Chapter 28
Eloise:
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The walls of my childhood room felt both comforting and suffocating all at once.
After the argument that I had with Lucy, I’ve been staying here in the bedroom.
I found myself feeling out of place and the weight of the conversation between Dominic and I did not make things any easier. The one
thing that held me together was my daughter. Her presence here was the one thing that kept me strong. Otherwise, I didn’t know what I
was going to do. I just found myself wondering how I was going to be able to deal with things. And I knew that now Dominic was
avoiding me. After the conversation, he hadn’t bothered to come to visit me once. And I knew that he was seeing our daughter outside
the bedroom. He was avoiding me as a person.
wasn’t sure what was worse, the silence or the unspoken words.
It would have been a lot easier if he had told me to stay quiet about it, to drop the subject or that there was nothing more than a past.
Little did I know, I believed that it did not mean anything to him and that was not something that I liked.
I sighed, running my fingers over the crib where Isla slept. Her tiny chest rose and fell with each delicate breath, her little hands curled
into fists. She looked peaceful, unaware of the storm brewing around her.
At least one of us could rest easy.
At least one of us could feel a little peace in this place.
A knock on the door pulled me from my thoughts.
I hesitated before answering, keeping my voice calm. “Come in.”
The door opened, and to my surprise, Ivana stepped inside, a small basket in her hands.
“I brought you some things,” she said with a soft smile, setting it down on the small table near my bed. “Some fresh clothes, extra blankets, and a few herbs that should help with your energy levels. You need to be taking care of yourself and not only your daughter. She needs you to be strong for her and that is not going to happen with you neglecting your own health.”
I forced a small smile in return. “Thank you, Ivana.”
She glanced at Isla before turning her warm gaze back to me. “How are you feeling?”
I exhaled slowly, my fingers brushing over my daughter’s tiny hand. “Tired. But I’m fine. My body is somehow recovering I think, but it’s going to take me a while to fully recover I believe. The nurses say that I’m strong though, which is a good thing an assurance.”
Ivana didn’t believe me, I could see it in her expression. But she didn’t push.
Instead, she stepped closer, lowering her voice. “I heard Giovanni was here today. It seems to me that Lucy is refusing to leave and he is not liking that.”
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I stiffened, my fingers momentarily freezing over Isla’s hand before I forced myself to remain calm. “Is that so? I thought that she
wanted nothing more than to leave.”
Ivana nodded.
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“I didn’t hear much, but I know it had to do with Lucy.” She sighed, shaking her head. “That girl has always been headstrong, but I never
thought she’d dig herself this deep. She wants Dominic to fight for her. She does not want to leave and she does not like the fact that
he is not doing so. She is going to keep going on the way that she is. What she does not understand is that she’s going to drag herself
into deeper trouble than she is going to want to deal with.”
I didn’t respond. I didn’t know how to respond. Lucy wasn’t my concern. I had enough problems of my own without adding her to the
mix.
Still, I couldn’t shake the unease that settled in
Giovanni wasn’t a man who made idle threats.
my stomach.
And if he was here, it meant things were only going to get worse.
“I just thought you should know,” Ivana said gently. “I also wanted to check in on you. You’ve been keeping to yourself since you moved
in here. That is not good for you. You barely went out once and then locked yourself all over again.”
I let out a quiet laugh, shaking my head. “I’m not exactly welcomed here, Ivana. It is not something that I can just easily ignore and
roam around without thinking about.”
She frowned. “That’s not true.”
! arched a brow. “Isn’t it? You know how things are here. You know how everyone is just looking at me as if I’m some kind of outsider.”
She sighed, folding her arms.
“Dominic is…” She hesitated. “Complicated. He’s just trying to adjust to how things are. It’s not going to be easy for him to simply accept things the way that they are. He never was the type to accept things easily.”
“That’s putting it lightly.”
Ivana smiled slightly before sobering. “He’s trying, Eloise. It may not seem like it, but he is.”
I wanted to believe that.
But belief wasn’t something I could afford anymore.
“He’s been avoiding me,” I said quietly, glancing down at Isla. “I don’t expect anything from him, but I know when someone doesn’t want to be near me. And he does not want to be near me.”
Ivana’s lips pressed into a thin line. “Maybe he just doesn’t know how to be near you.”
I scoffed, shaking my head. “That’s not my problem anymore, Ivana.”
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She didn’t argue.
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Instead, she reached out, squeezing my hand. “I just want you to know that you’re not alone. You have Isla, and no matter what
happens, you’ll have me. I’m going to stand by your side through it all, just like I did when you were younger.”
The words hit harder than I expected.
I swallowed past the lump in my throat and nodded. “Thank you.”
Ivana gave my hand one last squeeze before pulling away. “Get some rest, Eloise. You need it.”
She turned, walking toward the door, and just as she reached it, she paused.
“If Dominic doesn’t come around, then that’s on him,” she said softly. “But don’t let his silence make you believe you’re worth any less
than you are.”
With that, she walked out, leaving me in the heavy quiet of my own thoughts.
I let out a slow breath, turning back to Isla.
I reached down, running my fingers gently over her soft cheek.
For now, none of it mattered.
For now, the only thing that mattered was her.
Dorninic:
དངa གཤནའཏྟཾད་ཀ་ནད
200
The tension in the room was suffocating.
And the more I thought about it, the more I knew that things were not going to go my way, the worse things were going to happen, and I
knew the harder they were going to be.
Lucy stood in front of my desk, arms crossed, her eyes burning with fury. She had stormed in the second she heard I’d met with
Giovanni. I could already feel the storm brewing before she opened her mouth. She was not going to stop before, she was going to get
what she wanted, but right now this was not an option. Not when I knew that her father was on the verge of threatening the pack. It was
something that I was refusing right now and it was something that I was going to make sure that he understood the consequences of.
But first, his daughter needed to go back to him.
“You told me to stay,” she hissed, her voice dangerously low. “You asked me to stay, and now you’re telling me to leave? You brought
me here. You sent your men to bring me here.”
I leaned back in my chair, exhaling slowly. “I didn’t ask you to stay, Lucy. You chose to stay. Indeed, I sent my men to bring you to the
pack, but I did not send them to make you stay. It was you who chose to want to stay after you said that you wanted to leave. It is you
who keeps coming after trouble, and right now I’m no longer in the mood to deal with it.”
She scoffed, stepping forward. “And now what? You’re suddenly done with me? You’re throwing me away? After everything you want
me to just leave? After I fought for you, you want me to leave?”
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I rubbed a hand over my face, already exhausted by this conversation before it had even begun. I knew that it was not going to end well
when I called her over, but I did not expect her to make things harder than they already were.
“Your father was here, Lucy. He told me, very clearly, that if I have any value for my life, I’ll stay away from you.” I met her gaze, my voice
cold. “While I do not like being challenged, I know that your father is speaking in terms of protecting his daughter, and that is the one
reason why I am telling you to leave. I have a daughter myself. And I know what it is to want to protect her, even if she is just an infant.”
Her nostrils flared. “First of all, do not compare me to that bastard that you call a daughter. And second, he is not going to do anything
to you. He wouldn’t dare.”
I arched a brow. “Wouldn’t he? And the next time you call my daughter Bastard, we’re going to be dealing with things differently.”
“You cheated on me with that Omega, that girl and whatever children that you think that you can have with other women or bastards in
my eyes.” Lucy clenched her fists at her sides. I knew that I should respond to her, but I knew the responding was just going to end up
adding flame to whatever she was trying to play with and right now I do not want to do that. I wanted her to leave. “He wouldn’t kill you,
Dominic. He just wants control. He wants to scare you into submission…”
- im. He
AL
“Which is exactly why I’m done entertaining this,” I cut her off. “You should have left the first time you said that you were going to leave.
You did not want to stay here. You should have left on your own terms.”
Her face twisted with rage.
“You always do this,” she spat. “Every single time. You always choose someone else. Your pack. Your duties. Your damn pride. And
now… now it’s her. Again.”
My jaw tightened. “This has nothing to do with Eloise.”
She laughed again, shaking her head. “It always has something to do with her. Ever since she ran away from the park, she has been
something to you. You have been looking for her. Even when the two of you were younger, you were just roaming around her.”
I slammed my hand against the desk, the sharp sound echoing in the room. “Lucy, I don’t love you.”
The words hung between us, heavier than anything I had ever said to her before.
She froze, her breath catching. For the first time since she walked in, her anger cracked, revealing something far more fragile beneath
- it.
But she masked it quickly, her expression hardening once more.
“You’re a coward,” she whispered. “You hide behind your title, behind your fucking responsibilities, but the truth is, you just don’t want
to feel anything. You push away anyone who actually cares about you.”
I scoffed, shaking my head. This was not going to turn around to be something that it wasn’t. This was the first time that I spoke truth
to her, and I know that it was because of her words.
What’s happened to us, Dominic?
The question played in my head for a second too long before I turned my attention to Lucy, who was now raging. “You think you care
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about me?” I leaned forward. “You care about what I can give you. The title. The power. The image. And now that it’s slipping away,
you’re fighting like hell to hold onto it.”
Lucy’s lips parted, her eyes flickering with hurt before she masked it with fury. “You’re a fucking bastard, Dominic.”
Before I could respond, the door swung open.
“Enough.”
My father’s voice cut through the tension like a blade.
Lucy stiffened, tuming to face him. “This is none of your business.”
Thorne stepped further into the room, his gaze sharp. “It became my business the second you started acting like a petulant child.”
Her face twisted in rage. “He asked me to stay!”
“And now he’s telling you to leave,” my father shot back, his voice void of patience. “So take your damn pride and get the fuck out.”
Lucy’s chest rose and fell rapidly, her hands shaking. “You can’t force me to leave…”
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“I can and I will,” my father said, stepping closer. His voice was darker than I ever heard it being. I looked down on my feet for a
moment, knowing that this was not something that I expected him to do. He never interfered between Lucy and I. The one person he
did interfere in protecting was Eloise. “Your father gave his warning. Dominic is honoring it. And I don’t care how much you think you
mean to this pack, you don’t outrank its Alpha.”
Lucy turned back to me, her eyes searching mine as if she was waiting for me to stop this. To fight for her.
But I didn’t.
Her jaw clenched, her hands balling into fists. “Fine.”
She turned on her heel, storming toward the door. But just before she reached it, she glanced back, her gaze burning with one final
promise.
“This isn’t over,” she said darkly.
I met her stare, my expression unreadable. “It is for me.”
She let out a sharp exhale before yanking the door open and disappearing down the hall.
A heavy silence settled in the room.
My father crossed his arms, exhaling through his nose. “You should’ve done that sooner.”
I let out a slow breath, leaning back in my chair. “You’re enjoying this too much.”
A smirk tugged at his lips. “I always enjoy watching you realize I was right.‘
