Chapter 4 I Hate Home

• I drove back to the mansion my father had built. I might not be good in calculations or might not be a civil engineer but I was sure that our compound was bigger than three football fields combined.
• The whole area was covered with a fence with electric barb wire running over the walls. We had an electric gate too that opens automatically when a car passes through but is manned by two smart security guards.
• My father's most trusted Beta, Mr. Rudolph takes care of all the security architecture and he made sure that the best men are put to work.
• I drove past the two men and I waved at them. They looked at me through their dark sunglasses and ignored my greeting as though they didn’t see it.
• I wasn’t surprised though. I hate home as I had said. I was never happy at home and my father made sure of that. Nobody treated me with respect as the Alpha's daughter. Or preferably put: Alpha's only child. I had been living with it but I hadn’t mastered it. I had only been managing it.
• I drove to the car park and killed the engine. I alighted from the vehicle and headed straight to my room.
• Our house was a one-storey mansion with a penthouse at the top which harbored two more rooms I wasn’t allowed to enter. Most of the house was painted in white of which leveled carpet grass covered the ground surface outside.
• I waddled dizzily inside hoping I would get to my room without talking to anyone. I didn’t want to get more annoyed than I was already. But in the sitting room, just when I thought I had crossed everything, a steely basso voice echoed and I was almost startled when I heard it. It was a familiar voice though.
• “Why are you coming back by this time? Isn’t it too early?” Mr. Rudolph asked, his voice came out rude. Or did I understand him to be rude because I was unhappy?
• “I think I asked you a question.” Mr. Rudolph was a wicked-looking man. My father might be a few years older than him. But he looked older. The corners of his eyes looked edgy and it gave him wicked-cop appearance. He had cheekbones that stood out bizarrely on his face with two sharp scars that lined dip in there. He might have gotten that in his prime during a wolf war, I guess.
• “There weren’t many things we were doing in the class so I had to start coming back home.” I didn’t always find it difficult to find a good lie to tell.
• “I hope you know that you owe your father a favour and your school career is one of them?”
• How was that supposed to be your fucking business— I wanted to say. But Hell, I was too afraid to mention that. Instead of answering the man’s question, I looked at the blue suit the man wore, it looked good on him. Though I didn’t like the colour of his red tie, it was knotted perfectly on his neck.
• “I don’t think anyone needs to remind me of how I would need to manage my life,” I said. “It is my world and universe alone to design.”
• Mr. Rudolph giggled. “If you invest the energy you use when you talk into your studies, you might come out as the overall best in St. Louis High,” he sighed, “But no, you would rather do things of your own chosen, making wrong choices at the end,” he said and spat at the floor.
• I have had enough of the insults but was it ever going to end? Sometimes I wished I would run away from home and never return but the first day I tried it, my father had threatened to take me forcefully to Drake, the alpha of blood moon park. I had hated Drake even without setting my eyes on him.
• His only offense was just because the suggestion to be his mate had come from my father. And anything that came from my father’s side had also come from Mr. Rudolph. But instead of crying and whining like a baby, I ended up chuckling. I knew it would get Rudolph angry because he was aware of what they said about silence and fools. I turned and wanted to go in right inside the room.
• “I am not done here,” he growled, his wolf voice shaking the glass table in the sitting room. “You don’t just leave in the middle of a conversation like that. Are you a fool, Thelma?”
• “I didn’t remember myself to be one,” I replied sullenly.
• His breath pattern became somewhat fast but I remained where I stood, legs firmly placed on the rug of the sitting room where we were. “Ah, I see.” His face turned livid. “Well, you see, you are not worthy of being the alpha's child. I don’t think you are suitable to take over your father’s house after him. Your father would need to find a reasonable someone who would. The way I see it, your father is pouring water inside a basket thinking it would fill anytime soon to the brim— wasted effort.”
• Shit. Shit. Shit. This one pained me. It pained me through the bone marrow. Was I utterly useless? My wolf was urging me to turn and attack this man. It was forcing me to but that little remaining rational part of my brain was telling me that it would be a pretty bad idea. I could snap his throat right there and have a test of his fucking blood but that might be a death sentence.
• Mr. Rudolph was my father’s Beta and he is no joke. He had years of experience and training way, way ahead of me. He had been involved in dozens of wars, battles and it was believed that he had come out unhurt— not dead, in all of them. Except for the noticeable injury on his face, nothing would give him off as a fighter.
• I restrained myself again and smiled. Smiling was my greatest weapon. It has a way it strikes people, bad people. Bad people hate to see you happy and it creates a painful hole in their hearts when they notice that you are smiling after they had tried to strike you down.
• I kept smiling until it turned to a soft laugh. “You ugly wench, get out of my sight.”
• I controlled myself. Though my heart was heavy. My eyes were heavy too but I didn’t want to cry out tears. It didn’t fit in. “Are we done here?” I managed to ask him. “Huh? Or should we continue with the cop-to-criminal investigation going on?”
• “What?” he barked. “How dare you speak to me that way?”
• I laughed, this time longer. My eyes were closed in the process. A moment later, a resounding slap abruptly landed on my face, sending waves of pain and deep confusion to my brain.
• Automatically converting the laughter I had engaged myself to, into a panic. Surprised and angry, I opened my eyes immediately.
• “Yes, how dare you speak to him that way?” Alpha Lucas asked, my father.
• Wait, my father had just slapped me? Because of Mr. Rudolph? I looked at my father’s face, he was just as I remembered him to be.
• Apart from the twinkling little stars that ruined my vision at the point in time, my father still maintained that no-nonsense face. He had a long face and long nose just like me but his nose was a little longer. He hardly kept beards. Apart from his eyebrows and eyelashes, there was no hair present on his skull. He had cute eyes, amber of colour. On his body, he wore a crisp leather gray jacket over a white T-shirt.
• “Is that what you learn in school? To disrespect people as you deem fit?”
• “No. Father.” I frowned. I touched my chin, exactly where I had been slapped. “I didn’t disrespect anyone. You would have given me the chance to explain.”
• “You have nothing to tell me, Thelma. I witnessed the most of your rant.”
• Damn! When was this going to stop? I had always expected that I would get this annoyed.
• “I insulted no one father.” I echoed. “Mr. Rudolph just told me that I didn’t deserve to be your daughter.”
• My father smiled, an action I didn’t expect from him. “He might be correct. You are already causing enough nuisance.”
• Anger surged up again, flaring up from my legs up to my head. I didn’t know how to react. I wasn’t in the position to. This wasn’t like the Eric-guy situation. This was different. This was a family matter and it would be in my best interest if I respect myself and move straight to my room.
• “Good evening, father,” I managed to say, anger saturating my voice. I looked at him and glared at Mr. Rudolph.
• I left them and went to my room. In my room, I opened my door and slammed it hard on its frame. I jumped on my bed and placed my head on my pillow, facing down.
• I would have cried my eyes out maybe when I was still seventeen or maybe less, but I was eighteen now, and crying had almost been erased from my law of torts.
• This was a decision I took after my eighteenth birthday but I was not particularly sure if it had been the best decision. Because, sometimes, it becomes too much that I can no longer carry it.
• And at that moment, I would wish I could cry my eyes out. But I had already made a decision or hadn’t I? What should I do? I grabbed my phone and went through my music department. But wait? Where did I keep my earpiece? I had only collected my phone from Stephanie but forgot to collect my earpiece?
• Shit! Shit! The earpiece means a lot for me. When I listen to music with it, I tend to forget all the troubles and worries I pass through from home at the moment.
• It had its way of easing the pain, of lessening the burden. So what was I supposed to do without it? How was I supposed to sleep?
• I looked out my window, I began to count how much air I take away in a few seconds and how many times it came back home through my nose. Funny huh? But it worked— I went to sleep.