Omega (Alpha & Omega #1)

{Chapter Thirty Seven}

I wanted to please my dad - the one who played a part in birthing me. I wanted to just say yes, to make him happy. If I lived through the experiment, I could be put back on the registry and be his child again. He'd smile at me again, do things with me again, be my father again.

"How does mom feel about this," I asked.

He raised his eyebrows. "How should I know? I haven't seen her in three weeks."

What?

At my confused look, he snorted. "She tried killing herself, Phoenix. So I sent her away. I'm working on divorcing her at the moment anyway."

I did fall then, my knees giving out completely at the news that my mother tried to end her life. My knees hit the floor with a hard thump, and I bowed my head, breathing heavily while staring down at the spinning floor.

My dad's shoes appeared in my vision and he knelt down. When his fingers brushed my chin, I flinched back, thinking his was going to hurt me. But he only raised my face and wiped a tear away that had fallen unbidden from my eye.

"If she would have told me that her father was an omega," he murmured, wiping another tear away, "we would have never tried for you to begin with."

He didn't need to slap me or punch me to hurt me. Those words were enough, and he knew it. Every word he spoke was carefully thought through. He wasn't just spewing nonsense out.

I couldn't bite back any sort of retort. I was too busy trying to breathe through the sudden rush of breathlessness. I was breathing so hard and so fast, but it still seemed like I couldn't get enough air in.

"Hey," he said, feigning sympathy, "it's okay. She's getting the help she needs, then she can marry someone of her status."

Her status.

Her fucking status?

I slapped his hand away. "How fucking dare you?"

His eyes widened slightly and he backed away before he realized that he was backing away from an omega.

"I know you don't love my mother," I growled, "but you should treat her with some goddamned respect. Especially having to put up with your manipulative ass for so fucking long!"

Crack!

My body slammed hard against the floor and my cheek exploded with a pain I hadn't felt in a long time. I turned my face to look up at him, and all pretence of happiness was wiped off of his face. His eyes were narrowed into slits, glowing in anger. His hand was still in a fist.

I spit blood out onto the floor.

"I see living with the Scarborough brothers has made you lippy," he murmured.

I narrowed my eyes. I wasn't hyperventilating anymore. I was livid. So angry at my father for ever spewing that shit out about my mother. She did nothing wrong. She didn't hit me because of what I was. No, she was the one who came in after a beating and cleaned and dressed my wounds. No one else did that for me. Her distancing herself away from me was for my father.

"That's okay though," he curled his other hand into a fist. "We can fix it."

"You have no right to touch me," I said.

His lips curled into a smile I knew too well. "Don't think so?"

I tried moving out of the way, but he was too fast. His foot reared back and slammed into my gut so hard that my body went airborne. I landed hard and tried to gasp for air, but none came. It hurt to breathe and move.

He walked over to me slowly, giving me time even though he knew I couldn't move. He used his foot to move me onto my back, then pressed it against my throat, threatening.