Free Romance: Sold To The Alpha Dragon: BBW Paranormal Shapeshifter Romance (BBW Romance, Paranormal, BBW Shifter Romance) by Ashley Hunter

Chapter 1
     
    All Maria heard from her corner of the bar was the incomprehensible screaming and laughing of men. Her eye throbbed. She wanted to reach up and touch it to make sure it wasn’t bleeding but the handcuffs around her wrists weighed down her arms.
     
    Though she felt very weak, she was still able to sit up on the little stool she was perched on. Maria looked up slowly and saw various drunk, bearded old men waving various amounts of money in the air.
     
    She looked outside of the Scottish Highlands where the green grass appeared blue from the dimming sun. She figured it must’ve been seven or eight in the evening. Her stomach grumbled from intense hunger.
     
    All she remembered from the day was arguing about money with Desmond in the alley between the pharmacy and clothing stores. He wanted her to give up her wages for the month but she refused.
     
    Next thing she knew, she was being hit and pushed up against the brick walls somewhere.
     
    “No, Eliott, no!” Desmond yelled in a jolly manner.
     
    He stroked his gray beard and undid a few buttons on his bulging vest. He pointed at another man who stood up.
     
    “Hal is the only one who’s put down enough money!”
     
    “But she’s not even scrawny!” Eliott argued, pointing at Maria.
     
    “That’s a good thing, ain’t it?” Desmond responded. A few men in the back chuckled.
     
    The fattest man in the dank basement bar waddled towards and towered over Desmond.
     
    “This is how you’re going to pay me back?” the man scoffed.
     
    “Joel, I know I gambled a lot away-“
     
    “Not only that, Desmond, but you owe me money for rent. For five months!” Joel walked over to Maria as he finished his sentence.
     
    Maria looked up at him with one eye. Joel patted her knee. Even with her thick skirt and sweater tights, his hand hurt the bruises on her leg.
     
    She glanced back down at her arms and saw the bruises from Desmond forcing her onto the stool and into the shackles.
     
    Desmond placed himself between Joel and Maria, patting Joel on the chest. Joel moved back and gave Desmond and Maria a look of curiosity. Maria watched Joel study her from top to bottom.
     
    “Is she just for the night?” Joel asked.
     
    “Ha! Or forever depending on how much you bid.” Desmond howled.
     
    Joel backed up and blended into the crowd. “I like the curvy ones, so I’ll put down what your three months rent are worth and then free drinks on me at this here bar… for the rest of the year!”
     
    A few men laughed. Hal raised some money in his hand, waved it around and called out, “That’s free drinks for only a month, Joel! I’ll put down one thousand pounds for her!”
     
    Maria looked up and shook in place out of such fear that she’d be beaten up more and pass out. She didn’t think she could handle any more pain. She was angry at Desmond for putting her up for auction, for men to have ownership over her but deep down; Maria always expected the worst from him.
     
    She had fought him a lot in the past while working at his new pharmacy. They argued about which drugs were more important to refill for the next month.
     
    She remembered being pushed and hit by him almost every single day for talking back but he usually never let other men touch her. Let alone look at her. She couldn’t believe that she was still in a modern world where men still acted like pigs.
     
    As she looked at her possible future abusers, she tried to decide which man she could wish to win the auction. All of them were at least thirty years older than her twenty-four-year-old self. But she caught a glance of a young man standing close to the door.
     
    He stared at her silently. She watched him glance at the other men too. His dark hair hung around his chin where he stroked his scruffy short beard. Maria didn’t want him to bid either but he definitely looked better than all others in the room.
     
    She could tell that he had muscular arms under his dark green plaid