Alpha King’s Damsel in Distress

KIRA

A thunderous scream set me apart, waking me up from my deep slumber. Judging from the cries, I didn’t have to guess that it was my aunt, my mother’s sister, who lost her sanity from a broken heart. [1] I instantly sat upright in alert. Since my room was just beside hers, I could quickly check on her.

I passed by my mother’s picture in the hallway, and I paused to look at her beautiful face. Her hazelnut hair matched her chocolate brown eyes and stood out from her fair white skin. Her soft pouty lips and rosy cheeks melted with the sun and the white dress she was wearing was softly floating against the wind[2] . But most of all, her gentle smile and her tender expression calmed me down.

I was only a toddler when she passed, and I could only vaguely remember her face as it was etched in the back of my memory, slowly fading as time went by. I went to the kitchen to make breakfast, just a quick sunny side up egg, sausages, and toast paired with milk, which was for my aunt. I grabbed a glass of water to go to my aunt’s room. Her screams and sobs were now getting closer to me.

“Good morning, Aunt, I made your favorite breakfast!” I greeted her happily once I opened the door, feigning happiness just to make her stop having a tantrum, but she was still not stopping. I sighed, put the freshly cooked food on the side table, and sat on the edge of the bed to hug her. “Hush now, Aunt Della. You’re alright.” I comforted her.

 As the only child of my mother and dad, I was somehow used to taking care of myself, especially growing up with an absent father who did nothing but work and left me to his new wife to be mistreated. [3] 

Aunt Della seemed to calm down as I stayed hugging her for a minute. When she completely stopped, I broke the embrace.

“How was your morning?” I asked gently as if talking to a little child, running my hands along her hair.

She pouted and muttered, “I dreamed it again. I dreamed about him again, Kira.”

“Nightmare?”

She shook her head. “It wasn't a bad dream. I was happy to see him, but I saw it happening again."

I sighed. She had been muttering that for ten years now, since I was eight. I still didn’t know who she was referring to or what happened to that person in the dream. But it was a reoccurring dream for her, haunting her every night.

“Can you tell me who that is?”

“You know, your mother holds a great reputation in our clan, but she chose that man, and we were banished,” she suddenly said, just like she usually did. My aunt isn’t crazy, I could talk to her normally, but times like this, her replies made me doubt her.

“What?”

She looked down. “I saw it with my own eyes, how my loved one… was killed, before my eyes.”

Her loved one… that was what I was assuming was the cause of her depression. Some of her sudden phrases seemed too real not to believe, and all I could do was nod.

Her hand reached out to me and cupped my face. “Trust your mate. He will come for you.”

Mate. That talk again, I really couldn’t seem to know what was going on in her mind. I searched on that word mate and all that popped up were werewolves. It was not like we were living in some weird fantasy story, right? This was the real world, and supernatural beings like that didn’t exist.

“Come on, Aunt, let’s eat now—”

I was stopped when a pair of red heels clicked on the floorboard, and the door opened to reveal my stepmother’s face. “You should shut your aunt up, Kira.”

My aunt’s calm expression changed into a glare. “You b*tch.”

I covered my aunt’s mouth, not because I didn’t like to hear her say that, but I swore, there was no other word that I could describe my stepmom. But I valued my aunt’s and my body too. It was still early in the morning and I still had classes. I didn’t want to add more bruises to my body.

My stepmom gritted her teeth and tried to slap my aunt, but I was quick to cover her, making the slap hit my cheek. The harsh pain came and all I could do was grit my teeth.

“Just a little more savings and I’ll get us out of here, Aunt,” I whispered to myself.

“Tsk, you always come to your aunt’s defense. Let me hit her so she can learn her manners,” my stepmom yelled.

“No,” I firmly replied. “If you want hit her again, just do it to me.” My voice was constant but I was shaking, not with fear but with so much anger. God knew how much I fought the urge to hit her back, but no, let me survive this day in peace. I wouldn’t choose violence. Maybe in the future, but for now, I could still handle this little pain.

She smirked and grabbed a little piggy bank from her back. “Know this?”

I gasped, my eyes widened, and I ran to grab it from her, but she pushed my head. “You’re saving money for what? To get out of here?”

This was the only thing that kept me going every day, including my aunt. This was my hope. My stash of savings.

I worked part-time jobs and saved that. I tried hard to hide it in my room. How did she find it?

“Return that to me,” I ordered, staring at her with a determined look.

She chuckled, waving my money at me. “Or what? You’re going to tell your father about it?”

I gritted my teeth. She knew that if I happened to tell Dad, he would just believe his b*tch instead of his own daughter. Damn, what a world to live in.

“Go do your chores first and let me see if I’ll return this to you,” she threatened and walked away.

My aunt snorted. “I could kill that b*tch right now.”

I shook my head. "No, Aunt, I’ll find a way to get that back." She smiled. "You just need to focus on recovering, and once I save enough, I can get you out of this hellhole.” She smiled.

I made sure to let my aunt eat first before making breakfast for everyone in the house, doing the laundry, and washing the dishes. I had ten minutes left before I was going to be late, so I quickly took a shower and got dressed in a pair of black jeans and a hoodie, to cover the bruises I had. I glanced at the mirror and saw that my stepmother’s slap left a mark, and I put on some concealer to hide it.

Glancing at the clock again, I sighed, knowing I was going to be late again. Meaning, I’d be going to detention again, even though I was aiming for clean marks. As I grabbed my red backpack, I heard a yell from outside.

“Itzy!” my stepbrother Bryce exclaimed, calling me by my second name, Itzayana, waiting for me by the door. “Let’s go!”

I blinked, furrowing my eyebrows at him. “I thought you were already at school? Did you wait for me? You’ll be late too!”

He shrugged, grabbing my bag and slinging it on his shoulder before putting his hands on my shoulder. “Hm, nothing new. C’mon.”

I uncontrollably flinched when his hands met my cheek and he noticed it. “Another bruise from my mother again?”

I shrugged. “Nothing new,” I replied to his earlier responses, and he clicked his tongue disappointedly.

“I apologize, my mother is like that. She is in her menopausal stage, so bear with her,” he said genuinely.

I raised my eyebrows at him. “She's been treating me like that for my whole life, so she’s having menopause the entire time?”

“As payback, I’ll give you this." Bryce handed me hundred-dollar cash, and I gasped. “Where did you get this?"

“From Mom. I stole your money back,” he said with a mischievous grin, and I chuckled at him, accepting the money and hiding it in my bag.

He opened the door for me, then opened his car door, and started the engine. The school was a five-minute drive, and I was thankful that my dad had covered my tuition for this. I had to beg him as he thought I would just waste his money.

As soon as my stepbrother parked his car, we got out and he handed me my bag.

“Thanks,” I said and glanced to see the head popular girl of the campus, the ‘it’ girls of our school, glaring at us. She had been desperately trying to get my stepbrother’s attention, and my brother just didn't want anything to do with her. My brother was the football captain. Like in typical movies, she thought that a football captain and an all-famous girl should be together.

The mean girl rolled her eyes at me. She hated to see me with her crush so much. Tsk, this just gave me more confidence to irritate her.