I was going to kill someone, I was. It is going to be them or me. And I refuse to let it be me. I have my pup to take care of. I was not going to let my family kill me and leave my Rose, my little Rosebud, all alone with these monsters. Rose was a soul to pure and good for this world. She had given me strength for the last three years of my life and she was not going to be left alone with the monsters that were my family.
Rose was my rock after I had been forced to drop out of high school at fifteen. She came along four years after my family had locked me in their house away from our pack. When I was nineteen and my little sister was just shy of eighteen, my perfect little sister, got herself pregnant.
If I had been able to, I would have laughed my self silly. Melissa, the perfect, golden child, had let her boyfriend “sweet talk” her into having sex before they turned eighteen and found out if they were fated mates. On the day she turned eighteen, Melissa found out her boyfriend was not her fated mate and it was another boy.
Poor little Melissa, knocked up with no fated mate and her baby daddy had left her high and dry. She was pregnant and upset at the world. I snickered at her misfortune behind closed doors, goddess above if Melissa caught me laughing at her situation.
So, a few months later, Melissa gave birth to a healthy baby girl. She growled at everyone, my parents and mainly me, that she did not want a pup. She had her whole life to look forward to, she could not be tied down to a pup. Marie and Thomas, my parents, stormed into my basement room and basically threw the newborn at me. It was only thanks to my reflexes that the baby hadn’t hit the floor. My mother tossed the pup to me as my father threw a diaper bag on the floor. My parents then stomped their way back upstairs.
The baby then started to cry in despair. My poor Rose had been so tiny and afraid. She was still tiny, but cute as a button. Blonde haired with curls and blue eyes, she looked like a mini me. I had laughed when she started to grow up and look like me. She may not have been mine, but she looked exactly like me.
Time had marched on in our captivity. The first four years had dragged on, moving at a snail's pace. I only knew how much time, as I was allowed upstairs to do chores and I was able to look at calendars. Why would my family do any chores when they had their own captive to help. I cooked and cleaned the days away and then once Rose came into my life, I also took care of her. Time moved on a little more quickly now that I Rose filling my life with some light.
So, we had spent the years locked up in my parents' home. Rose was allowed out of the house to attend pack meetings. She was needed to show the pack how much of a loving family my parents and sister was. They put up the front of the perfect family since I had “run away.” I had been the black sheep of the family and not happy in our peaceful, little, midwestern town in the middle of Nebraska. Yep, I had run away to find myself in the big city.
The sad part was, I’m pretty sure everyone believed them. The first week, I had heard many people come in and out of the house to ask questions about me. But after that, no one came by anymore, no one cared about the oldest daughter of Remington’s. I had faded from everyone’s mind like I didn’t even exist, within the first month of my captivity.
Yep, I was alone except for my precious little pup who would look up to me and call me mommy. As much as I hated my sister, I loved her pup and claimed Rose as mine. My little Rosebud that was named after the only woman who loved me. My father’s mother, Rose Remington, had loved me and supported me up until the day she died.
Her death had happened only a month before I had locked inside the basement. The last person who would have come looking for me had died and then I had “run away.”
Beren, my stubborn, proud, and strong wolf, had a few choice words once she had come to me. She ranted and raved about our treatment and had tried to fight our way out shortly after our first shift. That had been a painful day. Pain from shifting the first time and pain from the beating I had received, for some minor tasks that I had failed to complete, a few hours earlier, had radiated off me for hours. Once some of the pain had subsided, Beren had tried to fight her way out of the house.
Our father, even though he was a drunk, was still a strong warrior. We had been quickly subdued and thrown into the basement. Rose dragged away from us, crying, “mama.” The beating we received had almost killed us. Beren had been so strong to be able to pull us through that night.
*‘Change is coming,’* Beren growls me as I stare out the window.
*‘If it does, I wish it would come faster. This place will kill us one day,’* I tell her.
*‘We will burn the pack down first before we die or let harm come to Rosebud,’* she tells me.
I hum in agreement. My parents will destroy us, but Beren and I will be damned if we go quietly.
