Arabella’s POV
I was shocked. My father was using me as a human shield? Surely there was a mistake. A misunderstanding because what parent would use their child as a shield?
Luciano paused in his tracks but his uncle looked like he could have cared less. As long as he was able to kill my father, he didn’t care who else had to lose their life in the process.
Luciano raised his hand to stop his uncle, his jaw was clenched and his blue eyes burned an unholy silver.
“Vitalio, would you really threaten your daughter’s life just to ensure your own escape?”
My father laughed, his chest vibrating behind me and a chill swept through my veins.
“Father?”
There was a mistake. There had to be. Maybe he just wanted to use me to escape. He would apologise any minute now and tell me that this was the only way for him to escape with his life. He would tell me–
“Shut up you dumb slut.” He said his gun digging into the back of my skull. I froze in that moment realizing that I might not know my father as well as I thought I did. All the dreams in my head of my father telling me that everything was a mistake, a misunderstanding, an extenuating condition that had forced him to do all the things he had done died. The dreams didn’t just die, they crashed and burned.
Luciano stood uncertainly as though just realizing the extent of precariousness of the situation.
“You couldn’t even do one thing right. All you had to so was to bring me the formula for Song and keep your legs closed long enough to get married to secure an alliance for the pack. Instead you betrayed me and the pack numerous times. Father? There is no way I could have sired a fool like yourself.”
He was still angry about the formula for Song that I had refused to give him that was why he was talking in this manner as though I didn’t matter to him. I felt a strange sense of relief. I could understand that.
Luciano looked enraged on my behalf though. I guess he was remembering how I had cried, wanting one last chance to speak with my father. Only for said father to speak to me the way he did. Like I was a piece of shit.
“You will speak to Arabella with respect or else I will severe your head from the rest of your body.”
My father seemed to find this even funnier. He laughed once more before regarding Luciano as though he was still holding back laughter.
“And you, Luciano Romano. You are just like your father. Controlled by your emotions. I never would have forseen that you would shack up with her though. If I had known this was all it would take to calm you down, I would have mailed her to you much earlier on.” He snickered, amusement coloring his tone.
“Father.” I needed to know why he was talking like this. Even when I had lived with him, it hadn’t been this bad. “I understand that you are angry at me because of Song but–”
He slammed the butt of the gun against my head. My vision swam and my ears rang. Luciano growled and took a step forward that he was forced to take back by my father waving the gun maniacally.
He’d really hit me.
“Stop fucking calling me your father. I already told you that I wasn’t your father. What kind of fool are you anyway that you couldn’t figure it out yourself? Huh?”
“What do you mean she is not your daughter? Are your familiar ties so weak that you break them so easily? Do you know how much that woman whose life you are threatening right now begged to save your life?”
Luciano was raving furious at my father’s behaviour but all I could think about was what he had just said. That what kind of fool was I that I couldn’t figure it out myself. No. No way. He was my father. I knew him. How could I not recognize my father, someone who raised me? The only living parent that I had.
“She begged for me? She always was a dumb cunt just like her parents.
I shook shell shocked into silence. I gathered myself together to ask him a question that I had never fanthomed that I would be asking my father.
“If you are not my father, then who are you?”
The entire warehouse was silent. I couldn’t look at Luciano or even Elder Tommaso in that moment. All I could think of was my dad replying me with how silly I was being. That he had only been speaking figuratively, not literally. That he was angry at me. How could he not be after everything that had happened? He would tell me that of course he was my father. How could he not be?
Instead he laughed again.
“Enough.” Elder Tommaso said angrily. “What exactly do you think you are playing at? You are her father. I knew you over twenty years ago and I know you now. I knew when your mate got pregnant and how she went missing when your daughter was a few months old.”
“Are you trying to buy time for your men to get here? You might as well give up now because my men already intercepted them. None of your backup will show. Did you really think that I would just sit on my hands and arrange a meeting between us without taking any precautions? Just give up. Stop whatever this is, you are only making a fool out of yourself. You will not leave this building alive.”
I felt my father stiffen behind me, the scent of his rage almost drowning me. He tugged me even closer, the gun a cold reminder that at any tone this could go exceedingly south for me.
He tsked. “Do you know how many times I have been told that I wouldn’t be able to do something? Every single time I have proven them wrong. When I was born second, they told me to stay within my limits. Only the first child could be Alpha even if they were only ahead of me by a few seconds.”
What was Father saying? He was the firstborn child. The only child not a twin.
“When the woman I loved didn’t love me back but chose another wolf, they told me to forget about it. ‘He is a Romano, they are untouchable.’ They told me. But guess what? I became the Alpha of my pack. And I killed the bastard who stole the woman I loved from me and I even went an extra step to degrade the bitch to the extent she took her own life. And today again, I will escape from this place. And you will let me do it because I have her.”
Elder Tommaso raised his gun.
“Stop spouting crazy talk. I don’t mind killing your daughter to get to you. We all know how protective you are of her so drop the act.”
“Uncle Tommaso, lower that gun. Bluff or not, no one is hurting Arabella.”
My father began to back away slowly with me as the men argued between themselves as Elder Tommaso tried to explain to Luciano that my father was lying to divert their attention.
I tripped over something nearly falling but he held me up. Luciano and his uncle looked up at the noise to see that my father had covered some distance and was already close to the door.
My father seeing he’d been noticed stopped. “Done with your argument so soon? You do enjoy storytime, I guess. I should tell you before I leave. You deserve to know that much at least. Especially you, Arabella. My name is Vatalio, I was born a twin to your father, Vitalio. Your father was the charismatic one, the one people liked while I gave them the creeps.”
He was shuffling back slowly now but I could have cared less as my entire world as I knew it was blown apart.
“The wars with the Romanos continued as it had even before our time and when your mother got pregnant, your father decided that he wanted his child to be born in a peaceful world. A peaceful world? As though something like that exists. Peace is built on the blood of others.”
“My father, your grandfather died at war but my brother was going to forget all that because he wanted his pup to rule after him in a peaceful manner. I had always known he wasn’t strong enough to rule but that was the final confirmation. So I waited for my opportunity and I struck.
“Shortly after your birth, his plan for the treaty was almost complete. I drugged him and killed him. It was surprisingly easy. I dressed him up as me and used a scent blocker. Your mother came in at the wrong time. I would have liked to fuck her a few times before killing her but oh well, life doesn’t always go the way we plan. I had to kill her as well and blame it on myself, Vatalio. So we buried your mother and left your father out for the crows to eat and I forbade the mention of my name in the pack.
“I even went as far as erasing it from the family register. The official story became that your mother went missing and that I never had a sibling. All the problematic people who knew and loved my brother had to go with him to keep my secret safe. And then I went for the Romanos. They never saw it coming. How could they? All they knew was my soft hearted brother. That was also easy. And now you know everything Arabella. Do you still wish to call me father?”
With that he moved pushing me me aside to run away. The world moved in slow motion. I reached inside my waistband, pulled out the gun that Luciano had given me earlier on. A gun I had been hesitant to use on my father even to save my life.
I clicked off the safety. He was almost ten yards away now. I aimed and fired. He went down. Luciano might have called out to me but I wasn’t listening. I went outside the warehouse, he was still dragging himself up. He was a werewolf after all. One shot like that couldn’t have killed him.
He saw me coming and grappled for his gun. I was about two feet from him when he fired. It hit my thigh but I kept walking barely feeling the pain beneath all the emotional turmoil I felt.
I aimed this time for his head. Before he had the chance to shoot me again, I blew out his brains.
This time when he fell, he didn’t stand again.
I stood for a minute making sure he was dead, then my legs gave out beneath me. Someone caught me. It was Luciano.
“Baby, I’ve got you.”
My cheeks were wet but I didn’t recall when I started crying.
“I– I killed him.”
“I know.”