Burned by Darkness - Alexandra Ivy Page 0,10

one night in my father’s shop and the trolls burst in from the back door and kidnapped me.”

“Trolls don’t randomly enter public buildings to snatch females,” he pointed out. “They were there to collect the only thing of value that your father still possessed.”

“That’s a lie,” she hissed. “My father was a successful businessman who—”

“Your father was a compulsive gambler.” He overrode her fierce denial.

She winced. “In the past, but he stopped when he opened the store. He promised.”

“Promises from a gambler are worth about as much as gold from a goblin,” Baine retorted.

She grimaced. Everyone knew that goblins could make dross look like gold. Only a fool would accept a coin from the deceitful demons.

“How would you know?”

Baine wasn’t about to admit that he’d spent years discovering every possible thing about her. From the fact that her mother had died when she was just a child, to the fact that she loved to bake. He knew that she had once dreamed of owning her own business and that she started working when she was barely more than a child to support her worthless father.

Instead, he moved toward a table that was set beside the throne dais. Reaching out he tapped the top of a rosewood box inlaid with gold. A second later he flipped open the lid.

The box was magically connected to his vast library and was capable of transporting any book, manuscript, or item he might desire.

Sticking his hand into the box he grasped the scroll and turned back to Tayla. Then walking back, he halted directly in front of her and unrolled the fragile parchment.

“Is that your father’s signature?” He pointed toward the name scrawled at the bottom of the page.

Even in the torchlight it was obviously written in blood. Which meant it couldn’t be forged.

Tayla leaned forward, her brows drawn together in a baffled frown. “What is this?”

“The agreement made between your father and Skragg, the King of the Mojave Mountain Trolls.”

She sucked in a sharp breath, her angry denial slowly being replaced with something that might have been fear as she scanned the neat rows of numbers until she reached the total at the very bottom of the parchment.

“This can’t be right,” she at last muttered, ridiculously determined to deny what was staring her in the face. “Even if my father was gambling, there’s no way he could be in debt for over a hundred thousand dollars.”

Baine shrugged. “The trolls have a reputation for extorting outrageous interest rates from their victims. Which is why only the very stupid, or very desperate, would choose to borrow money from them.”

“Okay.” She licked her lips, her shoulders hunched. “If my father owed this Skragg money he could have used the gems from the store to pay him off.”

“He did,” Baine informed her, a strange sensation suddenly twisting his gut.

He didn’t like the way her eyes were darkening with hurt. Or how her body was trembling. But she needed to know the truth, didn’t she?

If she understood that she had no right to run from him then he wouldn’t have to keep her as his prisoner. His finger moved toward the number at the center of the page.

“This is the amount owed after he’d promised the contents of his store. When the gems were gone, he had nothing left of value to offer.” He captured and held her wary gaze. “Nothing except you.”

CHAPTER THREE

Tayla felt as if she’d been slammed headfirst into a brick wall.

It’d been horrible to think she’d been a random victim of the trolls. And that a ruthless dragon was hunting her.

But this…

This was so much worse.

Granted, imps tended to be flighty, self-indulgent creatures by nature, and if she was honest with herself, her father, Odel, took selfishness to a whole new level. Which no doubt explained why her older brothers had washed their hands of Odel when they were old enough to leave the nest.

But to offer her to slavers just to pay his gambling debts was inconceivable.

“I can’t believe this,” she breathed.

“Believe, my pretty imp. It’s all written in black and white.” He deliberately paused. “And blood.”

She dipped down her head, unable to meet the burning amber gaze. She didn’t want to accept she truly was this arrogant dragon’s property. And she most especially didn’t want him witnessing her increasing sense of humiliation.

“He promised,” she stupidly muttered.

Baine leaned forward, whispering directly in her ear. “Do you admit the contract is real?”

She trembled, that dangerous, melty sensation she’d never felt with anyone but this male