Filed to story: Sorry Alpha I Am Wolfless Novel
“No worries on that, Talia.” Joaquin’s voice was smooth and menacing. “Arthur won’t be bothering you ever again. Will you, Arthur?”
“R..r..really, I..I don’t know what you are t..t..t..talking about.” He was stuttering again.
“Drop it, Arthur.” I snapped at him. “What we need from you now is to know how big this whole thing goes. Who else is involved in this little mission of yours?”
“Fuck you.” The boy’s face changed from fear to anger. “I won’t tell you anything.” The words flew from his mouth as if they were filled with venom.
“What was that?” I asked him in a tone that was cool, calm, and frightening. The look in Arthur’s eyes told me that he was about to shit himself when he heard me speak. “Did you really say that to me?”
“I..I..I didn’t mean it.” He stammered and literally started to cry. “Please, I don’t know what happened. I am innocent. This is all someone’s plans to frame me. I didn’t do anything at all.”
“We know that you are lying, Arthur.” I spoke in that same tone and saw that the boy’s bowels truly were about to give way spontaneously. I had scared the shit out of him so to speak. “And if you do not tell us who it is that is behind this little mission of yours, then we will punish your entire family and pack. No one will be safe because we won’t know who to trust anymore. The choice is yours, Arthur. And you only have ten seconds to make that choice.” I wasn’t bluffing here. And I needed him to know that. “Ten. Nine.” I started to count down and saw the fear deepen in his eyes, but he kept silent. “Eight. Seven. Six.” He still didn’t say anything. He just kept looking at me with wide, frightened eyes. “Five. Four. Three.” He was sweating, but still didn’t say anything. “Two.” I was almost done counting and for a moment I thought for sure he was going to condemn his entire pack and family. “One.”
“ALRIGHT!” He screamed at me. “I WILL TELL YOU! JUST SPARE MY FAMILY!”
“You need to start talking, Arthur.” Joaquin growled at him, and that was the moment that I smelled something extremely unpleasant. He had shit himself. It wasn’t just a saying anymore. The boy had actually done it. “Eww. Disgusting.” Joaquin covered his nose.
“Yuck.” Talia turned away from him.
“I expected that.” Alexio glared at the smelly boy.
“I can’t believe you.” I waved a hand at him and cleaned up his mess. I didn’t want to smell that anymore at all.
“I am sorry.” He was sobbing and blushing in embarrassment. “I am so sorry.”
“Who was involved?” Joaquin demanded from him.
“The elders of our pack. And two of my cousins. They wanted to tie our family to the royal family. I really did like Talia when I first met her, and I didn’t have these plans until I came here for the battle. They had put me up to it and told me that there was no downside to it. I didn’t mean it when I said that you were stupid Talia. I don’t really think that at all.”
“I don’t care what you have to apologize for, Arthur. Don’t ever speak to me again.” Talia turned away from him and Alexio moved her to stand behind him. He was going to block her from the boy’s sight so he couldn’t see her anymore.
“I need names, Arthur.” Joaquin demanded from him. “Who are these people that we need to arrest?”
“My cousins Ronald and Theodore, and the elders William, Charles, Edward, and Henry. They were the ones that told me to do this. I..I am sorry, I never would have hurt Talia otherwise. You have to believe me.”
“We don’t have to do anything, Arthur.” I snapped at him. “But you do. You have to serve a minimum of ten years in the new prison that we have for people like you. And be damned glad that I am the person I am or you would be executed for this, this is treason.”
“B..b..but I am innocent in all this. They made me do it.”
“You could have said no.” Joaquin growled at him. “You could have made your own choice. And yet, you decided to let them tell you what to do, you spineless bastard. You aren’t worthy of my daughter. Not now and not ever.”
“I will call a guard to take you away.” I told him as I sent a mental message to Kiernan in the lower part of the castle. He responded right away and came through the door that I had made. I didn’t want this sniveling piece of shit in my office anymore. He would stay in the dungeon until we had the others in custody and then they would all go to prison at the same time.
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Riviana
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“Talia?” I called her and watched her step slowly around Alexio. Now that the sniveling asshole was out of my office, she didn’t feel the need to hide behind her guard anymore. I knew that she had to be feeling more emotions than she was letting on. She had liked the boy, and she found out that he was just using her. That had to hurt.
“Yes, Mom?” She gave me a look that was supposed to be calm and collected, but I wasn’t fooled by it.
“I am sorry, sweetheart.” I stepped closer to her and pulled her into my arms. “I am sorry that you had to go through that.”
“It’s OK, Mom. Really. I was starting to feel strange when I was around him anyway. Something didn’t feel right to me, and I guess now I know why.” She shrugged, but I still kept my arms around her. I was holding her against me and trying to comfort her as best as I could.
“That may be, but I know that this is still hard on you. I know that at least at one point you had feelings for that boy. Even if they were fleeting and didn’t make much sense, you still like him, and this betrayal must hurt you a lot.”
“I..I’m fine.” Her voice shook as she tried to say that, ruining the image that she wanted to show us.
…..
“Talia?” I squeezed her tighter and felt her come apart in my arms.
“Why did he do this to me, Mom? Why did he try to hurt me like this?”
“I don’t know, sweetheart. I don’t know.”
“Talia.” Joaquin came closer to us, his voice calm and filled with sadness. “I know that it’s not an excuse for what he did to you, there will never be an excuse, but I know that for some people, power corrupts all too easily. He and the others were blinded by the power that they thought they would get from associating with you. They thought that they would be able to manipulate us. But they underestimated us, Talia. They underestimated you. You are strong, smart, and way too good for them. You will bounce back from this, sweetheart. And in the end, you will be a stronger person for it.”
“I don’t want to be stronger because of something like this, Daddy.” She looked over at him. “I would rather that it never happened.”
“I know, sweetheart.” Joaquin wrapped his arms around us both and squeezed us both in a hug. “I wish I could make it all go away, sweetheart. I truly do. But I can’t and you know that. All we can do is move on and be stronger and better because of it.”