NOT SO SWEET HOME

RUBY’S POV.

“I was selected… I was selected,” I said to myself again in disbelief. For a long, breathless moment, I did not think Charles would choose me, especially since the spell I used to suppress our mating bond would make me look ugly to him. While standing with the ten other girls waiting in line to be picked by the Alpha, I found myself growing a little jealous that he found other girls attractive. It was probably because I was mated to him, and it was only natural for wolves to be possessive. But other than that, I knew I hated Charles and his family. They ruined my family, and I was going to make all of them pay.

I took a deep breath, eager to let my mom know that her plans had worked and I could finally fulfill my sister’s wish. I gently opened the door to see my mom’s personal nurse administering medication. The nurse gave me a small smile before leaving us alone.

“Hey, Mom,” I whispered, rubbing my sweaty palms together. My mom would not have heard me without our heightened hearing as wolves.

Clearing my throat, I spoke more loudly. “How are you doing, Mom?” Outside this room, I was the most confident and fearless woman anyone would ever meet, but whenever I was next to my mom, I immediately turned into a scared little girl, terrified that any wrong move could cause her trouble.

My mom looked me up and down with disgust before frowning. “What did you just say?”

“I asked how you were doing, Mom,” I repeated.

“Don’t you dare? I don’t want to hear ‘mom’ out of your filthy mouth,” she yelled at me.

“I am sorry, ma’am,” I said, lowering my gaze. The medication was probably kicking in; she did not usually mind when I called her mom, but on some days, it made her hysterical, as if I had poured acid on her face.

She shook her head pitifully. “Why are you here? Your presence always makes me feel ten times worse,” she groaned. “You are just as pathetic as your stupid father.”

“I hope you have something good to say,” she hissed as she downed a glass of water on the bedside table.

“I have good news,” I said with a small smile, hoping to save her from the ruin my presence seemed to bring.

“Are the Fox family rotting in hell for all the pain they caused us?” she asked, looking me dead in the eyes.

“No, but I got accepted as one of his breeders and—” I was saying when my mom rudely interrupted me by throwing her glass at me. Luckily, I was able to duck just in time, and it smashed against the wall instead of hitting me.

“You are a f*****g embarrassment, Ruby. A big one. You come into my home and talk about getting accepted as one of Charles’s breeders like you are talking about getting into Harvard,” she screamed at me.

I looked at her in confusion. “Isn’t that what you asked me to do?” I asked, wondering if I had heard her correctly.

“What I want is for you to make Charles pay for their crimes, not for you to proudly announce that you are going to be one of his whores,” she screamed. “You should be finding their secrets, not f*****g their son.”

I could not take it anymore, and I didn’t realize when I screamed back at her. “I’m not f*****g anyone, Mom,” I yelled. “You asked me to do anything to get into their home, even if it meant becoming his breeder. Now I did, and you are blaming me as if it wasn’t all part of the plan we made together.”

My mom looked at me in shock, probably because she could not process the thought that I would ever raise my voice at her. I never did, and this caught us both by surprise. I was just frustrated that she would think so low of me, believing I would bed the man whose family killed my sister.

The nurse must have heard the commotion because she ran into the room in a panic. “What’s going on?”

Before I could answer, my mom clutched her chest tightly and started gasping for air. “You are a bad child, Ruby,” she managed to say. “I wish you had died instead of your sister. I hate you. I f*****g hate you,” she yelled.

“Ma’am, you need to calm down. Your blood pressure is rising,” the nurse said as she tried to stabilize my mother.

“It’s all because of Ruby,” she said, glaring at me accusingly. “She has always been trouble since the moment she was born. I wish it were you instead of Golden,” she yelled. “Golden was so much more perfect, better than you could ever be.”

********

The nurse managed to calm her down and put her to sleep. Once she was done, she came to meet me in the dining room, where I was having some coffee to quell the raging anger I was feeling.

“I’m sorry about earlier,” I said, sipping from my cup. “Would you like some coffee?”

She shook her head. “No, I’m fine.”

“It must be stressful working for me and my mom,” I said with a laugh, trying to pretend she had not just witnessed one of my worst encounters with my mom.

“No, it’s okay. It’s completely normal,” she said, offering a small smile.

I widened my eyes in shock. “You mean to tell me that you see mothers hating on their daughters every day?”

“No,” she laughed, then added more seriously, “I don’t think she meant those words she said to you. She was probably just in pain.”

I nodded, not wanting to talk any more about it. When she looked into my eyes and screamed about her hatred for me, I knew it was the rawest, most truthful emotion from her very soul. She never loved me, and she didn’t have to. I was a mistake to her. If I could go back in time, I would give everything to die instead of Golden.

People like me do not deserve love; it’s a hard truth I have learned to accept over the years. In a way, I knew my mother blamed me for robbing her and my sister of their perfect lives, and I was going to do everything I could to fix it. I could not bring Golden back to life, but I could definitely destroy the Fox family.