Chapter 114
“Darian fell in love with Ophelia when they were sixteen. She was that girl, the one that every guy drooled over, she was excessive in everything she did but also obsessed with Darian,”
“But wait, did she die or not?”
“Five years ago there was talk of a power struggle, the Council was hounding Darian for a more equal share of power over Valeria and they knew things…. things about our family history and sensitive business that they shouldn’t. Just to test her loyalty, Darian told Ophelia that the Council would be gaining more power, that he would give up certain territories and relinquish thirty percent control,” Gabe downed the drink and poured another. He was about to set the carate down on the bar but shook his head and brought it to the desk.
“Two days later the Council called a meeting and expected to hear good news but when they saw Darian’s confusion over the meeting, the masks fell and true intentions showed. I don’t have to tell you the shitstorm that followed, right?”
All of this and still he hasn’t told me if she’s dead or not.
Gabe was emptying the crystal carafe alarmingly fast but it didn’t look like the liquor was getting to him.
“When Darian asked why they set the meeting, the blood bitch entered. She’d been fooling around with a member of the Council and told them that she was leaving Darian now that they would be gaining more power, She was a title-chasing mutt who spread her legs for anyone who could feed her,”
It did somewhat explain why his heart seemed to be made of coal, it was broken by someone he trusted. Everyone thought Ophelia was dead but she left him for another, and not just a random person but someone who was conspiring against him.
“Fast forward to the annual Hunt and my brother receives a letter. The letter was an invitation to play a game and the instructions for the first scene were attached; He was to participate in The Hunt to which he laughed- he was to take a mate, he almost fell out of the window laughing at that; and he was to, and I quote, ‘shatter her walls and bend her will until she breaks’.”
Thinking back to when I first met Darian in the pre-room, he was a tyrant, the evil shone in his eyes brighter than the gold that decorated the Alpha’s
common room.
The colors of red and blue and mahogany seemed bleak when I looked into his eyes before he marked me. Cold and distant. Uncaring and without humanity.
“I can’t feel bad for him,” I shook my head.
“I’m not asking you to, I’m asking you to understand why he did what he did. Or at least hear the truth and do with that what you will. Darian refused to play along, so he tossed the letter. Then another came- and another- until they piled on his desk and he called on a meeting to see what confused old fucker they’d put on the post. During the meeting, the Council members made it clear that he was to participate. They also informed him that the power shift they so kindly recommended five years ago was no longer up for negotiation. It was a done deal, and it wasn’t parts of territories, it was all of them. The Council wants full control of Valeria.”
“They can’t, he’s the King, there are rules,” I said.
“Yes, but rules quickly fade in matters of the heart. Sometimes love is the price for losing everything,”
Was he still talking about Ophelia? Who would want that bitch back after what she did? Was he so desperate to have her back that he considered playing this fucked up game… playing me?
“So he tortured me to get her back,”
Why did that hurt me? Everything he’s done has been malicious and they would follow me forever. Things that I would never allow to happen again. But knowing that he did those things because of another woman…that pain was different.
“Who?”
“Ophelia,” duh?
“No,” Gabe’s face twisted in disgust, “that bitch is dead if he ever sees her again.”
“Who then?”
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Chapter 114
Gabe sighed and walked around Darian’s desk. He took a key from under the carpet and unlocked the bottom left drawer but then he froze, his eyes glistened and it looked like he couldn’t move. He eventually leaned down and took something out before walking back to his drink but I couldn’t see what it was in his hands until he turned to me.
When he faced me I saw the brown furry animal in his hands. It was a stuffed wolf, the ones you give to kids, I had a similar one when I was little but mine was pink and I glued a carrot to its forehead.
“Kiera,” Gabe whispered and stroked the wolf’s head.
Kiera, the name Zade told me to say.
“Is that the wolf?”
=
He chuckled but it was tense and his eyes were hooded, brimming with ghosts and sadness when he raised his head.
“That’s his daughter, my niece, the happiest little kid you’ve ever met. She turns five this year,”
“Darian has a daughter? Where is she?”
The anger rose in him and I could tell that we were stepping into the hard part of the story but I couldn’t ask him to stop- I was finally getting some
answers.
“She was a few months shy of turning one when Ophelia left Darian but she didn’t do it in the normal, adult way. She packed her things in the middle of the night when Darian was out fighting and when he came back, both she and Kiera were gone. He searched far and wide, he wanted his pup back but they were gone, protected and hidden by the Council. When Darian refused to play their game they made it abundantly clear that they had her and would do what they had to ensure that he followed through.”
“They threatened a child? Where is her mother?”.
“Ophelia wants power, she didn’t take the girl because she loves her daughter, she took her to piss off Darian and make him hurt as much as possible for the stunt he pulled with Council. If Kiera can help bring Darian to his knees and the Council to take over power, I bet she was happy to hand the little girl over
to them,”
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