53. Chapter 53 #2
Lorenzo smiled smugly as he watched the expression on my face shift as I considered it.
“See, even you know it’s true. That was the big-ticket item that got me into the inner circle.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend, and all that.
Once Mariposa was dead, your father figured out something had gone wrong so he tried to get you to come home from college.
But you had to be stubborn, because, of course, you did.
You were lucky Diego picked you up that night.
The Morenos were on the way, because I knew exactly where you were, and they were coming for you. ”
He slid the shears under my other pant leg, snipping the hem.
“You see, Francisco trusts me now. I have him eating from the palm of my hand. But then your father called and offered to let me marry you, which, let me tell you, was a great idea. It was easier to take over his assets without a fight. Nico’s pack had found an in by then, so it was kind of an unofficial race to see who could snatch you up first. Not that he knew that.
I’d signed the legal documents with Rafael already, so I didn’t mind the friendly competition. It was a win-win.”
My pulse skyrocketed. I never took Lorenzo seriously enough. He was playing the long game. The sharp prick of the blade scratched against my skin as he cut my pants away, and there was nothing I could do about it. Goosebumps scattered across my skin. He could turn those scissors over so easily.
I locked my breathing down. I had to keep him talking. “Sounds complicated. I’m surprised you figured it all out.”
Insulting him could backfire, but so far it had only made him want to prove to me how amazing he was. In the back of my mind, I couldn’t understand how no one figured out what he’d been doing for so long.
The scissors snipped through the waistband of my right hip, and he pulled the fabric out from under me with a little help from Emilio, who’d been arranging tools on a small mobile tray next to the table.
“I don’t know why you’re surprised. Of course, I figured it out.
I’ve been working on this for a long time.
” He inspected the instruments Emilio had laid out, picking up a scalpel, setting the cutting shears aside.
“Did you know when your father formed his pack, he considered bringing me on? Your mother didn’t like me, and I was too young, so in the end he went a different way.
He never knew the enemy he’d made of me that day.
” Lorenzo snickered through his teeth. “Getting his pack killed was easier than I’d expected, and no one ever even suspected I’d set that up.
The right rumor dropped into the wrong ears.
It was like watching dominoes fall into place.
Too bad Rafael made it out. Your brother was just a bonus.
Killing you in the crossfire might’ve been nice too, but then we wouldn’t have this time together, and what a shame that would be.
I’d hoped with them out of the way, your mother would finally come crawling to me, but she didn’t. ”
Every drop of blood leached from my brain, and my ears howled.
He’d organized the ambush that killed my brother and the rest of my father’s pack, and arranged Nico’s mom’s death.
A sob caught in my throat, and I lay there choking on it as a wave of misery drowned me.
He had been the villain all along, and I’d never known.
He leaned over my naked body, and his face pinched into a horrified scowl.
“You reek like alpha. Did you fuck them? Slut. I bet you did. And what’s that on your neck?
” He nudged my hair aside with the tip of his cutting shears and reared back, disgust plastered all over his face.
“Did you let them bite you?” He tossed the scalpel onto the tray with a bang.
His name-calling and accusations fell on deaf ears. Everything was cold and numb with shock. Agony seeped like rot through my bones and throbbed as if my flesh wanted to burst free from my skin. This was worse than any physical pain he could have inflicted.
“I can’t work with you smelling like that.” He grabbed the hose off the floor and turned on the spigot.
A violent blast of icy cold water slammed against my naked body in a torrent.
I gasped at the shock and sucked some of it down my throat.
Coughing wracked my chest as I turned my face away from the deluge.
The frigid water snapped me back to consciousness.
Fuck, he was going to drown me. I wheezed, trying to fill my lungs with something other than the freezing spray.
Finally, the flood stopped, and the squeak of the spigot indicated he’d turned it off.
“How? Why?” I choked the words out as tears pooled in the corner of my eyes, the shock of his revelation wearing off.
“Rafael thought he was so much smarter than me, that I wasn’t good enough for his pack or for his wife’s bed.
I spent years trying to prove him wrong, and when I finally did, it was too late.
Well, it’s too late for him—and for you.
The hate he planted grew. Now his entire pack, his son, and his wife are dead, and I control everything he had.
Along with that, I’m getting a more powerful pack, and I get to fuck you whenever I want.
That frigid bitch, Valentina, was such a fucking prude. You’re a much better bargain.”
Wait, did he just say…
“My mom is dead?” The words came out as a choked whisper. My throat ached with anguished sobs. What the fuck?
If he replied, I couldn’t hear it over the ringing in my ears.
Everything in my body went cold, my fingers and toes went numb again, and nausea churned in my gut.
There was no way he knew that, but what if he did?
That would explain so much. I never understood why there’d been no word from her, and that had hurt the most. Betraying my father, I could see.
After the massacre, my mother wanted to be free of the bloodshed and pain.
She didn’t want anything to do with this life.
Silent tears broke free, rolling down my cheeks. It had to be a lie.
He grabbed a rag off the counter and turned back to me.
“You’re very pretty when you cry.” Before the words were even out, he slammed the rag over my face, and when I gasped in a surprised breath, he shoved the cloth into my mouth.
It tasted and smelled like gasoline, and I sputtered trying to get it out, but he pressed a strip of tape over the top. “No more talking.”