Leverage

The Runaway

Marcella

I have always been naïve. The lack of worldly experience and judgement wasn't exactly considered an endearing quality but I had to live with it anyway. I blame my naivety upon the lack of a mother figure and the ignorance of my father in my life.

I was naïve enough to believe father when he said that he loved me. I was naïve enough to believe Chase my half-brother when he said he would protect me. Liars, all of them were liars. I mean, who would want a girl whose birth mother didn't even want her. I'm not bitter about it. Just sad. It wasn't that they didn't love me, I wasn't just enough. They loved their wealth, pride and reputation more.

The bus I was in was moving at a steady pace. I was lucky to catch the last bus leaving Dodge hills. It was much safer this way. His men will probably check the airport and the train stations first upon realizing that I fled. The weather outside was stormy much like the inner state of my mind. The rain was pelting heavily upon the roof of the bus and strong wind was gusting the branches of the trees. Leaning my head against the bus's window my thoughts drifted to the past.

It took me a lot of courage to come up with the decision to run away. Both from my family and him. I couldn't speak up when father gave me up to Roman Bishop as ransom to gain back the shares he lost in his company. The exchange was simple; Roman will give the shares that he had purchased from Sterling & Co back to my father Jacob Sterling, given that he pays double the money that Roman paid initially to purchase the company shares within six months.

The catch in this agreement being that during the duration of these 6 months my father had to hand over a precious commodity of his to Roman and failing to fulfilling his debt will lead to Roman owning the commodity indefinitely.

The commodity being me. Exactly two years ago my father summoned me to his office, which was quite unusual and with a grim face he explained me the situation. "You know I love you right," he said. "I might not be able to express it and the world might call you my mistake but the moment I looked into your eyes I knew I could never give you up despite Cheryl's protests. You will always be my child, my blood. Love, I know I have neglected you all my life but I have never been and never will be ashamed of you. My burdens are not yours to carry but your old man has a favour to ask of you."

That was the last conversation we had before I came to live in Will Manor. One of Roman's many estates where he usually lived. I complied being my father's child that I was. That one moment of his acceptance of his love towards me made to capable of doing anything to appease him.

Roman Bishop was a beautiful monster. He harbored a kind of hate that made people go insane. I never knew why. But this much I knew that he loved and hated with passion. I was eighteen when I first met him and he was eleven years older than me.

We shared a complicated relationship. He was vile. He was manipulative. And somewhere along the way, I fell in love with him. He was a man capable of anything, who could go to any lengths to gain what he wanted. He wanted to destroy my family and using me was a part of his elaborate plan. He never laid a hand on me but his venomous controlling demeanor was enough to put chills in my bones.

And I knew he would never let our- my child live if he found out about my pregnancy. That is when I knew I had to run.

Author's Note: I hope you liked the first chapter. Please vote, comment and share with your friends, it would mean the world to me. Also forgive me for any typos and grammatical errors as this is a rough draft. Thank you for reading my work.

I will be updating this book weekly so stay tuned for further chapters.

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