Page 165 of White Raven
Rhaena huffed through her nose. “They didn’t have to. I’m a detective.”
The disapproval on Ashina’s hard face was nauseating. “So you are. What a waste. Especially after what you know you’ve taken from me.”
“Real sweet attempt at trying to woo me into letting you keep it.”
She smirked, and it was nothing short of cruel. “It was never supposed to be yours. Don’t pretend that you care enough to wanna lead a pack. And don’t assume you’ve got what it takes just because your blood is a little stronger than mine. You’d never have been strong enough without it anyway.”
Only the ones closest to Rhaena would know the pain she was hiding behind that seemingly unbendable exterior. Brandon reached over underneath the table and laid a gentle hand to her knee. “Is that why you left me with Elston?”
Ashina sighed, knowing there was no way to get out of handing over every answer Rhaena deserved. She relaxed her shoulders, and leaned against the back of the chair, setting her hands in her lap. “Did you know that centuries ago…the wolves were hunted down the same way witches were? Burned. Hanged. Drawn and quartered. It’s easy to believe in the history because a witch was still a human…but us? We’re just a myth. A box-office moneymaker. Years later, a new witch hunt started. A clever one. One that had wolves of every color flocking to their demise formoney…all because we’d weakened our legacy down to nothing and couldn’t afford to live in the dark anymore.”
Rhaena rolled her eyes. “I don’t fucking care about any of that.”
“No?” Ashina twitched her mouth. “You should. You want answers, then you’ll have all of them. I don’t care to see you anymore after today. I’m sure the feeling’s mutual.”
“Oh, I didn’t want to see youtoday…let alone ever again. I made my peace with never knowing you after Elston died.”
“Elston was my brother, but he was a damned fool. We both were, but only one of us ended up with better sense. I let the weak care for the weak. Look where that got you.”
Something in Rhaena’s face betrayed her, but only for a second. Unfortunately, Brandon realized he wasn’t the only one to catch it. Ashina smiled again, triumphantly.
Ashina - 1, Rhaena - 0
“When we were little, Elston followed me around like a lost puppy. Quite literally. But I adored him. Then our parents had Emery. Emery was tiny and frail from the minute she was born. When a runt is born, the pack rejects it. I was too young to realize that my armor against Elston’s soft heart was its very own weakness. He couldn’t bear the thought of our baby sister dying alone in the woods. She was one of us. It wasn’t her fault she was an abomination that would break the strong links in our chain…so I pacified the little shit, and we rescued her. We found a vampire that was highly respected and had an army of a coven. He took her with his arms wide open, and that oversized brain running at full speed. It was our little secret forever.”
Rhaena’s head shook slowly. “Ryan’s mother.”
“She sure is. He promised to take full responsibility for her, and care for her like one of his own. The ugly duckling had a family.” She huffed a laugh in disgust. “I met Baron, and we fell for each other like fools. Hard. Inseparable. He was my mate.My everything. My parents didn’t approve, but they were too late. We bonded. We fucked. We ran away together. I ended up pregnant with you, and we were in Austin, Texas at the time. At first, I was happy. You seemed so strong. I felt you kicking, and you did it so often. Always fighting. Always trying to claw your way out.”
Rhaena swallowed hard, and Brandon knew exactly where this was going. Ashina’s face turned impassive and unimpressed.
“But then one morning, I bled. I nearly died trying to get you out of me, and when you finally did come into the world…you looked just like her.”
Emery. The runt. The mistake.
Brandon squeezed her knee, and Rhaena lowered her hand to grip his.
“You were early. Tiny.” She shook her head and spat the last word.“Weak.”She bared her teeth at Rhaena, and to his surprise, Rhaena didn’t balk. “You were supposed to be my fighter. You were supposed to be like me. I held you, and you were so small you wouldn’t even latch onto my breast. I wanted you out of my sight. Baron was supposed to come back empty-handed. I woke up to your wailing, and I wanted to kill him. He couldn’t let you go. He became as soft as fucking Elston, and he wanted to keep you. Rhaena, I tried. God, help me…I tried to love you. I tried to toughen you up. Tried to teach you how to overcome being a child so weak that you could barely keep your head up. We put you in classes, and Baron spent every dime we had trying to get people to fix you. He ruined us. All because he couldn’t leave you out there where you should have died in peace.”
Brandon couldn’t stop himself. “Died inpeace?” His voice cracked thinking of a tiny helpless Rhaena, crying for hermother in the wilderness. A mother who cared nothing about her. “She was just ababy.”
Ashina rolled her eyes. “Do you know why canines go somewhere quiet when it’s time for them to die? No…you wouldn’t. You’re not a wolf. And you’re not something that could make her life more fulfilling. You’re a simple humanplaything.” She leaned forward and glared at him. Rhaena growled in warning. “They go off to be alone so they can die with dignity. That’s what’s given to arunt. It’s all they deserve to fucking have.” She turned her attention back to her daughter. Something she shouldn’t even be allowed to call his wife. “Baron ruined us. We were broke. We had nothing left but a screamingpussythat was gonna do everything she could to drain us completely dry, and he had no problem with it. None. The only fight you had in you was used to make me hate the fact that we even breathed the same air.”
Rhaena’s eyes welled with tears. It made him want to hit a woman. For the first time in his life, he wanted to use every last bit of his strength beating the fucking teeth out of her snout.
“When you were a toddler, we were presented with an opportunity. A new hunt was on for people like us. People that had a special bloodline, and the pay was handsome. We jumped on it. I offered to give the vampire queenyou…but even she didn’t want you. She took us instead. Not only would we have money we needed to get back on track, but she promised to give us strength we never could have imagined. I was test A. Baron subject B. She injected me. He swallowed his down. My body changed…and that weakness you passed onto his soul…it fucking killed him. You killed mymate.”
“I didn’t put a gun to your head and make you bargain with the fucking Devil. Youarethe Devil,” Rhaena snarled through her tears. Ashina raised her voice.
“We never would have needed that money if not for your pitiful fucking existence!” She slapped her back against the chair and looked at Rhaena as if she should have been groveling. “You ruined our fucking lives. Baron was gone. I didn’t have any reason to continue on with this charade of believing you could grow into something greater. Elston took up across the country in Massachusetts. John Allan caught wind of everything that had happened. He asked to study me and said that my weakling sister had given birth to one just like me. Only she was born…not injected. He was curious about our differences, and so…I gave you to Elston to deal with. I left to join John’s cause. Don’t feel too badly. I didn’t just blame you for Baron. I blamed the vampire witch too. Then I realized that she and John had a long-standing feud, and I offered my assistance with that. She’d gotten to Elston, who I assumed had the same fucking trouble with you that we had…he was broke. She experimented on him too. And then the idiot was hit by a truck.”
Rhaena’s teeth were grinding, and her anger radiated. Brandon noticed her pressing Athan’s silver ring into her skin.
“Later on…I looked into you. I never thought I’d see the day where you made it this far. You were living in an apartment in Boston, and Dahlia’s coven had a little rogue renegade, hell-bent on destroying her. John tackled that opportunity. I didn’t know at the time that he had a daughter. I didn’t know a great deal about the rest of his plans. My only piece to play in this game was the bane of my existence.You. And so, I struck a deal with John. I handed you over, and we put the two of you together so that he could hopefully recreate what Ryan was. You already know the rest. You did exactly what you always do. You fucked it up. You ruinedeverything.”
Rhaena leapt from her chair and ripped the ring from her finger. It clanged on the tile floor, and as the metal table flipped, her body changed. Brandon flew back and pressed himselfagainst the glass window as Ashina shifted forms, and roaring filled the room.
“Celtics!Celtics!” he screamed.
