Chapter 9

Meadow’s POV

My heart was beating so loud, I could barely hear myself think.

His thumb brushed lightly over my knuckles, grazing the rock that sat pretty on my ring finger. I squirmed under him again, hating the way my heart responded to his touch. Hating how badly I wanted to close the distance between us and say yes, like some desperate, touch-starved idiot.

Not that I was that far off.

“I…can’t,” I breathed, my voice barely above a whisper.

Be his wife?

Alaric made it sound like a simple choice. Like all I had to do was say yes and he’d give me the world. But I didn’t want the world.

I just wanted to feel normal again. To not be someone whose entire life had just blown up in her face.

“Why do you even want me?” I pushed at his chest. “You say you want me to be yours, but what do you really stand to gain from this?”

His eyes didn’t flinch. “Nothing.”

My breath caught for the umpteenth time today.

Th