last Hope

The Truth

Luca

Something’s wrong, she looked too scared when I snuck up on her. She didn’t look surprised, she looked terrified. On top of that, I could feel just a fraction of her fear through the mate bond. 

So I take her up to my room to get some answers. “It’s time for you to tell me what happened.” 

She gives me a sad look with eyes full of pain and whimpers quietly. A pain shoots to my heart at the sound and I can see the brokenness in her eyes and feel her heart aching from the hardships she’s gone through. But she smiles softly through the pain and suffering and says, “Where should I start?” 

I pause for a moment and try to take in all of the emotions and pain being exposed to me then tell her, “At the beginning.” 

And she did. She told me everything. 

She told me about how she didn’t know what was going on until after they had left the pack ten years ago. How her Mom left countless times and her Dad chased after her until she completely dropped off the map about two years ago. She told me how she’s had to pretty much raise her two younger brothers, Daniel and Andrew. She starts to cry when she gets into talking about how her Dad started drinking and beating her about a year ago, blaming their Mom leaving on her. She then showed me some of the countless scars on her small body, all at different stages of healing. New ones forming into scars and old ones that have long since become embedded into her skin. I see red and my blood starts to boil. I can feel Leo starting to take over. 

She tries to calm me down and keep him at bay, but she’s still crying and trying to calm herself down at the same time. I calm down a little for the moment and manage to get Leo back under control. 

‘We need to be by her side to comfort her right now. To protect her. Not run off on a rampage!’ I scold him, but he just ignores me. 

“I will never let anyone touch you again. Do you understand me?” Leo starts to surface again, forcing his way up to try and show her we’re going to protect her. Lily nods while I press her against my chest again, calming both of us almost instantly as well as brings Leo back under control, purring at her touch like a cat. 

I scold him again. ‘What are you, a cat?’

‘Oh shut up, you know you like it too.’ I only roll my eyes at him not being able to deny it as he retreats to the back of my mind, still softly purring. 

-

Once we both calm down completely and she stops crying I tell her she should move into the packhouse with me. “We’re mates anyway so it’s going to happen sooner or later. I need to protect you.” 

“No, I can’t leave my brothers. I can’t let them think I abandoned them.” She has fresh tears starting to form in her eyes threatening to fall once again as she says this. Seeing this, I pull her close to me again. Trying my best to comfort her, while my wolf yells at me. 

‘Good job, you made her cry again!’ He growls. 

‘I didn’t mean to and you know it!’ He doesn’t say anything and just retreats to the back of my mind again. 

“OK, but only for now. I'll figure something out, but if he lays a hand on you again I’m forcing you to move out.” 

I’ll have to talk to my father about this. 

Once she’s calmed down again she falls asleep in my arms, exhaustion written all over her face. Leo resurfaces. ‘She’s so beautiful. It breaks my heart to see her crying face and all the scars of her past.’ 

‘I know, me too.’ I say this to him calmly, trying not to let my emotions take over again. 

I leave her to sleep while I head in the direction of my Father's office to talk to him as well as Lily’s Dad. However, as soon as I see the bastard that hurt my mate, my best friend, I almost tear his head off. 

Almost. 

Sadly my Dad stops me before I get the chance to. 

“Explain yourself, now!” My Father demands, his wolf starting to surface as he tries to hold me back. 

“That bastard hurt my mate!” Leo has pretty much taken over now and we’re practically screaming in his face. Contrary to the way I’m acting, he doesn't even flinch. 

“I haven’t touched anyone.” 

He says this so calmly, and so guiltlessly we lose it even more. My father is still holding me back though. But just barely. 

“You lying bastard! Try saying that without my Father holding me back! I dare you.” 

“Who are you talking about? Since when did you find your mate?!” My father questions me while struggling to detain me. 

“It's Lily.” I say this with a deathly serious face and look Lily’s Father straight in the eye while saying it. 

The look on his face is priceless. He looks horrified and angry at the same time that his daughter is my mate. The mate of his future Alpha. 

“That worthless little b***h is your mate? I feel bad that you got stuck with that useless girl.” He’s almost laughing as he says this, seriousness oozing from his every word. 

The nerve of him. Leo and I are both thinking. 

My Dad loosened his grip on me without realizing it and I take the opportunity to pounce on the son of a b***h. I manage to give him a black eye, busted lip, and a bloody nose before my father manages to get me off of him. 

‘I think we broke his nose? Good.’ My wolf says, a weird smile forming on his mouth. Well, snout. 

I smile to myself and my wolf, silently praising him. 

“If you ever touch her again I won’t hesitate to kill you and take her and you will never see any of them again. You can count on it.” 

He gives me a dirty glare before briefly looking at my father and storming out. No doubt he’s pissed about what just happened. 

My Father finally lets me go when he knows Lily’s Dad is gone. 

“What the hell! You couldn’t talk to me before you attacked and threatened him?!” My Dad looks furious, his wolf surfacing as he says this. 

I had intended to talk to him first, but that obviously didn’t work out. 

‘No point in trying to tell him that now.’ Leo says as he retreats. 

‘Ya, no thanks to you.’ He is such an asshole. 

‘I heard that.’ 

‘Good.’ That ends our conversation and I turn back to a furious Alpha. 

“Tell me exactly what that was about.” He says this slowly as he makes sure to enunciate carefully, anger masked in every word. 

And I did. I started with finding Lily last night and then went on to tell him exactly what she had told me. 

He was speechless and had a look of horror on his face. By the end me and Leo were just as pissed as when she had told me earlier. My father didn’t exactly look pleased either. 

“How could he do that to his own daughter. His children! That sounds nothing like the man I grew up with.” He has anger and confusion laced in his voice. 

We talk for a while about what we should do and we both agree that my mate and her brothers should not be left alone with that man. No. That monster. With that, I went up to my room to check on my Lily. However, I did not expect what I found. 

She was gone.