CHAPTER 42: HE COULDN’T KILL HER.

Alexander watched Anna as she slept peacefully on the hospital bed. He had been watching her for the past thirty minutes and he didn’t know why he hadn’t done what he came here for.

He moved closer to her bed, then reached for the gun in the small of his back and pointed it directly at her head. He was done waiting, now he should proceed. Just one bullet... that was all.

His finger hovered around the trigger, ready to pull. But it was as if the trigger was stuck. His hand felt weak and the gun suddenly became heavy. What was happening to him?

He had never been hesitant to do this before. But at the same time, he never killed anyone innocent.

’Fuck it,’ he muttered under his breath, and tightened his grip on the gun, trying to force himself to pull the trigger. She wasn’t innocent, Alexander reminded himself. She was ’his’ blood. She was part of the reason he suffered so much.

However, the longer he stood there, convincing himself why she deserved to die, the harder it was to go through with it.

He couldn’t kill her.

But why? Why was it always that way? Her father didn’t hesitate when he sent men to kill his mother. So why did he feel reluctant to do the same with his daughter?

Alexander’s fingers loosened slightly around the weapon. Thinking about it, he had spilled a lot of blood, taken so many lives to get to where he was now. Yet, none of it had filled the void. And now, with Anna lying defenseless in front of him, he realized this wouldn’t either.

Killing her wouldn’t bring his mother back. It wouldn’t erase the scars on his body or the memories that haunted him every night. It wouldn’t undo the years of pain and torment.

Why did he feel like he was the one begging for mercy now?

Alexander exhaled sharply and lowered the gun completely. A wave of frustration and disgust washed over him... not at her, but at himself. He felt the sudden urge to turn the gun at himself and pull the trigger through his own heart.

This was all he had planned for ten years, to make George Steele suffer and crawl on his knees in front of his feet. But now he couldn’t even pull that off.

Casting one last look at Anna’s peaceful face, Alexander slipped the gun back into the holster, then turned away from her and walked out of the room, clenching his jaw to contain the tumult of emotions rising inside of him.

Once he was outside, Ethan came to him.

"What did you find?" Alexander asked.

"I got the van’s plate number and was able to track it down. The van belonged to some old man in the other neighborhood. When I confronted him, he said something totally different..." Ethan paused and looked at him.

"What did he say?" Alexander demanded, his patient running thin.

"He explained that a young man rented the van two days prior to the accident, and he didn’t know who it was. But based on his description, I figured out it was actually the wanted guy on the poster."

"Wanted guy?"

Ethan nodded.

Alexander raised a brow. What did a wanted guy have to do with Anna?

"He must be working for someone," he suggested. "Find out the person who he is working for. And for Claudia Steele, I want you to keep an eye on her.

"Sure, boss."

"Any news regarding seraphina?" Alexander inquired, glancing at his wrist watch.

Ethan slowly shook his head. "The doctor said the poison already damaged most of her organs. She only has a few weeks to live. There is nothing they can do about it."

"Alright," Alexander breathed. "Make sure her daughter doesn’t know about it."

Without waiting for Ethan’s response, Alexander turned on his heels and walked away. Getting into his car, his thoughts circled back to what Ethan said just now about Anna’s mother. He only found out the woman was extremely sick just a day after Anna’s accident, and maybe if George wasn’t so greedy to take his mistress to the hospital, she would have survived.

He wondered how Anna would feel to know that her mother didn’t have much time left.

Well, that was not his concern. He had already done enough by placing her mother in hospice care. She owed him for that.

****

"You idiot!" Claudia smashed the glass of wine on the tiled floor of the VIP room. "I told you not to make any mistakes. Why is she still alive? Tell me why!" Her face was red with rage as she stared daggers at Sandro for answers.

Sandro on the other hand just rested his back on the couch with no expression.

"I did exactly what you told me to," he said. "It was pure luck that she managed to survive."

"You always ruin everything!" Claudia could hear none of it. She was so angry, angry that Anna always got away. After all the hard work she put into this to make it flawless. Now, she was still alive, still with the man who was supposed to be hers in the first place. Thinking about it made fire pumped through her vein like blood.

"Listen, this isn’t over. I want her out, okay?" She said, after she had forced herself to calm down a little bit.

"Whatever you want," Sandro shrugged.

Claudia reached for her bag and pulled out an invitation. "There is going to be a prominent business party in ten days I am sure she will be there." She handed the invitation to Sandro. "Don’t ruin it again, otherwise..."

"I won’t." Sandro collected the invitation and tucked it in the breast pocket of his leather jacket. "But also pray luck wouldn’t be on her side, you know..." he grinned, mischievously.

"There is nothing like luck. Do your job well." Saying that, Claudia grabbed her purse and stormed out of the room.

She had lured Anna to seraphina the day of the accident. She knew the stupid girl would run to her mother after hearing the news. But what she didn’t expect was for both mother and daughter to survive.

The doctor had said the poison did a lot of damage to Seraphina’s system and the poor mistress only had a few weeks to live.

Claudia shook her head, both happy and sad. Sad because Seraphina always treated her with kindness ever since she came to live with them for Anna’s sake, because her mother, Irene wouldn’t take care of a bastard child.

Happy because Anna was losing her mother, the same mother she had wished and hoped that she would one day see her as her daughter

Anna would always be a loser. And it wouldn’t be long before she lost her life too.