Luca stared at her before bursting out in a hearty chortle. "You cannot be serious. Its impossible for you to leave the pack, Inez. You will die the second you lose the protection of the pack."
He was right. If Inez were to leave the pack, she would only have two options left in front of her. Either join another pack or live in the human world.
Joining another pack was not easy, especially if you were discarded or a runaway from your old pack. And living in the human world was even more difficult. After all, in the eyes of humans, shifters were nothing but demonic entities that needed to be burnt on a stake.
If her identity was ever found, Inez was certain that the humans would give there all to kill her. And to top it all, the Zealots were getting more active now than ever.
They were a fraction who believed that shifters didn't belong in their world and had no right to live and breathe in their society. These people targeted the lone shifters and killed them in the worst possible way to create a sensation and fear in the shifters and among their community.
Of course, there was also the option of turning rogue. But Inez knew she couldn't leave as a rogue—wasn't this the reason why she had stayed in this pack for three years even though she had been treated worse than the omegas of the pack?
But now that the situation had gotten this severe because of her lack of action, Inez wondered whether there was any point in staying here. She didn't want to die but was she even alive if she was living like this?
"You don't have to worry about that," Inez remarked as she opened the door of the truck. "This was what you wanted anyway, right?"
Her tone was casual, as if she couldn't be bothered with her own life and death.
Luca stared at her and felt a sense of unease.
However, he couldn't understand the reason for this unease. He should be glad that they had broken Inez the way they wanted. She was now craving death, and this was exactly what their goal had been from the start; he should be recording this moment and sending it to Dominic so that they could party in the evening.
But he couldn't.
He caught hold of Inez's wrist and pulled her back.
"You have lost your mind, Inez," he rumbled, incredulous. "Living in the pack is better than going out of the pack and getting yourself killed."
His words caused laughter to spill out of her lips. She looked at him and chortled, "Its not me who has lost her mind. Its you."
She turned to look at him and deadpanned, "The rogues would be kinder to me than you all have been, Luca. I don't know what the fuck I did to you all but you should be fucking happy right now. Imagine breaking someone to the point that they would start believing that dying is a much better option than living."
It should. She was right. This was what they had planned all along after Abertha's death. Making her pay for the murder that she had committed, even if Inez didn't know how severe Abertha's sickness was, she shouldn't have stolen the tears of sirens.
But he didn't feel fucking overjoyed. Instead, there was a subtle sense of panic, which made his wolf pace.
Inez didn't care what was going on in his head; she wrenched her wrist out of his grip and slipped inside the truck.
Though Luca's expression showed that he was not feeling well, Inez didn't bother to linger. She had been betrayed more than once; to trust these men again was foolish.
She drove out of the parking lot, leaving nothing but a cloud of exhaust behind.
Luca watched her leave and rubbed his fingertips with an annoyed expression. This was the first time Inez had turned her back on him without caring about him; ever since they were children, she had been the gullible one.
Even if Dominic, the father figure of their little group, didn't trust him, she would.
But now, even when he showed raw vulnerability on his face for a second, she didn't care about him. Was it supposed to hurt this much?
"Oh my god!" Scarlet looked at Inez and gasped in horror. "What the fuck happened?" she pulled her in the clinic and examined the injuries of her sister from head to toe.
"Luca happened," Inez replied as she told everything that happened in the parking lot. Once she finished speaking, Scarlet bristled angrily as she started to pull this bottle and that as she placed them on the counter.
"That bastard," she cursed as she pulled the plunger and dabbed the alcohol on a cotton ball. "I wish I could get a chance to mess up that pretty face of his."
She didn't like it when those men hurt Inez. Just as she didn't like when Blake came to linger in her clinic and tried to talk to her as if the two of them were good friends.
Inez smiled. Her cold heart warmed slightly when she heard the worry in Scarlet's voice. She let her sister fret over her as she bandaged her and after a short pause, she asked, "Would you help me run away?"
However, as soon as she finished speaking, Inez cursed herself inwardly. She had caused enough trouble for Scarlet already. If not for the fact that Scarlet could heal and treat the shifters, she would have been tossed around by Dominic and the rest just like she was.
"Forget it—"
"I thought you would never ask," Scarlet rolled her eyes. She closed the bottle that she had opened and said to Inez, "With how much leverage you have given those men over you, I already booked a casket for you. All set and ready to go with a gothic dark theme. Fortunately, your eyes are opened and I can get my money back."