Suppressed Rage
BRUCE
I’ve been reduced to nothing more than a puppet.
Walter Hart’s puppet.
I’m completely powerless in my own home. Megan has been locked in her room because she wouldn’t stop trying to fight her mother and Walter, and there’s nothing I can do for her. In fact, I think it’s best if she stays away from all this, even if it’s against her will.
Nothing good will come of her fighting and I’m afraid she’ll get hurt the way Quinton did.
I don’t know if my brother is truly hurt or not, but I haven’t heard from him in days and I know Walter has him. I can only assume that he’s being locked away somewhere. The only reason why I don’t think he’s being tortured or spending is because of his mother’s involvement with Walter.
She wouldn’t let him hurt her biological son, would she?
I don’t know. I thought I knew that woman. I called her ‘mom’ for years. Hell, she’s the only mother I ever knew. But it seems that she didn’t feel the same way.
She’s my biggest disappointment to date.
If I ever find a way out of this, I’ll never forgive her.
Thanks to her, I’m forced to do everything Walter tells me to do. I have to sign warrants for arrests of Alphas who refuse to cooperate. I have to give him the order to invade a certain part of the city where the rogues live. If I don’t play along, Opal dies. He knows where she is, but I don’t, so I have to trust him or risk losing everything I love.
I can’t risk losing her.
I’ve made a lot of mistakes. I keep remembering how my father told me not to trust Walter Hart completely, but I ended up doing it anyway. I should’ve never allowed him into our home.
Into our lives.
But if that hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have met Opal. This situation was doomed from the start.
I wasn’t able to save her, so this is my only chance to do that.
The door of my office opens with no warning or any knock. Walter strides in like he owns the place, smiling. “Son, it’s a wonderful day. Why are you in here, sulking?”
I clench my jaw hard and ignore him. He walks toward the cabinet where I keep all my liquor and pours himself a glass of scotch. I ignore him and look away from his face when he turns around to face me.
“Everything’s going according to plan,” he claims before taking a sip. “In no time, you’ll be reunited with Opal.”
I should slit his throat. Every day, I ask myself if the world wouldn’t be a better place with Walter Hat out of circulation.
But I’ve become a prisoner in my own home. My men were killed ruthlessly and were replaced by him.
Even my Beta was killed.
“I have one last order for you.” He walks toward my desk, then sets the glass down. I glare at it, focusing all my attention on it so I won’t do anything stupid. “As I said, we’re close to ending this and we’ll both get what we want from this. Are you ready to hear it?”
“Why don’t you stop wasting time and just tell me?” I bark.
Walter chuckles. “Now, now, son. This is no way of speaking to your superiors. Maybe I should have my men drag you outside so I can teach you a lesson.”
As soon as the words leave his lips, I’m on my feet. I wrap a hand around his throat and squeeze as hard as I can. Because of the traces of silver still in my system, I can’t shift. If I could, I’d rip him apart.
Walter’s face starts to get red but in a matter of seconds, the door behind me opens and a whole group of his guards walk in.
I’m hit in the back of the head with something heavy enough to make me see stars. Black creeps along the edge of my vision and my knees weaken. Before I can recover, I’m hit again, and this time, I do see black. My hand slips from his neck and I sink to my knees.
Walter tries to recover from the unexpected attack, coughing and clearing his throat. Gradually, I start seeing again. There’s a group of six men standing behind, and I zero in on the guy with the bat who just hit me. I hold his gaze, but he stares back at me with a vacant expression.
“You…” Walter begins before breaking into a fit of coughs. “You made a big mistake just now! I told you that we were close to ending this and that you’d get what you want! Do you want Opal to die? Is that it? What about your brother?”
I don’t say a word. His words infuriate me all over again. If I could shift, the walls of this room would be splattered with his blood.
Walter steps toward me. There’s a furrow between his brows and for the first time since I met him, he looks enraged as I feel. Good. He should know that there’s nothing for him to smile about.
“Will you keep playing along or not? Tell me, have you changed your mind? If that’s the case, then tell me right now and I can tell my men here that we won’t have to worry about you anymore. Is that what you want?”
I keep my lips pressed together, not saying a word. Walter straightens his back and commands his men to leave the room. “He’s going to behave. I know he will.”
I struggle to get on my feet because I won’t be looking up at him. Walter reaches for his scotch and takes a deep gulp.
“Good,” he remarks once I start toward my seat. “Now that that’s taken care of, we can move on to what really matters.”
He slides a document in front of me, and all I can do is stare at it while feeling hollow on the inside.