Klaus’s POV
I sigh loudly as I stay in the jeep, waiting for Joseph to convince Ella to come back with us to the head pack. My head was still spinning from everything she said in that room. All those horrible marks I saw on her body were caused by her old alpha and beta. It wasn’t just a one time thing, it happened every day for 10 freaking months!
The bastards were heartless monsters! How could they do that to her? My blood was boiling in rage. I wanted to rip them to shreds over and over again until my rage diminishes.
No wonder she didn’t scream during the public punishment, what I did to her was nothing compared to them. She handled a lot worse than that.
I closed my eyes as the pain of handling what was done to her weighed on me, crushing and breaking me from the inside out.
To top it all off, I forced her to speak about her abuse by alpha commanding her. I lost my shit when she told me that guy tried to kill her to keep her from saying something else to me. I accused her of hiding something from me and lost control of myself. Her screams and struggle to keep her mouth shut to protect her secret cut me deep in my chest. It was the last thing I expected her to be hiding about them.
It was official. I am worse than her old alpha in her eyes now. I couldn’t deny it. She is right. The way I have been treating her since last night made me an asshole. But it all stops now. I will do everything I can to change her mind about me. I will make her forgive me. I will do everything she wants me to do to earn her forgiveness. She was innocent from the beginning, and I was a fucking bastard to assume the opposite. I failed her as an alpha just like Grey.
A movement to my left catches my attention and I turn my head to look. Joseph was carrying a sleeping Ella out of the hospital. She was wrapped up in a blanket to keep her warm since she was dressed in a thin hospital gown.
I hop off the car to open the back door for Joseph. As he lays her inside, he turns back to me and asks “Should I stay back with her or do you want to?”
I think about it for a minute. As much as I wanted to hold her through the entire ride, I knew that I had no right to touch her.
“You should stay with her. You are the only person she probably trusts now” I tell him sadly.
Joseph nods in understanding and climbs up in the back with her. I start the car and drive back towards our head pack. It was a one hour drive only.
I sneak a peek at the rearview mirror and watch Ella sleeping peacefully in Joseph’s arms. He was looking at her with such affection, it reminded me of the way he used to look at Kate.
I distract myself from the pain by asking him “What did you talk about after I left?”
“I told her about our decision to take her with us to protect her. She thought you were using that as an excuse so you could make good on your promise to make her suffer for what her father did. She hates your guts and wants nothing to do with you. She said you were worse than her old alpha”
My grip tightens on the steering wheel in frustration. Give it to Joseph to slam the truth right in my face.
“You really think I am worse than him?” I ask him carefully.
“No Klaus, you are nothing like him. But if you want my honest opinion, to her, you were worse than him. Starting from the public punishment and ending with the alpha commands. The whole thing is nothing like you”
“I honestly have no idea what came over me. There is something about her that triggered things in me I never thought I was capable of, ever since that night she stabbed me with the knife” I admitted to him. He was the only person left that I could open up to. That I could be honest with. Although I drifted away from him after Kate and my father died, but I was starting to find my way back to him.
“So all that revenge crap is really over, or are you going to bring it up again? Because I promised her that she will be safe with us, and I will not fail her like everyone did”
Ouch, that last statement was specifically directed at me, and hit the spot dead on.
“It’s over. Do you think she will ever forgive me?”
“I honestly have no idea. But I know one thing. She was pretty scared of me from the beginning, although I did nothing but be kind to her. She assumed we were like them. But after she saw how I defended her and stood up for her, she started trusting me, a little. That tells me that she never had anyone to protect her before, not even her father I presume. Do you remember what she was yelling in the backyard last night? She said ‘I hate you all three of you, I hope you are rotting in hell’ the first two are her alpha and beta. Who do you think the third is?”
“Her father”
“Yes, she hates her father as well which tells me he was never good to her when he was alive. What I am trying to tell you is, the three men that were mostly involved in her life were all dicks. She became scared of all of them. The nurse for example, as soon as she saw him, she got hysterical. What happened to her made her always assume the worst in men. Until you show her otherwise, she will never forgive you”
“wow. I feel like I am talking to your wife right now” I tease him.
“Well, being married to a therapist, you pick up a thing or two” he laughs under his breath.
“Speaking of your wife, do you think she should sit with her? She probably needs professional help dealing with her… abuse”
“I was thinking about that. I am just not sure if she is willing to confide in her. I think she is ashamed of admitting her weakness. The whole time she was talking about it, she couldn’t look at us. She didn’t want us to pity her”
“Weakness? She is anything but weak. If anything she is the strongest person I know. No one can suffer through ten months of abuse and survive, but she did. Someone else in her place would have probably killed herself. She tried to escape the pack and would have succeeded if I wasn’t there, she tried to kill me, she suffered through her punishment without a sound even over open cuts, she fought for her life severely judging by her multiple injuries, she fought a freaking alpha command for Goddess’s sake. There is nothing weak about this girl”
Joseph stays quiet, I sneak a look at him through the rearview mirror and see him staring at me amusingly.
“What?” I ask him.
“Nothing. You are right about everything. She is strong, but she needs someone to remind her of that”
We stay quiet the rest of the ride. I sneak peeks at her through the mirror every now and then.
I don’t know how I am going to win her trust like Joseph, but I promise myself that I will. I can’t bear the idea of her hating me or looking at me in fear. Not anymore.