Imperious.

Part XXVIII: Emilia

© 2014 XxNotTonightXx.

All Rights Reserved

Author's Note: Please vote and comment, it helps.

Pages: 110 - 112

E M I L I A -

Tom greets me as soon as I enter our home with a beaming smile and open arms and I try to bring myself to smile back at him. At the very least, I attempt to return his hug, but I can't. Not with what I've just learned, not with this stinging sensation of betrayal coursing through my veins, weighing down on me like an anchor at sea.

Surprisingly, Tom seems to understand that I can't speak or return his affection, so he takes me upstairs instead of questioning me. He quietly goes to work, slowly taking off my clothes until I'm left in nothing but my panties before walking into the closet. I don't hide myself from him; I can't even if I wanted to. He comes back shortly and puts a tank top over my head and lifts my legs to dress them in shorts before bringing me back downstairs into the living room. Sitting down, he pulls me into his lap where I lay my head on his shoulder and shiver as I feel him run his hands through my hair and up and down my back.

The tears I felt coming finally blur my vision and I don't try to wipe them away. I don't think I have it in me to try and wipe them away. How could she?

The ride back from the prison gave me time to think. Too much time to think. I put a lot of confused pieces together, like the nightmare I had so long ago. The man in the nightmare had to have been about him. Gabriel said my mom was afraid for him and afraid of him. And in my nightmare I didn't have to see the person, but I heard his voice, so commanding and so full of anger. Then there was my mom: I didn't have to see her either but I know she was scared, I could hear it in the quake of her voice. This man hurt my mom, and he's the one who's also in charge of the rebellion.

"Tom, babe, could you please go into the office and get the photos in the top drawer of the desk?" I ask suddenly, looking up at him.

"Yeah." He says, glancing at me uneasily. Unwrapping himself from around me, he kisses my forehead lightly and leaves me with my thoughts.

I just don't see how she could've done this. My mother, who always instilled in me that I had to do the right thing, that I had to put my needs of the pack before anything else, how could she then turn around and do the things she told me not to do? It just doesn't make sense.

Tom comes back and sets the photos down in front of me. Opening them for the first time, I look at the pictures taken of the dead she-wolves. Each she-wolf looks so different from each other - some are black, some are white, some are asian - but it doesn't matter, because they each have one terrible thing in common. Why hadn't I looked at these before? I would have noticed them.

"They all have the same claw marks on their backs." Tom says quietly, and I feel my throat clog up in both anger and sadness.

Gabriel was right about it all and I'm right about my nightmare. The person my mother was hiding is behind this entire rebellion. Every dead she-wolf has the same deep, long, angry claw marks on their backs that were on my mother's the day she died.

This is all her fault. My mother kept secrets, my mother allowed herself to get hurt, my mother unconsciously allowed this person to start a rebellion. She put herself before the needs of her pack. She unknowingly left me and the other Alphas to clean up her mess years later because she didn't have to guts to do it herself. She's the reason why these she-wolves are dead, their innocent spilled blood is on her dead hands.

I idolized her. I looked up to her, to a liar. I wanted to be like her. I wanted to run this pack like her. She seemed to be so great, but when it came down to it, she put someone else over the safety of this pack. She should have killed him but she was too selfish to do what was right and he killed her instead. What if he had killed me or her mate? Or random members of this pack? What would she have done then? I wonder if she ever fought back when he was hurting her. I wonder if it ever crossed her mind that what she was doing was wrong.