bitter as the coppery blood that filled her mouth. She'd been slapped and punched and kicked.
And conned.
Aurie's longtime crush and her scheming stepsister had "rescued" her from her possessive, obsessive fiancé, Kellan Ward.
Their lies were honey, thick and sweet. She was a fly drawn into their sticky web of deception, and now, these poisonous spiders had killed her. All to gain the inheritance left to her by her mother.
Aurora had abandoned the man who wanted her more than his next breath ... to marry a loser who beat her to death to gain wealth---and worse still, who tortured her to please her awful half-sister.
I'm so stupid. Tears leaked from her swollen eyes. I'm sorry, Kellan. You were the only one who truly loved me.
Regret filled her heart as she took her last breath, right before the flames consumed her.
***|***|***|***|***
A Week Later...
KELLAN WARD
He threads his fingers through her silky dark hair. He pulls until she arches, showing him the rapid pulse beating in her neck.
He presses his lips against that vein.
She sucks in a breath.
He dares to kiss the soft, sweet skin.
Just there.
Just once.
But he can't let her go.
She belongs to him.
The manacles are thick. Heavy. He snaps the cuffs around her wrists. He scoops her into his arms and carries her to the cage. "Just for a while," he says, gently placing her on the silk coverlet that tops her bed. "Not long. I promise."
Others want her.
But she can only be his.
He twists the key in the lock. It clicks, and relief shudders through him. She is safe now. Insulated from the dangers of the world and the lusts of other men. "I know you hate me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
"Husband," she says softly, "it's okay."
Kellan Ward woke up, gasping. Sweat beaded his forehead and he wiped away the clammy evidence of his grief. He sat up. Realized he had fallen asleep on the couch in his office. A single lamp on a side table barely chased away the shadows.
He leaned his elbows on his knees. Put his head into his hands. Sucked in deep breaths.
He didn't want to think about the dream, but the images pushed into his mind and yearning grew like thorny vines deep, deep into his soul.
Aurora had always despised the cage. But he wanted her beauty and sweetness and innocence protected. From childhood to adulthood, he wanted to be her knight in shining armor.
The first time he saw Aurora Moon, he was twelve and she was eight.
Her hair snagged in a rose bush, her neck scratched by unforgiving thorns. Her blue, blue eyes stared at him with such defiance. Tears shone in her gaze, but not a single drop fell.
She hadn't remembered their interaction. Later, he learned that was the day her mother died. It was no wonder her mind shut off memories of that time.
But that was also the day he fell in love with her.
Kellan pressed his palm against his aching chest. His heart refused to let her go. It didn't care that she was dead.
There would never be another Aurora.
He'd known it the day he'd carefully extracted her from the rose bush and told her it was okay to cry. She had sobbed and dropped into his arms, a wounded little butterfly. He held her, patting her back while she soaked his shirt with her tears.
And he'd known it the day her ashes were placed in the memorial he created for her. He made sure her mother's grave was nearby, but her resting place with its black headstone, vine-wrapped pergola and butterfly bushes---Black Night, Miss Pearl, Royal Red---belonged exclusively to his sweet, beautiful Aurora.
"Aurora Moon," he whispered. "I can't live without you."
In the dream, she accepted his possession. She didn't scream or cry or curse. She merely let him be who he was. That wasn't his little butterfly at all.
His Aurora hated him as much as he loved her.
"Sir?"
Kellan looked up at his trusted assistant, Jingyu. "What is it?"
"The arrangements have been made, sir. They're waiting at Miss Moon's grave site."
***|***|***|***|***
AURORA MOON
When Aurora regained consciousness, she stood in front of her own tombstone. She crouched down and placed her hand on the black marble, gasping when her fingers sank into it.
She ... she was a ghost?
She stood up and looked at herself. She wore the wedding gown Kellan had designed himself. It had been custom-made and hand-sewn in Italy. She'd never worn it in life, but in death, it had become her shroud.
Flashes of her last day alive hit her like bullets.
Zppt! Her longtime crush Aiden Cross and her scheming stepsister Ivy Moon helped her escape from Butterfly Villa.
Zppt! She'd gone directly to the Civil Registration Bureau with Aiden and gotten their marriage certificate.
Zppt! She was so happy to be Mrs. Cross that she signed every piece of paper Aiden put in front of her. In no time at all, he had full, legal control of her mother's estate and the Moon Art Gallery.
Zppt! Hours later, Aiden and Ivy had tortured and killed her.
Tears fell and she swiped them away. Kellan's obsessive love had frightened her. She listened to Aiden and Ivy's provocations, and fought against Kellan until he put her in a real gilded cage.
The day she escaped, he had unlocked the chains so he could marry her.
And she had abandoned him.
"Mr. Ward. We're sorry. We're so sorry."
Why did that voice sound familiar? She turned around and saw her so-called family: her heartless father Harold Crane, his vicious mistress Sheila Crane, and the mistress's conceited daughter, Ivy Crane. They knelt on the side of her grave, wrists bound. Their faces sported bruises and cuts. Their clothes were stained and torn.
And then there was Aiden Cross. He looked like he'd gotten the worst of the beatings. He swayed on his knees, obviously in pain, one blackened eye swollen shut.
"Mr. Ward, please," begged her stepmother. "We were wrong. Give us another chance."