His midnight bride, p.1
His Midnight Bride, page 1
His Midnight Bride
THE OMEGA BRIDES
BOOK ONE
NATALIE HIGHLAND
Copyright © 2023 by Natalie Highland
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
All resemblances to people or nations are strictly coincidental.
Created with Vellum
For my Husband
For Morgan
For Heather
For the Inner Sanctum
This would not exist without you.
Contents
1. Content Warning
2. Beginning
3. Insult
4. Force
5. Discovery
6. Voyage
7. Place
8. Return
9. Stable
10. Issue
11. Fall
12. Puzzle
13. Mind
14. Recovery
15. Awake
16. Plans
17. Relief
18. Association
19. Doubt
20. Carriage
21. Witnessed
22. Return
23. Rooms
24. Days
25. Flowers
26. Clarity
27. Kindness
28. Lady
29. Hurt
30. Healing
31. Visitor
32. Birds
33. Want
34. Audience
35. Threat
36. Attempt
37. Fear
38. Care
39. Gossip
40. Nerves
41. Warmth
42. Heat
43. Leave
44. Invitation
45. Duchess
46. Task
47. Request
48. Morning
49. Aftermath
50. Party
51. Break
52. Hide
53. Orphanage
54. Meeting
55. Townhouse
56. Love
57. End
Look for the next installment
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CHAPTER 1
Content Warning
Trigger Warnings:
Attempted SA, vague discussion of SA Abusive relationship, PTSD
For all of this, there is a guaranteed Happily Ever After.
CHAPTER 2
Beginning
The carriage rattled along with Bea’s nerves. She knew better than to argue with her father, but every time that the carriage slowed or stopped as it rattled through the streets the viability of leaping out the door and fleeing down the street ran though her head.
She didn’t count herself a fool, or she might have done just that. But who would she run to? Where would she go? Anyone she might run to would simply return her to her father and she had marks that spoke to his mercies.
So she would sit and not fidget as the nerves burned her insides. She would hope that the stories of Lord Cammerly had been greatly exaggerated by society.
She refused to let her mind wander to what her new life might be like.
Her mother was next to her, back ramrod straight. Her father sat across from them, both hands clasped over the knob of his walking stick and giving her a harsh, angry look. She knew she was deficient, not the son he’d wanted to take over his estate and that she was still unforgiven for that.
But his ire was normal, no matter how it chafed that she was constantly censured for being female and an omega and therefore he had to sell her to another man, Lord Cammerly, in order to get an heir for his estate.
Naturally, as her husband, when her father elected to step down from being lord of the estate, Lord Cammerly would step in and take over and that was currently the source of her fathers ill temper.
Bea didn’t quite see how that was her fault or what she could do to remedy her father’s ire towards her for things beyond her control. The most she could do was to be silent and biddable and not leap out of the carriage as it drew closer and closer to Lord Cammerly.
Bea had never met Lord Cammerly, but it wasn’t as though that mattered a terrible amount. She would do as her father had decreed. Women were nearly cloistered here, not afforded the freedom of their southern counterparts and not nearly as protected under the law. So it behooved her to be quiet and complacent and do what she was told.
It was her lot in life and she was resigned to it.
At least that’s what she told herself at night when she had to force away the thought that her marriage might be a good one. That her husband and her might come to an understanding and perhaps even friendship.
It wouldn’t happen, she knew that. No one was friends with their wife. Wives were for the bearing of children. Omega wives were for claiming and then using their power to cement your place in society.
Whatever satisfaction she was going to find in her life was going to have to stem from another place than her marriage. There was every chance that the rumors spoken about Lord Cammerly were true and she was heading into a relationship like her mother had with her father.
Eventually the carriage halted outside a rather imposing townhouse and her father dismounted and went to ring the bell without a backwards glance at either of the women who were left to their own devices to get out of the carriage as gracefully as possible.
“Your skirts dear,” her mother gestured for Bea to turn around and shook out the tucks so that they sat evenly. “This will all be over soon, I promise.”
“It’s only the start, mama,” Bea said quietly as her mother took her arm. “I will be fine, it will all be fine.”
“And if it isn’t-“ her mother muttered the words almost too quiet for Bea to hear.
“It will be,” Bea squeezed her mother’s hand and headed towards the door of the town house to face her fiancé. To face her future, whatever it might entail.
CHAPTER 3
Insult
They were shown into the parlor by a nervous looking young woman in the garb of a maid. Which was odd. Why would a bachelor in the city be keeping a maid when it was just as simple to have a service come in and keep a footman and a butler for day to day operations?
She’d done research on her husband to be and the man didn’t tend to stay at home. Gossip said he was a regular feature at the clubs and bawdy houses of the area. Hopefully he would be home seldom and it would allow her a measure of freedom.
“I’ll tell the master you’ve arrived.” The maid slipped out of the room before Bea could do more than give her an encouraging look.
Bea looked around the room. It was a classic, masculine drawing room. Red and deep green. The furniture was horsehair and looked heavy and unforgiving. The curtains at the windows blocked out the light and the whole effect was quite somber.
It chilled her, though she couldn’t truly say why. It was much like their parlor at home, but the parlor at home made her feel this exact same way. Mostly because it was where she was called when she had made some sort of overstep and-
But she wasn’t going to think about that right now. She was going to keep her head up and her eyes open and move into this with as much bravery as she could muster
And she would need every speck of it, because the man that marched into the room was a younger version of her father. Just as hard. Just as cruel eyed and he gave her an assessing look and a bow so shallow that it could barely be called that.
She responded with a curtsy that was deeper than it really needed to be. She needed to show that she was willing to be submissive from the first. His eyes were hard and unforgiving and there was no softness or curiosity to them.
Which meant that her marriage to Lord Cammerly was very likely to be the twin of her Mother’s marriage.
Bea’s heart stilled in her chest, the last tiny bloom of hope that she might have a partner dying. Lord Cammerly marched over to her and looked down at her with disdain before he left her without a word and went to greet her father.
The two men sat in a far corner of the room next to the heavily curtained windows and Bea could hear snippets of the conversation. She and her mother were not asked to sit, but that was to be expected and was likely some sort of test.
“What’s her temperament?” Lord Cammerly asked. “I won’t hold with emotional nonsense or resistance.”
“Oh she’s well broken,” her father replied. “I make her watch as I discipline her mother for whatever she does wrong. There’s no resistance left to her.”
“Good,” Lord Cammerly nodded and flicked a glance Bea’s way. “They seem to be well trained enough. You may be seated, ladies.”
“Yes my lord,” Bea was bristling on the inside, but wasn’t fool enough to let it out. There was something odd here, but she couldn’t look curious or try to discover what it was without seeming rude.
And rude was something she would never be or her mother would pay for it in pain.
But she could already tell that there would be no affection in her for Lord Cammerly. She would reside under his roof, bear him heirs, and her heart would die inside her like her mother’s had from a lack of care.
But all was well, it would all be well. She would simply find somewhere else to place her love. Lord Cammerly was said to maintain a very fine stable at his house. She would use the h orses as her escape when her soon to be husband wasn’t around.
Which would be often since she would never be anything more than a womb and power to him.
“Do as you like, Cammerly.” Her father was saying. “The contracts are signed and as far as I’m concerned she’s your property now.”
“Good, then if you’ll excuse us I’ll take her and put her through her paces.” Cammerly rose and snapped his fingers at Bea. “Here, now.”
Bea got up and went, she had no choice. To do less would see her mother in pain and she would harm herself first. “My lord?” She dropped into a deep curtsy when she reached the spot he’d pointed at. “How can I be of service?”
“Good enough,” he turned and started walking. “I’ll have you three steps back and on my left shoulder. You are never to walk at my side, am I understood? You are not my equal.”
“I understand.” Bea nodded and counted steps until she could follow in his wake. Out of the sitting room and down the hall to his office, or what Bea assumed was his office since it was lined with books.
She stopped when he did, just outside the center of the office and waited in silence and absolute stillness until he turned around. She had her hands clasped loosely in front of her and her head bowed so he didn’t see the dying hope in her eyes.
He was just like her father. He would never honor the claim and she would never be whole again after he stepped out on her.
But she would become accustomed. Like her mother had. She was stronger than any of them gave her credit for. All that she’d gone through had left her with a stubborn, hard core that she would never allow to show, but that she would never allow to die.
A sharp, sudden pain bloomed across the side of her face and there was a hard hand in her hair forcing her to her knees at his feet. His lips had twisted into an angry snarl and she braced herself for the scent to hit. The scent of an angry Alpha, the one that made her cower and had her whole life.
But it didn’t come.
CHAPTER 4
Force
Bea dropped to her knees, fighting the urge to press a hand to her cheek where he’d hit her. Rather, she would pretend that it hadn’t happened.
He tore his hand out of her hair, taking the better part of the pins that had held it with him and leaving her disheveled, in smarting pain, and on the floor.
It was nothing that she couldn’t handle, nothing that hadn’t happened before, but this time it didn’t seem to have a reason.
“Forgive me, Lord Cammerly.” It was the only acceptable response that she had. She couldn’t ask why, why he’d hit her when they’d known each other for less than an hour. That sort of defiance would only earn her more pain.
“Good, stay there.” Lord Cammerly turned from her and went and sat at his desk. “I expect that you will repeat back to me what I am about to tell you and if you do not, you will be in pain until you can.”
“Yes, my Lord,” Bea didn’t look up at him, freezing her posture exactly as she’d been placed and preparing to listen.
It was almost exactly what she had been expecting. Her duties, his expectations, the maid that had met them at the door had been engaged to assist her in dressing and sundry other duties. Which she knew from experience would extend to covering the bruises he left behind.
Once the litany stopped, the questions started. Luckily, the expectations were fairly similar to the ones that her father had of her and she could repeat those in her sleep. Then only ones that were different were the ones about her marital duties and where she would reside.
She wasn’t to exit her rooms until either called, or she was acting as Lady Cammerly when he had friends over. Otherwise she was to remain absent as much as possible from his life.
They left to return home as soon as she’d answered all his questions and he’d told her father that she was marginally acceptable.
She was banished to her room and supper was sent up to her on a tray. She was to remain isolated in her rooms until she was called again by Lord Cammerly.
Was this what her life was going to be? Was she worth nothing more than to be an amplifier and a broodmare?
There was no way out, so she had best become accustomed to this. If she ran, she would have nothing and no where to go and anyone that she ran to would simply return her to her father.
Which would serve her worse than if she simply stayed where she was.
She had no protections, no laws were in her favor. She had been the property of her father, and she was now the property of Lord Cammerly.
Who didn’t smell like an Alpha.
Which was a puzzle
But she wasn’t going to attempt to contemplate that. Not now.
Perhaps not ever. It didn’t matter who owned her, she was nothing more than a possession and an amplifier. Whatever small satisfaction she was going to get out of her life would come from his horses and her children. She would empty all of her love into them, support and care and everything that she was.
And she would protect them from her husband.
The next day, she was summoned back to tea with Lord Cammerly and returned home with a fresh bruise on her arm from where he’d grabbed her when she hadn’t poured to his standard. She’d spent the remainder of her time with him on her knees while he enumerated her failures.
But she hadn’t cried, or railed at the unfairness of her life.
She went back the next day, and the next. The days started to run together in a sort of numb fog that was punctuated by his callous treatment of her.
But it didn’t matter since there was nowhere for her to go. There was no one to save her. She did what was expected of her did what he demanded. The wedding got closer and closer as the world faded into a white, blank space where all she was doing was existing.
It lasted until the wedding was two weeks away and he dragged her off her knees where he had decreed that she remain, and glared down at her.
“I’ve decided,” he half snarled the words at her before he reached out and yanked her head to the side. “You will go into your life as my wife with my claim on you.”
“Whatever you like.” She forced herself to relax, to not resist, even though every fiber of her being wanted to flee. He’d done this before and had always pulled back at the last minute.
But he didn’t this time and there was a searing, deep pain in her neck along with a deep sense of wrong. The claim was supposed to provoke a connection, a movement of her magic to connect with his and there was just nothing.
He pushed her back, making her stumble and look up at him, to where he had her blood on his teeth. “Leave,” he grated out. “Be gone from my sight.”
She stumbled out and away, fleeing towards home and some small measure of safety. She could feel her neck leaking blood into the lace at the collar of her gown and all she wanted was her mother.
She ran for her room, finding her mother already there and threw herself across her lap to sob.
This was her life now, but did it have to be so utterly, brutally, nonsensically cruel?
CHAPTER 5
Discovery
