Wake Me Up | Theo Raeken

0.18 I'm Not Leaving

"I don't blame you for leaving me; I blame myself for not being good enough."

"Let me out of here!" Aden demands as she bangs on the bars of the cage that Derek has entrapped her inside of.

"Not until you learn control." Derek states casually.

"I won't hurt anyone, I swear!" Aden pleads and Derek lets out a laugh.

"Really? May I remind you that you just ripped Theo's finger off. Sweetheart you can't go around ripping peoples fingers off."

"He deserved it! He's a psychopath" Aden yells as she tries to rationalize ripping someones finger off.

"It doesn't matter if he deserved it! The more you give into your dark side the faster it will take over! That means no blood, none. It also means that you have to keep your anger under control." Derek states as he watches Aden through the bars.

"If you're going to keep me locked up in here the least you could do is answer some of my questions."

Derek walks away for a few seconds to grab a stool to sit on.

"Shoot."

Aden thinks for a few seconds about which question she wants to ask her biological father first.

"Do I have any brothers or sisters?"

"No." Derek says as he shakes his head quickly as if he is relieved that he doesn't have anymore children.

"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" Aden asks.

"I have a 17 year old little sister named Cora who is currently living in South America." Derek tells Aden deciding to spare Aden on knowing that everyone else in Derek's family had tragically died in a fire years ago.

"Oh. How'd you meet my mom?" Aden asks bluntly, hitting a nerve in Derek.

"I was at a party, had a little to much to drink and boom you were created." Derek says summing his one night stand up into the least stomach turning way possible for Aden.

"So you didn't love her? You were just fućk buddies?" Aden asks with sadness in her tone.

She had hoped that there was some wonderful love story between her parents that lead to her creation but there wasn't. All she was, was the result of the failure to use a condom and that really hurt her.

"Aden, it doesn't matter if I loved your mom. I love you and thats all that matters." Derek says in attempt to cheer Aden up.

"You love me? But you don't even know me."

"I know that you're my daughter and that is enough."

"No it isn't." Aden states as her eyes begin to water. "Why didn't you ever come back for me?" Aden's voice cracks as she asks the question that she has been dying to ask.

"Baby I did, I came back for you. You just weren't there." Derek says as a tear rolls down his check as he remembers the moment fifteen years ago in the hospital when he found out his daughter was no longer there. "Your mom died during childbirth and there was no one else there, one of the doctors adopted you and swept it under the rug. I looked for you for two years before I found you. But when I finally found you, you already had two responsible parents that loved you. You had a mother and that was something I could have never given to you. It would have been selfish of me to try and take you away from your family. I had to do what was best for you, regardless of what I wanted to do. You were going to have a better life with the Dunbar's than you would have ever had with me. I had to let you go, but it did not mean that I didn't love you because I love you more than anything in this world. I always will." Derek finishes as he opens the door to pull his daughter into a long needed hug.

"I'm not leaving, okay? Not again. I love you baby." Derek whispers as he wraps his arms around his daughter.

"I love you too, daddy."