Page 3 of Sandro

Leonardo

It was days like today that I missed my mom more than anything. I knew I was fortunate that I was even allowed to remain here at the pride house, but my mom had been born into this pride, and even though she had died a few years ago, I had nowhere to go, and Alpha Franco hadn’t seemed as if he was in too much of a hurry to kick me out.

But today was especially difficult because it would have been Mom’s birthday, and she wasn’t here to celebrate it. I knew that it was dumb and missing her wouldn’t bring her back. That didn’t stop the ache though.

It did no good to stand and dwell on things I would never have, so I grabbed the bucket and put it into the utility sink to fill it. I needed to clean the floors in the hallway, and they were my least favorite because of course they were cream-colored tiles with light grout. Why couldn’t they be the darker terra cotta–colored ones with the brown grout that was basically everywhere else in the house? Why did the ones that were in the highest-traffic area of the pride house have to be the color to show the most dirt?

Because Alpha Franco didn’t have to clean them. That’s why. The man didn’t do anything except abuse his authority as pride alpha. I was only here because Mom was born into this pride, and even after finding her mate, for some reason they chose to stay here. Life had never been what I would call easy. My parents chose to live here at the pride house, and it wasn’t until I was older that I understood why they didn’t live near my dad’s family. He was human, and after he and Mom claimed each other, he stopped aging.

Dwelling on the family that I wouldn’t ever have only helped to fuel my desire to make certain I worked hard enough to someday get away from here. Life had been marginally better when my parents were still alive, but I knew their “accident” wasn’t really a mishap. I was supposed to have been with them that evening, but they’d left me here at the house while they went out for a date night. They never returned, and I didn’t know until the next day. That was the last time my life had been even somewhat normal.

Now I was the pride’s servant. I spent my days cleaning whatever had been tasked to me that day and hoped that I stayed out of the peripheral of the alpha and his brother. Of the two, Alpha Franco was marginally better, but just barely. The real issue was his brother Pietro and Pietro’s best friend, Bruno. They made everyone miserable if they weren’t part of their inner circle.

The bucket was filled with hot water, and I picked it up and carried it back to the opening of the hallway. There were terra cotta tiles in the hallway, but in the foyer, Alpha Franco liked cream tiles. He had said they looked cleaner and brought a sense of prestige to the pride house. I rolled my eyes at that memory. They always looked dirty if you asked me. They were impossible to keep clean, and anytime someone had muddy shoes, I ended up scrubbing the grout for hours.

I started at the hallway and worked my way toward the front door, hoping that I wouldn’t have to clean them more than once because Alpha Franco demanded that these tiles be scrubbed by hand with a brush and a harsh cleaner. Even with my shifter abilities, the cleaner still bothered my skin, and they were often irritated.

I spent a good hour of my time scrubbing the grout lines, then going back and mopping the floor to make certain all of the harsh cleaner was mopped up. Unfortunately, I’d have to do this exact same thing again in less than a week because someone had the genius idea that cream tiles were the way to go and made the place look expensive. I shook my head at that thought. Maybe if there weren’t tacky figurines everywhere, it might actually look a little classy. Who wanted figurines and artwork of blobs, squares, and randomly naked people all throughout their house? I shook my head and got back to work.

I was probably half-finished and back on my knees, scrubbing the floor and grout, when I heard footsteps and then laughter behind me. I didn’t think anything of it at first, because the pride house had many people that lived in it, but then I heard something else. Something that sounded like splashing. Like someone was dropping water on the floor, and that irritated me because my first thought was that someone was playing in the mop water.

“You missed a spot” was the only warning I had before there was a stream of red liquid thrown toward me. I gasped and managed to move back just before whatever liquid it was spread out on the tile floor where I’d been cleaning.

“What? No, no, no!” I shouted as Pietro and Bruno hurried off while laughing. I hated both of them with a passion. They lived to make my life difficult. I crawled back toward the mess, only to realize that it was wax that they’d thrown at me. Hot, liquid wax that was now hard and stuck to not only the cream-colored tiles, but the light gray grout that was on the floors. Remembering the noise from just before, I looked around, wondering how I was going to get it out of the grout, and saw what looked like a trail from the other side of the house. How could they be so cruel? What had I ever done to either of them?

I knew that if I didn’t get the stains out quickly enough, Alpha Franco would beat me. He would blame me for this mess and would never believe me that it was his brother and his equally evil friend who had done this.

Frustration and rage filled me, and I don’t know what overcame me. Something inside of me snapped, and I screeched in outrage and took off running after Pietro and Bruno. I caught up with them at the end of the hallway and simply jumped. I landed on Pietro’s head and sunk my claws into his face.

“I’m going to make you pay for that,” I shouted. I felt someone pulling on me at the same time Pietro started screaming in earnest. I held on with everything I had in me, and it wasn’t until I was knocked on the head hard that I finally let go of my hold on my bully. My head instantly hurt, and sparkly floating things were in my vision.

Years of torment came to the surface, and I was just done. Once my head stopped spinning, I took a leap at Pietro again, but this time, I was the one who yelped when I was hit again, this time even harder.

“Leonardo! Fermati!”

I froze at the sound of the alpha’s sharp command and immediately curled up into a ball, waiting for the next hit. When it didn’t come, I peeked out from behind my arm to see what was going on.

Alpha was busy checking on Pietro, and I took the opportunity to stand and take off running. I darted for the door and was out before I heard the shouting behind me. I didn’t care. I was tired of being Pietro’s punching bag and basically the pride’s servant. I had wanted to get away for a long time, and although now wasn’t exactly when I had planned to make my final exit, I wasn’t going to look back. I knew that if they caught me, I’d be lucky to live. One didn’t attack the alpha’s brother and live to tell others about it.

Alpha Franco didn’t care what his brother and Bruno did. They both terrorized the omegas in the pride, and more. I wasn’t sure how it was that I’d managed to remain somewhat out of their radar when it came to “nighttime pleasures,” as they referred to it, but I had, and I was grateful for the fact. But I knew that the stain the red wax was going to cause on Alpha Franco’s precious floor was going to earn me a beating that I’d suffer from for days, and I’d had enough.

I continued running, thankful that we lived in such a large city that it didn’t take long for me to get lost in the large number of people in Rome. I dove into the first shop I could find that I knew had a bathroom. Did I manage to sneak in without others seeing me? I wasn’t sure, but I knew that after I’d attacked Pietro, I would need to wash my hands at a minimum. I tried to be as calm as possible so as not to bring any unwanted attention to myself and kept to the left side of the shop, where I knew the door to the bathroom was.

I was grateful that it was unoccupied, and once I was inside and was able to close and lock the door, only then did I take a deep breath and try to calm myself. I knew this day would come. How, I couldn’t say, but I knew that eventually Pietro or Bruno would push too hard or force certain things, and I would need to escape. Now I needed to get cleaned up and then to the other side of the city to get my things I had stored in a locker near the railway. I knew I would need to escape, and I’d slowly been saving what I could.

I took another minute to calm myself down and then walked away from the door and looked at myself in the mirror. It wasn’t too bad, which is probably why I didn’t seem to draw any attention to myself. I turned the water on, and after pumping several squirts of soap into my hands, I started scrubbing at my hands, wrists, and lower arms. I rinsed them well and then did it again, making certain I got all of the blood out from under my nails.

Pietro would live, and he wouldn’t even scar, which was really a pity, but I knew that if Alpha Franco didn’t kill me or allow his brother to do so, my life would be by far more miserable than it already was. Despite everything that had happened, I knew they would spin the tale to make Pietro the victim and me the aggressor, which was laughable. I shook my head at the thoughts and tried to keep myself as calm as I possibly could. I needed to be thinking clearly.

After washing and rinsing my hands a second time, I inspected them for traces of blood, and when I deemed them clean, I stared at my reflection. There was a little bit of splatter on my own cheek, and I used a wet towel to scrub it clean. I looked at my shirt, and although there were a few spots on the shoulder, it wasn’t anything too obvious. Of all of the days that I chose to wear a red shirt, today was the day. Later, when the blood dried, it would be more noticeable, but I wasn’t too worried about it at the moment.

I needed to figure out how to get to the other side of the city with what little funds I had on me. I didn’t keep much cash at the pride house because Pietro and Bruno were known for stealing it. Alpha Franco paid me for the work I did at the house, but it wasn’t an honest amount, and he only did so because he was forced into paying everyone who worked in the pride house. It was just enough to keep from getting into trouble if anyone ever asked. I was provided a room and two meals a day, and really, that was more than I would get if I lived elsewhere. But that was the biggest issue. I didn’t have the funds to rent my own place yet, and I wasn’t allowed to get a job outside of helping at the pride house.

There was a quiet knock on the door, and I felt pure panic. I slowly moved toward the door, wondering if I could hear who was on the other side. “Stai bene?” a soft voice called out, and immediately, I relaxed. That was certainly not any voice I had heard at the pride house before. But that didn’t mean they hadn’t found me and had managed to get someone else to ask if I was all right.

“Sì,” I called out before unlocking the door. I found a sweet older lady standing there, and she gave me a questioning look. “Mi scappa la pipì.” I told her. It was the first thing that had come to my mind, and when her eyes grew large and then her cheeks turned a shade not much lighter than my shirt, I knew it had worked as intended. I nodded to her and then walked off. I hoped that telling her that I urgently had to pee was enough to keep her from calling for help. The last thing I needed right now was la polizia after me as well as my pride. I knew the pride would come after me, but would I be able to get far enough away that they would simply let me go?

I stepped back out into the morning sun and squinted. It was already warm for a mid-August morning, but the temperature had been unusually warm this year. I would need to be careful with my funds while trying to navigate my way across the city. Really, in general. I didn’t yet have enough saved to rent a place of my own, and did I wish to stay here in Rome? It was a large city, but the pride had reach, and I knew that I would never be truly safe here ever again.