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“Very well. I have an interrogation to oversee.” My dad leans in and kisses my forehead. The warmest, most wholesome gesture he’s ever offered me. I wish I’d gotten that growing up, but I have to admit, I’m glad to have it now and though it may take some time for me to get used to, I look forward to attempting to develop a real father-daughter relationship with him in the future.
“Sit with me,” Kane says, inviting me to sit next to him on the bed.
“I had hoped to get you here at some point tonight, but not to talk,” I say, trying to lighten the mood at bit.
This has been the most fucked up Christmas ever. The best and worst one I’ve ever had all at the same time. I’m so fucking ready for it to be over.
“And I’m more than happy to give you the time in bed you want. I just hope that after you hear what I’m about to tell you, you’ll still want me.”
“Kane. You can shift into a wolf. I’ve seen you kill several people. I’m fully aware you’ve killed others before—.”
“I killed your real father,” Kane blurts.
I gasp, leaning away from my mate. “You—. Why?”
“After your mother died, he wanted to take you away from us. He didn’t think you were safe here.”
“He knew your secret?”
“Not that we’re shifters. Considering the business he’s in, he didn’t think Dimitri was fit to be a father. Even though you weren’t blood, you were Dimitri’s pup. He wasn’t going to let anyone take you away from us. And neither was I.”
“So, you killed him? He was my father. He could have given me the human life Dimitri claimed I deserved. You should have let me go with him. Let him raise me instead of forcing me to basically raise myself, surrounded by lies.”
“Even if he’d been a good and decent man, you are a member of this pack.”
“He wasn’t? A good man, I mean?”
“Over the four years he spent trying to take you back, we discovered things about him. In the end, one thing in particular that if we’d let you go with him… Alice, there’s no telling what he would have done to you. Or let happen to you.”
My stomach churns trying not to imagine what Kane’s implying. But after the threat that man gave me tonight, there’s one place my mind can’t help but go and I want to be sick for it.
“Your mother didn’t know. It took us a lot of time and digging to find the truth about him.”
“Why dig?” Not that I’m upset they found out they were right to keep me away from him, but if they never planned on handing me over to him, why bother looking for a reason not to?
“He was never going to stop. He thought you were owed to him. I was looking for a reason to stop him.”
“To kill him,” I clarify.
“And I found it. Confirmed it. Then, followed through on it.”
“Four years…” I say, putting the timeline together. My mom died of cancer when I was four years old. Kane killed my dad four years later. “You left after you killed him.”
Kane confirms it with a dip of his chin.
“Why’d you have to leave? He was dead. It was over.”
“I was stupid. Blind with rage. Someone saw me kill him. Ran off before I could ID them. Without their face or their scent to find them first, the risk of them ratting me out was too great. Dimitri and I decided it was best if I disappeared for a while.”
“Ten years,” I say, implying heavily it was excessive.
“I killed your father. If I’d come back too soon and that guy resurfaced and decided to turn me in, you would have gotten dragged into it. You were still a kid. It wouldn’t have been fair to put you through that.”
“Why you? Why didn’t Dimitri kill him? Or anyone else in the pack?”
Kane hunches over, resting his arms on his thick thighs. “Because I knew,” he says gently. “Even then and even though I never admitted it to anyone, not even myself, I knew you were my soul mate. I couldn’t bear to let anyone live who would do you harm. As hard as it was to leave you, it was the right thing to do. Fate wouldn’t reveal the bond to you until you were older and I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself from murdering any boy you dated or those you just showed interest in or they in you. All Dimitri wanted was for you to have as normal a human life growing up as he could give you. I would have fucked that up for both of you. Killing your father gave me a damn good reason to finally do the right thing. To leave.”
I almost have to chuckle at that last bit. I couldn’t agree less that leaving was the right thing to do, but it’s over now and I understand his reasons.
