Alexa’s Point Of View
Just then, something clicked in my head.
Alexandra.
He called me by my full name. Something I’ve never told him.
“How did you know that?” I questioned, pushing my face towards his. He raised his brow in confusion.
“You called me by my full name,” I told him. “I’ve never told you my full name. There’s no way you could have known that without anyone telling you,”
His expression was blank. He leaned away from my face and tucked his palms in his pockets.
“There are many things about you that I know that even you don’t,” He said simply, confusing me the more.
“What do you mean?”
“You are my mate,” he stated. “do you expect me not to know anything about my mate?”
I frowned. “Well, I know nothing about you,” I said, folding my arms, and his deep chuckle echoed in the room.
“Because you chose not to,” he said, maintaining eye contact. “I’m here, open like a book to you. Why don’t you read me, huh?” He perused.
Though it was hard, I diverted my gaze from his warm eyes. If I look at him for one more second, I might get bewitched. I stepped away from him and looked around the room we were in for the first time since we got in there.
“Wow,” I breathed out as I beheld the beautiful paintings in the room. There were paintings of beautiful nature scenery. I went to one of the paintings. It was one of a woman in the middle of a rose garden. She was facing the back, wearing a white flowing gown caught in the wind. Her hair was red as a rose and long and her skin was white as snow.
Without seeing her face, I could tell she was the most beautiful woman on earth. I could tell the painter took enough time and was delicate as this painting was brought to life.
“Who painted this?” I found myself asking.
“An infamous painter,” he told me.
“Why is he infamous?”
“He betrayed his pack. He left them when he was supposed to protect them.” He paused. His expression hardened and he swallowed.
“Where is the painter now?” I asked him.
“Gone,” he stated, his voice heavy. “He’s just gone,”
I hummed. “So…” I drawled, “who is this woman?”
“His first love. The woman he has ever and will ever love. He never saw her grow up. He lost her when she was still a young silly girl. He thought he just found her adorable back then but he actually loved her. So he used his paintings to imagine how she would look like now,” he explained with adoration in his eyes. His gaze made the pit of my stomach turn. I felt like his statement was directed at me.
And it also brought me sadness. He made me remember Lyell. It was just like this painter’s story. I always found him weird and annoying when we were young but when I lost him, I realized it was more than that. I cherished him and I loved him. Even more than myself. Is he alive out there somewhere? I always ask myself.
That’s why I gotta leave this place. I have to find Lyell. Even though I die trying. I gotta find him, so we would take back what is rightfully ours from the vampires.
“So..” I managed to say. “Did he ever meet her again?” I asked him and he nodded.
“He did but things are different now,”
“How different?”
“The girl hates him,”
I frowned. “Why?”
Doesn’t she feel the same way as he feels for her?”
“Because she hates him now. The painter has changed so much that she couldn’t recognize him.”
I hummed. “I see. But why can’t the painter just tell her who he really is?” I asked. “I mean… if she realized he’s her friend from childhood, she won’t be cold to him anymore,”
“He doesn’t want that,”
I cocked my brow, “why?”
He was about to speak when a knock came at the door.
“Alpha,” Xena’s voice came in, completely ruining my mood. Ugh! Here she comes.
“What is it?”
“You really need to see this,”
She sounded disturbed. Akira and I exchanged expressions.
“Let’s go,” he said and I nodded. We exited the room and followed Xena to the pack market. The sight I encountered made me yelp in fright.
“What happened here?” Akira demanded angrily. Riaz came in running.
“Alpha, he came staggering in covered in blood. The last word he said was ‘they are coming.'” Riaz explained. I peeked at the dead body of the man on the floor. He was covered in blood but he looked pale. Like all the blood in his body was drained.
I stepped towards the corpse but Xena stopped me. “What are you doing?”
“I’m just gonna check it,” I told her. She tried to protest but Akira stopped her.
“Let her be, Xena,”
I bent beside the corpse and turned his neck sideways. Just as I suspected, there were bite marks on his neck.
“He was bitten by a vampire,” I stated and fearful murmurs erupted from the crowd.
I touched the blood on his body and sniffed it. “This blood is a mixture of his own and the attacker’s. He fought until his last breath,” I said, my voice almost breaking down.
“Daddy!” A little girl’s cry came from the crowd.
“Dad!” Her cries became louder as she rushed out of the crowd to meet her father. Her heartbroken cry filled everywhere as she got to see the state her father was in. The girl looked small. Six years old at most.
“Daddy,” she choked out, shaking her father’s lifeless body. I went to her and pulled her into a hug despite her resistance. She shook violently in my arms as she wept while I tried to keep my tears in check.
“It’s okay, it’s okay.” I kept assuring her.
“Who is this man?” Akira asked.
“He’s the main supplier of bread,” a man replied. “His wife died while birthing Isabella,” he explained. “He was all she has but now he’s gone.” He concluded sadly.
Akira bent over the corpse and touched a black liquid on the man’s shoulder. He brought it to his nose and sniffed it. The liquid looked very familiar.
“Can I smell that?”
He brought his hand to my nose and I sniffed his finger. Black lotus. I could recognise that deadly smell anywhere. There is only one place where this poison is being used.
Raven Pack.
Darco is on our trail.