Chapter 75 Chapter 75:

Chapter 75 Chapter 75:
The Darkness:

Red and I are waiting in the car, while Gia is in the hospital, she specifically told us not to come in. She’s still angry at me, not even saying anything to me.

I don’t blame her though; second chances are rare for people like me. Earlier, I had met with the doctor who told me about the Primordial Wolf blood, and deciding to give Enrique has been entirely my decision.

“Stay in the car, Red. I am going in.” I tell him, opening the door, but of course, Red trails behind me, hands tucked into his coat jacket. Together, we walk into the doctor’s office, and while everyone’s scared to see me, Enrique’s father yells the most at me.

However, the moment I tell them I am here to transfer my blood, the room falls quiet. Gia stares up at me from her wet lashes, batting away the tears. Something squeezes inside me, seeing her cry like this, it does something to me.

Finally, Enrique’s father says, “we don’t want your blood.” I raise my brows at him and his wife nudges him in the shoulders, her eyes pleading.

“Why are you doing this?” Gia’s twin brother, Tyler asks, his face red from anger. “Do you think by saving Enrique, we are going to accept you as our family?”

I shake my head, not even smiling. “I am not doing any of this to gain your approval.” They stare at me hard, and yes it’s true. I am not doing this so they can like me. They don’t and I am not forcing anyone to like me.

“Do you want my blood or not?” I direct my gaze to Anna’s parents; I am running out of patience. “I can leave if you want me to.”

“No.” Enrique’s father says, his voice cracking. Desperation can lead to countless things; it makes you lower your pride. “Doctor, will this work?”

“Well, maybe. The chances are pretty low and we can lose Alpha Enrique in the process, it’s a possibility.”

“Doctor, even if we don’t go through the surgery, we are going to lose my son. So hurry up and start the damned surgery.” Enrique’s father angrily says, I don’t blame him, he’s hanging on the hope that his son has a chance of staying alive, even if it’s low.

“When do we start?” Anna’s mother says, her voice thin with hope.

“I have to place a call to the surgeon, depending. He can be here in thirty minutes; we will get the surgeon room ready for operation.” The doctor says, “thank you for doing this once again, Alpha Dominic.”

They all look at me like they want to say something, but their eyes shine with gratefulness. Soon I am in the reception room, sitting down and waiting for the doctor to call me into the operation room. For a moment, I consider bringing out the cigarette in my coat pocket but I am about to go into surgery, so I decide against it.

I smell her perfume first, messing up with my mind. I cast my eyes up to see Gia standing there, wrapped in a cashmere sweater, her burgundy hair plastered across her face. She looks really tired, more exhausted but there’s this way her gray eyes shine, lifting away her moody spirits.

“Why are you doing this?” She asks, still standing there. Gia knows me as the type of person that does everything for a reason, and she’s right. I do have a reason.

“It’s personal.” I answer her, standing up. I stand in front of her.

“Thank you.” She breathe out the words to me, her bottom lip quivering, “thank you so much, Dom.”

I look at her- for the past few days, she has been calling me Dominic but now, she calls me Dom, it’s a bit of progress. She locks eyes with me, and I can feel the weight of her emotions pressing down at me, her pain, her vulnerability, all so raw it’s killing me slowly.

A tear slides down her face and I step closer, placing my palm on her cheek, saying gently. “Don’t cry, angel.”

She doesn’t respond, her body trembling. “You are making it hard for me to hate you, Dom.”

Goddess, that nearly reels me in. She wants to hate me, hell I want her to hate me, because I know that I don’t deserve her forgiveness or her kindness or seeing her smile, or even waking up beside her early in the mornings, but fuck. I don’t want her to hate me.

The feelings press harder into me as I pull a strand of her hair behind her ear. “Then don’t.”

Her eyes glisten with more tears and it breaks me to see her break down like this, in a hospital for that matter. I am not an angel, I am very far from that word, it hurts to say that an angel doesn't deserve to be with a monster.

Monsters don’t get happy ever after, we don’t beg for forgiveness. If I open my mouth and apologize, what difference will it make? I can’t take back the hurt I caused her, I can’t take back that painful look in her eyes when she found out I was using her.

“I-I just...” she stutters, her voice breaking. Looking over her shoulder, I see Tyler shooting me a hard glare, clenching his fists as if he wants to punch the living daylights out of me. I remove my hand from her as she runs over to him, burying her face into his chest, her shoulders trembling as she holds on to him like he is the only thing keeping her from breaking down.

I am the one causing her to hold on to someone. Tyler takes her away leaving me there, cramming my knuckles. In all my life, I have never hated myself to this much extent. My demons come back now that she’s gone, pricking at me, the voices in my head are getting loud again.

The memory of little me standing there while watching my father’s friends talk him into banishing my mother without being able to do anything. The feeling of being useless starts to creep in.

“Hey.” Nixie’s soft voice drags me back to reality. “Thanks for doing this, bro.”

I look at Nixie, she looks fresh, her hair pulled back into braids, I am not the type of person to convince my younger sister to come back home, because I know she wouldn’t.

“No problem.” The thickness returns at the back of my throat.

Nixie sighs. “You don’t look good, Dominic.” She says gently and I look elsewhere to see Anna approaching us, she picks at the wool of her sweater, her look a mixture of guilt and gratefulness.

“Thank you,” Anna says thickly when she reaches us.

“Yeah.” I say back.

“Please help us save Irene, Gia already found out her location. You are the only one who can get her out.” Nixie says.

“No.” I reply, staring at their stunning faces, “Irene doesn’t need saving. Nobody does, she will save herself. I am sure of that.”

“What? That makes no sense at all.” Anna’s voice thickens a bit.

“I already told Red everything. He knows what to do, leave it all to me, okay?”

They look at me like they don’t trust me, but Anna’s face finally softens. They nod at me before leaving.

Bringing out my phone, I dial a number.

“Hello?” The person’s voice on the other end sounds soft. “What is it, Dom?”

“I love you, mom.” My voice thickens with emotion. The other line reigns with silence as I bite my lips, waiting for her next words.

“What happened, Dom? Did something happen? Are you dying?” Her voice cracks and for a second, I can almost hear her crying.

“No, mom. I just wanted to let you know how much I love you.” It pains me when I realize that it has been so long since I said those words to her.

Finally, I hear her break into a sob. “Oh baby, I love you so much.”

“Thanks, mom. I have to go now.” I disconnect the call to see a nurse coming to me.

“Alpha Dominic, it’s time for surgery.”

I nod my head. “Okay.”

\--

Irene:

It’s very surprising how much someone can age when they have given up on life. I have refused to eat any food, if I might die, I may as well die from hunger. Is that even a thing? Goddess, I hope so.

Even Dante is surprised at how I have been returning the bowls of mashed rice, uneaten. At least they aren’t cuffing me again, so I am free to move my hands whenever I wish, however. I would have preferred if they left the damn cuff on me. My stomach rumbles, a consequence of returning the bowls.

“Hey.” A quirky voice says, I look up to see one of Dante’s men scowling at me. “Get up, Queen Irene.” He says mockingly, opening the iron bar. Getting up to my feet is even worse, what I will give to have a simple sandwich. I try to grip his shoulders for support but he ends up shoving me roughly, so I stumble on my feet while muttering fuck under my breath.

“Come out to the living room.” He doesn’t even bother waiting for me and while I consider that very rude, I also consider myself very hungry to retaliate. Together, we walk towards the living room and a man wearing a long coat is already seated there, looking at the ground while tapping his feet against the floor.

My breath catches in my throat, fresh hope brimming inside me. “Enrique?”

He looks up at me, dark green eyes not leaving me. All earlier hope vanishing into thin air, I say lamely, “Red.”

Red waves for the guard behind me and he leaves us alone, the living room feels cold just standing there and looking like a complete loser. “Are you here to torture me the more after killing Enrique? Or did that scumbag Dominic tell you to come here?”

Red smirks, honestly all this guy does is smirk like a demi-god. “You don’t look too healthy.”

“Fuck you, Red. Just fuck you.” The anger in me is enough for me to lunge myself at him and destroy that hideous hair of his, but hunger has me glued to the floor without moving. The only thing I can give him is a very angry glare.

“Well, I will make this quick.” Red stands up, reaching for his coat pocket. Walking over to me, he hands me an envelope. “You can read it here; Dante knows I am here, so you won’t get in trouble.” He smirks again and I want to slap it out of his face, but my hand probably feels like jelly, so I debate over it.

How dare he and Dominic? After giving me to Dante and killing Enrique, they have the fucking guts to hand me an envelope.

I throw the envelope to the floor and I do what I should have done a long time ago, I slap him across the face so hard that my hand stings. He rears back, taken aback. It would have been better if that fucker, Dominic is here so I can slap him as hard as this.

“You killed him!” My body trembles as tears sputter from my eyes, “You and Dominic killed my husband!”

Red just stares at me calmly before wrapping his hands around me, at first I try to kick him out of my grip but he tightens his hand around my body and I collapse into him, sobbing like a mess.

His hands find my hair and he strokes gently, while I sob harder.

“It’s going to be okay.” He says gently, holding me as if I might break in any moment from now.

“It’s not going to be okay,” I remind him, crying harder.

He releases me from the hug, bend and grab the paper. Handing it over to me, he smiles gently. “Just read the letter, Dominic wrote it himself.”

He hands it over to me, before leaving the room. Before he goes, he hands me a wrapped sandwich and winks. “Don’t tell anyone, but I am really great at reading minds, I knew you craved this.” 

My hands tremble as I grab it from him. “Thank you.”

When he leaves, I sit on the chair and munch on the sandwich hungrily, the moment I munch on it, a mix of pain and pleasure explodes in my tightened stomach, afterwards when I am done with the sandwich, I peel open the envelope, bringing out a letter with Dominic’s readable handwriting.  

I begin reading.

Irene,

I don’t remember the last time I sat down to write a letter, but well. I am not writing this letter to apologize to you, because I don’t ever say sorry. 

Look, in all my life, I feel like I haven’t helped anybody, but I am helping your husband by giving him my Primordial blood, he’s going to live, Irene.

It’s my choice, I could have chosen not to help him but I am doing this for you because I know what it’s like being trapped in a prison and to give up on hope. For years, I have been trapped in a prison of self-doubt and unease and these demons keep coming back. And then I found Gia, and she just chased those demons away.

She gave me a reason to hope again, to see life the way ten year old me had seen it before it all shattered; bright and cheerful. You hate me now, I am not asking you to like me, I am only giving you a reason to live life. By the time you are reading this letter, I should have already been in surgery.

In life, don’t wait for someone to save you. Save yourself, you can do it, Irene.

The letter ends and my eyes are getting misty with tears. At the end of the letter; Dominic included the address of the hospital on the table. I spot a glistening knife; Dominic must have told Red to leave it there, for me.

Strength begins to fill me again. Hope to live. A reason to be strong.

“Thank you, Dominic.” I say with tears in my eyes, he might not be the prince charming that everyone desperately needs, but he’s the type of man that never leaves you. Just by reading this letter, he taught me one thing, I have to fight to live.

The door creaks open and Dante walks in, looking smug as usual. Quickly, his eyes fly towards the knife on the table, his brows rising. I don’t think twice before I hurriedly grab it and lunge at him.