Judas's POV
"Sit," Father commanded, not even bothering to look at me.
I didn't. Instead, I leaned harder against the desk, the corner digging into my back. It didn't bother me. Hell, I welcomed the discomfort-it was better than dealing with this. Knowing damn well it'd piss him off. That's what my motive was anyway. He just ruined my morning. "If you have something to say, just say it."
He turned then and his dark eyes bore into mine before he sighed and pinched the bridge of his node. "You've become careless," he muttered coldly as if I was the biggest headache for him and not his precious daughter. "This is a safe house, not a brothel where you can bring any woman and fuck. She could be a spy for fuck's sake."
Any woman?
My lip unconsciously curled into a sneer. "She's a nobody," I said flatly. "Just a body I happen to like."
Strangely the words left my mouth like venom stinging me in my fucking throat. And they did. Father's eyes narrowed.
"Nobody?" he repeated and took a step closer. "Then why was nobody in that warehouse with Lucius Morozov?"
I didn't flinch, didn't look away. Anya snitched. That brat.
Instead, I chuckled. "She's harmless."
"Harmless," He mocked and my eyes narrowed. "You've always been good at lying, synok, but not to me. You're not just careless; you're distracted. And distractions are dangerous. Very dangerous."
My jaw tightened, and I forced myself to stay calm, though the urge to lash out gnawed at me. "I handled the warehouse. I handled the Morozov bastard. This is my business, and I'll deal with the fallout."
"Your business? Since when did killing men for a nobody become your business?"
"My business," I repeated slowly this time making sure he get the hint, "since you decided to let Anya run her mouth like a goddamn parrot. Maybe you should worry about keeping your golden child in check before lecturing me about who I bring around."
Father's expression didn't change, but I caught the subtle clenching of his jaw. A small victory, but I'd take it.
"You don't show emotions, synok," he said quietly. "And now you look pissed off."
"You see through shit, father. You just sound like mother and nothing more. Worried for nothing-"
Slap.
My head barely turned but shit…. It hurt.
"Do not disrespect your mother again. Not in front of me. She birthed you and raised you.
I blinked as my pulse hammered in my ears.
I licked my lip, tasting copper. Blood. Figures. The first time he raised his hand on me.
"She birthed me. But it wasn't love-it was duty. Let's not dress it up."
His hand twitched, but he didn't strike again. Shame.
"You're spiralling," he muttered. "I won't let you get yourself in danger again."
I chuckled. "Spiraling?" I repeated, a sharp grin splitting my face. "You think I'm in danger? I am not Zayne. And I will not sit till I have Morozov's blood on my hand."
"You're reckless,"
"I'm efficient," I shot back. "I get things done."
"Not at the stake of your life!" he snapped.
"Why the fuck do you care?!" I roared back.
"Judas,"
"No, don't Judas me," I snarled, stepping back and my breath becoming ragged. "Fuck! You're just like her. Pretend to fucking care when all you do is see me as a fucking monster!"
His eyes darkened, and for a fleeting moment, there was something there-pain, regret, guilt? It didn't matter. It wouldn't save him from my fucking wrath. I respected him. I thought he understood me.
"You think I wanted this?" I hissed feeling darkness inside me roaring. "You think I chose to be like this? Why am I the monster when it's not even my fucking fault for being born this way?"
He moved toward me, but I stepped back. All I saw was Alexei Volkov and not my father.
"Don't," I growled. "Don't fucking touch me. I don't need your pity. I don't need your lectures. I don't need you."
He straightened. The impenetrable, unflinching Alexei Volkov.
"You're not a monster," he said quietly. "You're my son."
His words hit harder than any slap could, and for a moment, I faltered, my throat tightening with something raw and unfamiliar.
"Then maybe you should've loved me like one," I scoffed. "Instead of building me into this... weapon. This thing that doesn't know how to fucking stop."
I stood there, staring at the man who gave me life but never taught me how to live it.
My jaw ached from clenching, my hands itching to break something. Him. Me. Everything.
Feel something.
Feel anything.
But there was nothing. Just the endless void. Like screaming into a fucking canyon and waiting for an echo that never comes.
He looked at me and I wondered if he ever felt it too. The emptiness. Or if he just built his walls so high that nothing could ever get in-or out.
"I didn't build you into anything," he said finally and I laughed. The voice of a man who always had control. "You're the one who chose this path."
I laughed. It wasn't funny, but I laughed anyway. A sharp, ugly sound that scraped at the walls. "Chose?" I echoed running a rough hand through my hair. "Right. Like I had a choice to begin with."
His expression didn't change. "You always had a choice, Syok," he said quietly.
Syok. Don't. Don't fucking call me that. I was not his son. Not biologically and not by name. He was just my Godfather I thought I looked up to.
"Yeah?" I sneered. "And what's my choice now? Feel nothing and survive? Or feel everything and drown? Because those are the options, Father. Those have always been the options."
I sneered. "But let me tell you something about the void. It's comforting. It's predictable. You stare into it long enough, and you stop caring about falling because you're already at the bottom."
He didn't flinch, but I could see it in his eyes-the recognition. The understanding. He was just like me. If not him. Then Ralph Romano was who always looked at me as if I was more unhinged than him.
"That's why I don't need to fucking stop. Because there's nothing to stop for."
For a moment he didn't say anything and I knew he had no words. "I'll handle Morozov," I said coldly. "And the next bastard. And the one after that. Don't worry about me, Father. I'm good at what I do."
I turned to leave. "And if you regret birthing a son like me, you should've killed me when I was a child."
For a second, I let myself feel it-the tightness in my chest, the rage that clawed at my insides-but then I crushed it. I was used to it by now. I was used to nothing.
I could feel his gaze boring into the back of my skull, and I didn't need to turn around to know the look on his face. The same one he'd always had when I stepped out of line when I killed that fucking bird-emotionless, illegible, and just... there. He didn't know how to fix me, and I didn't care enough to let him.
It wasn't love. It wasn't fucking care. It was duty. Always duty.
Maybe that's why I hated myself. Because no matter how much I tried to destroy everything I touched, there was still a part of me that wanted something I couldn't have. Something real. But it always crumbled to dust the moment I reached for it. Like sand slipping through my fucking fingers.
I clenched my fists, my nails digging into my palms as I forced my breathing to stay steady. The urge to break, to tear, to kill was bubbling just under the surface, but I kept it there. Kept it in check. Control. That was all I had left. Control.
When I opened my mouth, I was back in that abyss. "I'm not the same kid you used to look at with some sick hope that I'd turn out to be more. I'm not who you wanted me to be."
I could feel the bitter taste of blood again, the copper from the slap still lingering on my tongue, but I swallowed it down.
"At least your wife wanted to abort me," I muttered under my breath, the words slipping out like a ghost of a thought I never let myself say aloud. But it wasn't regret. No, it was just another way of proving that nothing mattered. Not to me, not to him.
My heart didn't beat like it should. It didn't feel like it was mine. It was just a rhythm, something mechanical, something I couldn't control. I wondered sometimes if I was already dead, just walking around, pretending. Or maybe I was a ghost in a body, stuck between worlds.
"She loves you-"
"Loves everyone but me." I laughed bitterly.
I didn't need to see his face to know he heard it. That was the truth I lived with every fucking day. He made me into this-into something that couldn't feel, something that destroyed anything that got close. My mother hated me. She was scared of me.
'You should've aborted him, Rara. He's just insane.'
I shut my eyes.
I didn't need love. I didn't need care. All I needed was blood. Blood that was already on my hands, blood that would always be on my hands.