Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The King's Innocent Bride
    The King's Innocent Bride
    The King's Innocent Bride
    Ebook91 pages1 hour

    The King's Innocent Bride

    By Alexa Riley

    4.5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Kate was forced to live with her uncle when she was little and was kept locked away. Then one night she found out her uncle was going to use her as collateral in a bet, and she knew she had to break free. But when she did, she never imagined she'd run straight into trouble with the king. 

    James is ruler of all that's around him, and he has to keep the peace in his kingdom. When a trespasser is brought before him, he isn't prepared for what happens next. He's ready to stake his claim and take what he wants. He's the king, after all. 

    Warning: This obsessive ruler is just what the palace ordered! Grab your tiara and get ready to celebrate the Royal Wedding with some fluffy, fun insta-love. 

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAlexa Riley
    Release dateJul 14, 2019
    ISBN9781393530077
    The King's Innocent Bride
    Author

    Alexa Riley

    New York Times bestselling author Alexa Riley is two sassy friends who got together and wrote some dirty books. They are both married moms of two who love football, donuts, and obsessed book heroes. They specialize in insta-love, over-the-top, sweet, and cheesy love stories that don’t take all year to read. If you want something SAFE, short, and always with a happily ever after, then Alexa Riley is for you! www.AlexaRiley.com

    Read more from Alexa Riley

    Related authors

    Related to The King's Innocent Bride

    Related ebooks

    Contemporary Romance For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Festival

      Sep 15, 2018

      My husband, who loved festivals, who was a great fan of festivals, wanted to get to the square in time for the first band at eleven o’clock. From bed, the dog and I watched him dress. He tried on various T-shirts, declaring some of them too tight and

      13 min read

    • Article

      Coming To Terms

      May 25, 2021

      Coming To Terms
      14 min read

    • Article

      This Is Our Secret

      Sep 1, 2022

      This Is Our Secret
      6 min read

    • Article

      Weekends With The Devil

      Dec 29, 2022

      Weekends With The Devil
      3 min read

    • Article

      The Professor’s Wife

      Sep 1, 2020

      The Professor’s Wife
      8 min read

    • Article

      Haunted

      Sep 27, 2023

      Haunted
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Identity Parade

      Feb 2, 2019

      The Identity Parade
      9 min read

    • Article

      Living With The Devil

      Feb 22, 2024

      Living With The Devil
      6 min read

    • Article

      I’ll Not Risk Myself

      Feb 10, 2024

      My phone reception is better outside the laundromat, so I spend most of my time waiting for laundry on the bench near the door. I don’t talk with my friends, but I surf the news. I like to know what’s going on. I don’t like people to know about me, t

      13 min read

    • Article

      Good Guysfinish Last

      Oct 6, 2020

      Good Guysfinish Last
      3 min read

    • Article

      Begin Again

      Jun 14, 2022

      My grandfather came to live with me. There was nowhere else for him to go. What had happened to all his children? Death, decay, exile—I hardly know. My own parents died of pain. But I must not be too gloomy, at the beginning, or you will leave me, an

      6 min read

    • Article

      Ask SUZIE

      Jun 16, 2020

      Q My sister, who is 15 years younger than me, had a late marriage to a man everyone else in the family thinks is wonderful. I’m not so sure. He’s got no ambition, so when my sister got a really good job in London, he gave up his own job and followed

      2 min read

    • Article

      Why, Dad? Why?

      Oct 2, 2022

      Why, Dad? Why?
      7 min read

    • Article

      Shame Is Ever-Present When You’re Sitting in a Cell

      Oct 23, 2020

      Between a strained relationship with my family and the death of a good friend, I’ve struggled to feel like I’m worth something.

      5 min read

    • Article

      ‘Sing to It’: Featured Fiction from Amy Hempel

      Mar 25, 2019

      If she was home at night in her husband’s bed, did he care what she did with her days? The post ‘Sing to It’: Featured Fiction from Amy Hempel appeared first on The Millions.

      7 min read

    • Article

      More Fool HER

      Feb 10, 2021

      More Fool HER
      8 min read

    • Article

      I Thought I Knew My Father, Then I Met Him in Prison

      Jun 12, 2019

      Editor’s note: This week, we’re running a special Life Inside series about fathers and incarceration. Read the previous essays about next-cell neighbors and dancing in the prison gym. I always called my father Mr. Moore. It didn’t seem strange to me

      7 min read

    • Article

      Always Watching

      Jul 7, 2022

      Always Watching
      5 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Mar 1, 2019

      It’s 1 AM on the east coast and midnight in Iowawhen the Russian lawyer with a house in Newarkand an office in the city sends me an e-mail:“Your writing is so emotional yet so detached.It’s wonderful.” I respond without delay:“Dear Oleg, I don’t know

      3 min read

    • Article

      Perfection

      Jun 9, 2020

      For years I could barely write a page. I thought I was becoming a virtuoso of smallness while the grief, which is wordless, occupied an ever-greater volume. My friend lived in the estates on the bad side of town. Let’s go to the forest, she said when

      9 min read

    • Article

      Good Boy

      Aug 3, 2021

      Good Boy
      10 min read

    • Article

      Collateral Damage

      Nov 6, 2020

      Collateral Damage
      6 min read

    • Article

      Dangerous Past

      Oct 21, 2021

      Dangerous Past
      5 min read

    • Article

      Trying To Be Just And Pious In Crusader Kings III Part II

      Dec 29, 2020

      Quick recap: I’m trying to ignore the urges this game inspires in me and everybody else, and be lovely, kind, and noble at every possible opportunity; unless I catch anybody being in any way immoral, then they shall feel my pious wrath. After losing

      7 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The King's Innocent Bride

    4.5/5

    27 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The King's Innocent Bride - Alexa Riley

      Chapter One

      Kate

      M ove, boy! The guard shoves my back, pushing me forward. I stumble into my Uncle Jack, who stops me from falling to the hard concrete floor. His hands tighten on me for a moment. I look up into his dark eyes and know he’s telling me to keep my mouth shut. He pushes me back away from him. I stagger but find my footing.

      Move! the guard barks again. I drop my head down, wanting to keep my face shielded as much as possible. My gaze falls to the floor, and I let the hood I’m wearing mask even more of my face. I’m thankful that I have it on to begin with. I’d taken it to not only keep me warm but to also hide that I’m a girl. That seems to be working so far. They keep calling me boy and I haven't corrected them. The only problem is that it’s heavy and almost two times bigger than me. I keep tripping over it. I hadn't counted on needing to run. I thought I’d be sneaking away slowly in the night. Thinking I had hours to make my escape from my uncle's house.

      I’d been wrong. He found me missing within minutes. He had to have been checking on me. I wonder how often he did that without me knowing. Why he came at such a late hour, I have no idea. But he had. When he came flying out of the house screaming my name, I’d run as fast as I could. It wasn't fast enough. Not only had he caught me, but I’d made a grave mistake, one we were both about to pay the price for. I’d gotten lost when I’d run and somehow stumbled onto the king’s land. We both were picked up for trespassing by five armed guards. I knew I should have stuck to the road, but I was sure I would get caught by him faster if he was looking for me. It was clear it hadn't mattered. My uncle wasn't going to let me go without a fight. I belong to him. I’m his property.

      He’s ingrained that into my head over and over. He has the right to do with me whatever he likes. I should be thankful to him for how good I have it with him. Things could be worse.

      Let’s not forget the minor assault I’d committed. I might have punched one of the guards when he grabbed me. That ended with me getting a hard backhand. My cheek is still throbbing. Along with my hand. I reach up and touch my face, wincing when I make contact with it. My uncle tried to argue with the guard to let us go. He told him I was his child and he was just chasing after me. He wasn't having it. Our hands had been bound in front of us and we were loaded into the back of some large vehicle that didn't have a top on it.

      I’m not sure what I want, to be honest. I don’t know which of the two would be a better choice for me—a cell or a place back in my uncle’s home. I hated it there. I hated it from the moment I was forced to move there after my grandmother passed. She raised me since I was a little girl. I never knew my parents and only ever heard of an uncle. Then five years ago I was sent to him. Sent to what felt like a whole new world. It might have only been another country, but everything I knew about my whole life was gone.

      I was left with a man who seemed to hate me for no real reason at all. To him I was free labor. I’d been counting down the days until my eighteenth birthday. Where I grew up, you became an adult when you turned eighteen. I’d assumed the same was true here. I could be wrong.

      But I’d been hoping that was true and that I could finally be free of him. Where I’d go I had no idea. He never let me far from home. I was isolated. Then last week during one of his weekly drunken poker games he has at the house I heard my name come up.

      He gambled me in his bet. He won. I’d never been so thankful for being with my uncle than in that moment. Better the devil you know, I’d thought. But I also knew I had to get out of there because he might not win next time. I’d seen the way the men that came to his games looked at me. I’d even seen my uncle’s eyes roam over me a few times.

      So last night at midnight when I turned eighteen, I ran. Apparently, I’d run the wrong way. Not only had I dropped my bag with everything I owned, I ran right into a bunch of the king’s guards. Now it looked like I would be going to jail. Maybe that would be better than going back to my uncle’s. It would certainly be better than being given away like a piece of property. That couldn't be legal. Right? One would think, but I honestly didn't know. It’s not like my uncle sent me to school. The only people who even knew I was there anymore were the people who came to the house, his friends. He referred to me as the housekeeper to them.

      My uncle grabs my arm, pulling me into his side as we start to move down the long hallway from the cell we’d been sitting in all night. Keep your mouth shut and do as you’re told, he grits out at me for the twentieth time now.

      I also don’t think he wants anyone else to know I’m a girl either for some reason. I only went along with it at first out of habit, like I do when my uncle has people over. Most people thought I was a boy when they came around. Only a few of his friends really knew. Then once I got tossed into the cell with more men, I decided it was best to keep the act going. I also didn't want to feel the wrath of my uncle. He’s only struck me a few times, but it isn't something I want to feel again, less so after already taking one backhand to the face already today.

      I don’t respond, just keep walking next to him with my head down. A lock of my hair falls forward. I quickly tuck it back with shaking hands. The hold he has on my arm tightens. Okay, I whisper, jerking my arm from his grasp. I know he can’t reprimand me here in front of the guards. At least I don’t think he will. He releases my arm, and I try to step away from him, only to bump into another guard.

      Watch it, boy, he grunts, giving me a small push away from him. I stumble again, but this time I find my footing. All the guards are wearing all black with weapons strapped to their hips. I thought my uncle was a normal-sized man, but these men make him

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1