I didn’t even try to defend myself. My mouth barely worked, and my body was betraying , growing weaker by the second. But even if I could speak, would it even matter?
"You don’t know your place," Father seethed, taking a step forward with his fists clenched at his sides. "Axel can never be yours. You are wolfless. You are nothing."
The words should have hurt. They probably would have if I had anything left in to feel.
Rosa sniffled beside him, nodding solemnly. "I—I didn’t want to believe it, Papá, but..." She looked at then, eyes cold and victorious. "She’s been acting so strange lately. And now this?" She let out another fake sob. "I... I just don’t know what to do anymore!"
Don Diego turned his full wrath back to . "You disgust ."
I felt lightheaded now, like my body was slowly separating from itself, floating further and further away. The room swayed. The floor tilted.
And then Don Diego moved. He lifted his hand. I braced myself already.
I knew what ca next. I had been hit before.
But just as his palm hovered over my bruised, bloodied face, he stopped. It took a second to realize what happened.
His hand trembled mid-air, his breathing heavy and erratic. I forced myself to et his gaze, and for the first ti in my entire life... I saw the hesitation in Don Diego De la Vega.
It wasn’t rcy.
No. It was sothing else.
Because when his gaze trailed over my face; over the deep, jagged wound Rosa had left, over the way my left eye was already swollen shut, over the way my body wobbled under the weight of itself... sothing flickered in his eyes.
Sothing that looked like... regret. It lasted only for a second though. It was almost like he couldn’t believe I was the sa beautiful daughter of his.
Like I couldn’t be the sa pretty flower looking so ugly with my scar. It hit my heartless Father so hard that he stopped in his motion.
Yes, your oldest daughter did this to your youngest.
I had almost thought I’d penetrated him when his expression hardened again.
But instead of hitting , he took a shuddering breath and lowered his hand.
"Pack your things," he ordered.
I blinked slowly. My head throbbed. My ears rang. This wasn’t what I expected to hear.
"What?"
He nodded but was unable to et my eyes. "You heard . You will leave this estate tonight."
My jaw dropped.
"You are no longer my daughter," he continued. "You are no longer a De la Vega."
Wow...
That was all that ca to mind, really. My thoughts were so blank that I couldn’t even think clearly.
"You have been disowned, María José. And from this mont forward, you belong to nothing. Not to this family or anyone. This is the best I can do for you because if you continue to stay here and embarrass , I will send you off to a rogue. Believe !"
Oh, so to Father, this was his form of rcy. Quit being my daughter or get married to a rogue. Any day and ti, I would pick the latter over the forr.
However, it was already late. I had nowhere to go. I knew no one in the pack. Who would be willing to take in Don Diego’s disowned Oga daughter?
My future just got bleeker.
Rosa gasped beside him, pressing a hand to her lips in fake shock. But I could see it; the quiet delight dancing in her eyes.
I wanted to laugh. Not because it was funny.
Because it was so expected, so predictable, and so ridiculously tragic, that all I had left was to laugh.
But I didn’t.
I just stood there, staring at him, barely registering the words and barely feeling the weight of them.
Maybe because I had already known deep down that I never really belonged here. Maybe because I had already known that my father, after finding out what I was; never truly saw as his daughter.
Maybe because, after everything, I was just too damn tired to care anymore. I didn’t care anymore.
Oh, hell... I couldn’t lift my lids anymore.
The world started to blur and the room began to tilt.
My legs shook beneath .
And as I hit the ground, the last thing I saw was Rosa’s victorious smirk before the darkness swallowed whole.
**********
I winced but I could barely hear my own voice.
First, there was darkness. It was a suffocating kind of darkness that weighed on my chest, pinning down like an iron chain.
I tried to move but I couldn’t.
Tried again. A dull ache blossod in my limbs, spreading like slow poison through my veins. My body felt foreign, heavy and unwilling to cooperate. My head throbbed, and my mouth was so dry I could swear I had swallowed an entire desert.
Then ca the voices.
Muffled at first, like they were speaking underwater, but slowly sharpened into words.
"We’ll get in trouble if we get caught."
"I know... but we couldn’t just leave her out there! They dumped her outside like basura! What if she dies?"
"Her family clearly doesn’t care, so why should we?"
"Because, Letizia, the poor girl didn’t ask for this fate. She lost everything—her status, her beauty, her family. The only things she had left!"
"I know... I do feel bad for her, but I have to think about my own family too. If we get caught, I could lose my job. And then what? My mother, my sisters... who’s going to take care of them?"
"If María José were your daughter, would you have done this to her?"
There was a pause from Letizia. A heavy, weighted silence.
Then, a sigh. "No. No, I wouldn’t."
"Exactly. And now what? She’s been unconscious since last night. It’s already evening!"
"She should’ve woken up by now. We stitched her up, gave her dicine..."
"If only she had a wolf, she would have healed by now."
Guilia and Letizia.
I recognized them now. The maids.
The only two in this cursed estate who had ever treated with anything close to kindness apart from Juana. I needed to wake up now.
Did they say I had passed out since yesterday?!
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