TRIGGER WARNING: SUICIDE.RAFAEL - SEVEN YEARS AGO. “Come on, Rafael!” Gerald’s voice brought my feet to a halt and I fell to my knees, breathing heavily. “Oh you’ve got to be kidding me” He snarled, running his hands through his hair before turning back to me.“You’re going to need to run a lot faster if you plan on beating Lucien in the challenge” He added and the sweat that dripped from the sides of my face could fill a bucket. I chugged a bottle of water before looking back at him. My beta, Gerald had dedicated his entire day to train me for the battle against my brother.Last week, Lucien had announced his intention to challenge me for the Alpha kinship title. That when Carlos’ reign was over, he would take charge as the leader of the pack. It came as a shock at first even though a lot of us probably saw it coming since his outrage the first time I was announced as heir instead of him.Carlos was like a father to the both of us and he raised us to even call him one. He raised
RAFAEL. Then came a few years later while I was hunting with Gerald, I saw her again but this time from the foot of the hill that held up her packhouse. She looked so much older now, tendering to the flowers in her garden and I took a picture. From one picture, to two and to three. Each time I was around there, I would search for her and wouldn’t leave until I saw her—until I was sure she was safe. But then came a night that I happened to be close to her and saw for myself, the treacherous ways they treated her like she was worse than an animal.There was a man who pushed her to the ground and struck her sides with the heel of his shoe. It took everything to restrain myself from saving her, even as I saw her struggling to breathe. I could hear her cries and I could feel it even inside of me. It was like an unexplainable bond which ignited my need to save her from them.I knew with the way she was treated, it wouldn’t take her long to try to kill herself again and what if I wasn’t ar
KAYLA.I keep a lot of things to myself.It was the way I grew up—without really having anyone but my journal to talk to and when even that was gone, I was left with nothing. My mind was accustomed to hold these many secrets I burdened it with and my heart was no longer willing to open up to anyone after everything. I was barely living throughout my whole childhood, I was only surviving. And the closest thing I was to feeling anything at all was the pain from all the torture and the guilt from the fact that I killed my own mother and I remember hearing repeatedly in my head that I didn't deserve this life—I didn't deserve to live.Many people told me that so many times that it registered in my brain and haunted me in my nightmares and daydreams. I was suffocating and still, no one to talk to. Jumping off the cliff wasn't the hardest part, it was finally caving in to the voices in my head.It was walking all the way there and thinking killing myself was the only way out of this. I hat
KAYLA.“You should walk faster if we’re going to get somewhere before morning” Lucien threw a look over his shoulders back at me and I diverted my eyes from the pictures in my hands. We walked through Manila forest in the dead of the night and he was just a few meters ahead of me.Although, he paused in that second to snatch what was in my hands.“What are you looking at?” His eyes fell on the photographs before rolling them to the back of his head. “Give me that!” I fought back as he burst into a soft chuckle a second later. “I’m sorry but this one is just plain hilarious—“ He stretched out one of them and I got a hold of it.“This is an interesting angle too, I’ll give him that” I brushed his shoulders and his laughter died down. Lucien trailed behind and I could foresee how insufferable this journey was about to be with him here. Although I never saw more than a smirk across his lips, it was harder to believe that the sound of his chuckles were even more infuriating.“Where are we
KAYLA.“You know maybe he has his reasons” Lucien muttered, sitting by the edge of the cliff and looking over the forest. I paced behind him, before coming to a halt some distance away. “Take it from someone who knows how obnoxious and spontaneous Rafael can be sometimes” Lucien looked back and when our eyes met, I didn’t know why he was defending him.“It’s one thing to destroy my home but it’s another thing to not tell me about it. He’s had so long but these secrets keep piling up. I don’t think they’ll ever stop, Lucien—“ There was a crack in my voice. “I deserved to know. I deserved to know there was nothing left for me. You know giving up everything was the hardest thing I had to do but I comforted myself by thinking at least I still had my home, my little garden that when everything is over, I could return to” I whispered to him even though I didn’t expect Lucien to understand.But there was a sense of thoughtfulness behind his eyes while tears streamed from mine. A short silen
RAFAEL.Immediately my door swung open, I jolted up from my bed. Already on alert, I faced Gerald who was backed by a few of our guards and he had a horrid expression across his face. I could sense something bad had happened and since I'd told him not to contact me except it was about Kayla, I could tell now that something had happened to her."What is it?" I jumped out of bed and Gerald bowed his head in subjection and remorse. "Gerald!" I growled his name before he spoke."It's Kayla" Although I already knew, my heart still stomped in my chest. "What happened to her—where is she?" I grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and Gerald cowered his head. "She's gone" He muttered. An arch came between my brows as I freed him.I brushed his shoulders and pounced my way out of the room, making it down the stairwell and to the dungeon. "I went to check in on her this morning and when I got there, I found the gates open and the cell was empty" Gerald trailed behind me and I couldn't explain
KAYLA.I was suddenly jolted back to consciousness when something rammed into the side of my head. It sent an unwavering sliver of pain from my temples to all around my body. I pried my eyes open to the darkness around me and there I was, head to the ground and crouched in a fetal position.All I could remember was a hand grasping me from behind and a bag over my head—I had to stop ending up this way. My face hurt from the bruises across it and it was then I muttered.“Lucien!” I called his name, remembering he was the first to be wounded but as I looked around, he wasn’t the one here. It was yet another masked man with a rifle in his hands. It was the muzzle that he’d rammed into my head to wake me up and he scented strongly of alcohol.Grasping me by my clothes, he threw me against the wall and my heart pounded in fear. I had no idea where I was or who this was and what he even wanted to do with me.“You’ve rested enough” He leaned forward but only to confirm the handcuffs were stil
RAFAEL.The sound of the trotting horses came to a halt by the edge of the cliff and both Gerald and I alighted. Lucien was a close third, stopping at a distance from us. It was better that way as I couldn’t even bear to look at him without the urge of sticking my fist in his face. On this side of the forest, it was just the three of us while the many scores of security guards trailed the other side of town. It had already been hours into the search for Kayla and still, she was nowhere to be found. My heart stomped as I looked around the perimeter to pick up even if it was just a scent but nothing.“Kayla!” I yelled over the skies returned an echo.“You realize she won’t be able to hear you right?” Lucien scoffed from behind and at the sound of his grating voice, my hands folded into a tight fist. “Lucien” Gerald tried to caution him but he loosely shrugged his shoulders.“What? I’m the only one being realistic here, I mean if she was close, we would have been able to pick up her sce