Page 156 of Ruthless Knot

Can't wrap my small brain around the idea that my parents—who look at each other like the sun rises and sets in each other's eyes, who touch constantly, casually, like they can't bear to be apart—could have everdespisedeach other.

Dad chuckles.

The sound is warm, fond, colored by years of memories I'm not privy to.

"Yes, we couldn't stand each other. Me and my group of friends..." He trails off, that distant look in his eyes that adults get when they're remembering things from before you existed. "Well, we were very different than now. Arrogant. Certain we knew everything about everything. And your mother…she made us realize we were underestimating her."

His smile turns rueful.

Proud.

"We learned it the hard way."

I giggle, imagining my mother putting a group of arrogant Alphas in their place.

It's easy to imagine.

She does it all the time now—that sharp tongue, those sharper blades, the way she can silence a room just by walking into it.

"What did she do?" I ask eagerly. "Did she beat you up? Did she?—"

"That's a story for when you're older," Dad interrupts, but he's smiling. "Much older. With appropriate context."

I pout.

He laughs.

Then his expression shifts—something sadder creeping in at the edges, something heavy that I don't understand yet but will learn intimately in the years to come.

"Life isn't going to be easy for you, Sera."

The words land differently.

Heavier.

More real.

I stop squirming, some instinct telling me that this is important. That I need to listen. That these words are being given to me as a gift I won't understand until much, much later.

"I don't know if Mommy and Daddy get the privilege of seeing you grow up," he continues, and his voice is steady but his eyes are bright. "Not with what we do. You know?"

I don't know.

Not really.

I know my parents do Important Work. Know they sometimes come home with blood on their clothes. Know there are Bad People who don't like us, who might try to hurt us, who are the reason we have guards and safe rooms and escape routes drilled into my memory like multiplication tables.

But I don't know.

"But you know—" Dad's hand comes up to pat my head, ruffling my pink hair in that way that always makes me squirm and giggle, "—whether near or far, we're proud of you, yes? We're watching over you."

His voice drops to a whisper.

Conspiratorial.

"And we know you'll be an amazing Omega for a group of Alphas who you may have to prove you're abadassto."

"DADDY!"