An unforgiving deceit
Chapter two
The resentment is getting stronger
Clarke had noticed, during the short period in which she was living here in this house in California, with Abby, Harper, Charlotte, Kane, Octavia and Bellamy, there were all sorts of ways in which her resentment could build and build.
Even when she thought that there was no anger left to feel.
She hated Abby. That went without question. She hated Kane. And she was repulsed by Bellamy and Octavia.
But there was more still she could feel descending into her depths of anger.
There were more physically violent ways in which she imagined dispatching these people who dared to think they got to call themselves her "family."
They were not family. They were people that tried to control her life.
And every day that went by, she imagined more and more using her pen knife on them.
But then again, she knew better. She couldn't afford to land in prison now, could she?
She knew she would just have to wait for the next eight months.
Boring and honestly agonizing for her. But she could do it.
She just had coped with the change by staying in her room, secluding herself from the rest of the household, as said household did what they wanted around the house.
A lot of the time, Abby, Harper and Charlotte, and at times, Kane too, tried to get Clarke to come downstairs to spend time with them.
Clarke reacted accordingly. At least to Abby and Kane.
She told them exactly how she felt about them. And when she did, that usually got them to leave, looking horrid and humiliated.
Octavia Blake, frankly, was a fun idiot to smirk at. The stupid bitch would make comments about how self-righteous Clarke was and how she clearly thought she was better than everyone else.
Clarke found Octavia, the stupid bitch that she was, funny, because well, she was right about one thing.
Clarke was better than everyone in the house. She knew that she was. It was just a fact.
She wasn't interested in this delusion of domestic bliss. She knew it for the plastic formed lie that it was.
Every violent image that she had of carving the blade of her pen knife across the throats of the people that controlled her life right now? Didn't give her the satisfaction that she wanted.
But it got close.
Every now and then, she would glance outside and be certain that she saw someone standing by the trees, but then she'd blink and those figures would disappear.
She tried not to think too deeply on it. She knew that she was just unused to rural life. It had to be only that, because how else would you explain her seeing a small group of people one minute, then that same group of people disappearing the next second?
No one could move that quickly.
So, Clarke knew that she had to be imagining it.
It was the only logical explanation.
Clarke wasn't Abby or Harper or Charlotte or that idiot, Kane.
She wasn't prone to flights of fancy.
Unless there were people stalking around the outside of the house, then there was no way she saw the things that she was seeing more and more of.
She knew how to logically put the ridiculous thoughts like there being people outside, watching the house, away.
The logical answer was that she was just imagining it.
It was why she never mentioned it.
Because she could just picture all three Charlotte, Octavia and Bellamy making fun of her for it.
That was just the type of people they were.
Likely to make fun of someone who was uncomfortable.
So, she didn't say anything about it.
And she certainly kept the fantasies she had about cutting all of the people in this house except herself, Harper and Charlotte open like pigs, to herself.
For Clarke's entire life, she had always found herself being tempted to commit some violent act or other.
She didn't know the reason why, what the cause was.
But she did.
It bubbled up in her, like those teapots that suddenly whistled when it reached the boiling point that was needed for the whistling to be possible.
She felt hate. Hate unlike anything she suspected any young girl her age and with her privilege in life had the right to feel.
She knew that she had privilege, but it didn't change that this rage, seemed to just come out of nowhere.
It was a rage she possessed that felt like it overwhelmed her, all the time.
It was like every moment she let her guard down-rage, rage, rage, rage, rage.
She often wondered what would happen, should she seek out therapy of some sort.
But she also knew that she wouldn't, since from what she had experienced in therapy so far? Therapists tended to rat an underage patient out to the underage patient's parent or parents.
She had told her previous therapist how much she felt unappreciated by Abby, and of course, what did the therapist do? She ratted Clarke out to Abby and Abby was happy to mentally pick Clarke apart regularly since then.
So, Clarke realized that therapy was not a place she could turn to. She only had herself, until she went to Phoenix to join her real family.
Again, she tried to focus on the good things that she could look forward to, after the eight months were up.
She focused on the things she could do in her room-that being drawing and painting and reading.
But she looked forward to being with Jake, Callie, Carmen and their babies.
She looked forward to living in Phoenix, Arizona.
She looked forward to having a bunch of pet lizards. Hopefully if she got a savannah lizard, it would follow her around the house, like a dog.
She would keep a load of tanks in her room, each tank holding an animal. And she'd have her "lizard dogs," the larger lizards, follow her around the house.
Maybe even eventually, when all three Michael, Pauline and Sean, were close to their preteen years, Clarke could get a tegu. Those lizards were like scaly, affectionate dogs-if trained properly, that was.
There was no way she could have any pets with the pieces of shit she was currently living with.
But after she turned eighteen, in eight months, she could leave and everything was going to be okay.
Clarke had almost immediately, kept the containers full of money, in a compartment right behind the heavy bed in her room.
The other containers, she put behind one of her heaviest bookshelves.
There was no way she was going to fucking risk any of her stash being found and keeping her from Phoenix.
If the money somehow was found and taken from her, then she'd do what she had to and walk all the way to Phoenix.
She had done the math. When she looked it up on the Internet, it said that to get from southern California, to Phoenix Arizona, it was up to 269 miles. The Internet didn't give her that much information on that number, but, she learned that 250 miles, took up to four and half hours. That must meant that she'd have another couple of hours to go to get to Phoenix. And where Kane lived in California? It was just right next to Arizona, right close to where Phoenix was.
That meant that she likely really would have only six or so hours to get there.
And if it took more than that? Well, too bad. Clarke would take as much time as she needed to get there. Nothing would keep her here with Kane and Abby and their idiotic, plastic family.
It didn't matter if she had to grab loads of bags with containers of water, extra food and so on, she would get from California, all the way to Phoenix, Arizona, to her real family, one way or another.
From downstairs, as she sat against the headboard of her bed, reading, she heard a lot of giggling and laughing. Likely Charlotte.
She couldn't care less, though. Good to know that Charlotte was so easily pleased.
She supposed she could be happy for her little sister.
But Charlotte and Harper had accepted the life that Abby and Kane had set up for them.
Clarke couldn't. She couldn't bear it.
Clarke just needed to wait.
A month went by and Clarke's hate for Abby, for Kane, for Bellamy, for Octavia, just built and built.
And that was when those out in the forest, watching the house, watching Clarke, knew what to do next.
They understood that Clarke was in pain. She was in so much pain. They knew that they would need to stop it for her.
She had already endured the mental and verbal abuse for a month.
They would get rid of Clarke's pain.
They would need to draw Clarke away from the house. And when she was far away from the house, they would set the whole house on fire, while everyone else was asleep.
Charlotte and Harper? Clarke's younger sisters?
They would never see Clarke's point of view.
They would never understand why Clarke needed what she needed.
It was better that they kill both Charlotte and Harper. And it certainly wasn't the first time that they would be to kill children.
And they knew that it would be worth it to help Clarke. Clarke needed this.
Clarke might love Harper and Charlotte. But it didn't change that they were dangerous to Clarke mentally, because they always would do whatever it was that Abby said.
Clarke needed to be free. And the way to free her, would be by killing everyone in that house who wasn't Clarke.
They had arranged for Abby to meet Kane. Because they knew that Abby moving from the city to where Kane lived, would keep them isolated and in so doing, would be very easy to get rid of them, without witnesses.
That was why they had "slipped" Abby's contact information to Kane and had watched and listened as Kane video chatted with Abby, the two of them essentially forming a romance.
The situation was set up perfectly for them to dispose of those that kept Clarke down. And soon, Clarke could live with who she wanted to live with.
Those that were watching, crept closer to the house.
One of them, Carol, smirked as she tilted her head up at the window which was the window to Clarke's room in the house she currently was living in.
The house was the place that Clarke was living in, but it was not her home.
They all knew that Clarke would never accept this house as her home.
Her home, as far as Clarke could see, was with her father, Jake Griffin, and Carol and the others knew that.
One of the others, Bruce, said, "Should we do it now?"
"Yes," Steve said, "Soon."
By "soon" and "now," they all knew that they meant tonight.
They had waited long enough and Clarke needed to be free of these people.
They didn't mind killing Charlotte or Harper Griffin.
It would free Clarke from being dragged down by anyone else. She would not be tied to anyone else, except to those that she wanted to be tied to.
And Abby and Harper and Charlotte, not to mention Kane and his children? Would not have their hooks in her ever.
All of them, they wished to kill the occupants of the house, save for Clarke, Harper and Charlotte.
They were going to kill Charlotte and Harper, one way or another. But they didn't want to.
Harper and Charlotte's deaths were just a means to an end, nothing more.
And Clarke they would never harm ever. Because she meant everything to them. Everything.
It was the opposite. They would give her everything. Everything Clarke could ever possibly want and need.
The only key here, was leading Clarke away from the house. And making sure that she had an alibi, making sure that there were witnesses seeing her around, during the time that they killed everyone inside the house.
Slowly, Natasha turned to Pepper and Tony and instructed, her voice icy and steely, "Send her the email."
Pepper, who was seated against a log, leaning back against the tree behind her, with her open laptop on her lap, began to work.
There was an event happening in town. While they didn't doubt that Clarke knew that there were multiple events that took place in town, it was doubtful that she heard about those events, because Abby and the others tried to keep her occupied and didn't like that Clarke had time for herself.
Currently, there was an event in the nearest town, where a semi-rock performance was happening.
Rock and roll wasn't Clarke's favorite music, it still was something to do, and they didn't doubt for a second that Clarke would rather see it, than spend time around Abby, Harper, Charlotte, Kane and his children.
So, Pepper sent the article on the semi-rock event taking place in town, tonight, around 5 o'clock at night and carrying on for hours, until 11 at night.
There would be six hours. Six hours for people to see where Clarke was at the event.
And six hours for them to go into the house and kill every last person inside the house, while Clarke was gone.
Clarke could use her anger, all she wanted as a barrier between herself and Charlotte and Harper.
But they all knew that Clarke would grieve for her sisters, even if she didn't want to. For Harper and Charlotte, she would shed endless tears.
However, the twenty-seven of them? They would give Clarke what she needed.
And they would make sure that Clarke had the family she wanted. Them. And Clarke's father, Jake, and her two new mothers, Callie and Carmen, and her three baby siblings.
And she would have so much more.
As of right now, Clarke was seventeen. She was not of age yet.
And they would not approach her. Not yet. Not till she was over nineteen.
Yes, technically, in most places that didn't believe in adults sexually taking advantage of children, eighteen, was the age of consent.
However, they wanted to give her a chance to live with her new family in Phoenix, Arizona, live her own life, for a few years.
Then they would approach her.
They would wait till she was of twenty-one years. Then they would approach her.
They hoped she would understand them.
Clarke's rage? It came from somewhere. It wasn't normal for her.
Or at least, she wouldn't have, were it not for Abby Griffin having been attacked when she was almost six months pregnant with Clarke.
Seventeen and a half years ago, when Abby had been pregnant with Clarke, Abby was attacked by one of their species.
The one that had attacked Abby, had hit Abby hard and had gripped Abby around the throat, then had bitten Abby hard.
They knew how the infection would work.
Abby would not be affected by the venom injected into Abby's bloodstream.
That wasn't how the venom worked.
It was designed to pass on to those who were carried by pregnant individuals.
In other words, it was designed to create hybrid vampire children.
Unfortunately, there hadn't been enough venom pumped into Abby's system for it to work. Abby, of course, had been unaffected, except for a pierced throat. But the venom only affected Clarke so much.
Clarke's biology hadn't changed enough for her to be a hybrid. But it had affected the chemicals that affected her moods.
Her anger.
Clarke would have had a normal range of emotions, were it not for that vampire venom which affected her all the time.
It made it so that her ability to control her anger, was nonexistent.
The group outside of the house where Clarke was? They all knew that Abby feared Clarke. Feared her deeply.
And for good reason.
They knew that when Clarke was ten years old, she had gone into a rage after Abby had called Jake a loser and a failure as a husband and father.
Clarke had trashed the entire house.
Books on the floor, smashed glass everywhere, broken furniture, broken dishes-the TV had even been cracked when Clarke had toppled it over.
And the way that Clarke had looked at Abby, as if she wanted to kill the woman?
Well, Abby had learned to watch her mouth about Jake Griffin, after that.
They knew that when Clarke was thirteen, and it was Halloween, Clarke had snuck up on the woman, wearing an extremely realistic zombie mask.
She had yelled and Abby had jumped, turning around and had screamed, jumping back, seeing Clarke with the mask on, before Clarke chuckled and ran back to her room, with Abby yelling her name after her.
When Clarke had gotten back to her room, she had pulled her mask off and sneered quietly, "Scared you, didn't I, you bitch?"
They knew that when Clarke had been fifteen years old, she had heard Abby mocking Jake over the phone, telling him that he would never see any of his daughters again, and Clarke had punched her right fist out against the glass window she had been right next to, creating a huge crack throughout the glass window.
Were Clarke completely human? Or had the venom injected into Abby's neck been more than it had been, then Clarke would have had the ability to control her anger problems. But she wasn't completely human. And she didn't have enough venom in her to balance out her rage. The venom would have given Clarke the same amount of restraint as the amount of anger she had, it would have balanced out with her anger, the way a full human being's ability to restrain themselves would be balanced with their anger.
But Clarke had a shred of vampire venom in her, which meant that it wouldn't offer her balance with her anger.
Her anger was that of a vampire's, since vampires felt things more intensely than humans did.
The problem, the venom didn't allow her the impulse control needed to balance it out, because she didn't have enough venom for that.
When they turned her, when she was older, then she'd have enough venom to have normal emotions and normal impulse controls.
But for now? She was mass of rage and uncontrolled anger.
The only other two things that Clarke seemed to have gotten from Bruce biting her biological mother while Abby was pregnant with Clarke, was that Clarke tended to crave red meat. And she could see better in the dark than most people. But that was about it.
But Clarke's anger, was her most prominent trait which she had been born with after Bruce had bitten Abby, while Abby had been pregnant with Clarke.
And to her? Abby keeping her from her daddy, painted Abby as the biggest and worst villain of this story you could ever ask for.
Were Clarke not able to feel this amount of rageful anger?
It was very likely she would still see Abby as the enemy. She likely would still be pissed at Abby.
Because Jake Griffin had loved Clarke more. In the right way.
Jake Griffin, who had encouraged Clarke's interests and who was happy for Clarke whenever Clarke did almost anything, who didn't condescend Clarke, who didn't treat Clarke as if she wasn't good enough, who didn't treat Clarke as if she was a mistake-goodness, who wouldn't resent Abby?
For Abby, Harper and Charlotte were her perfect daughters, because they weren't practically literally attached to their father.
Jake and Clarke? They always had a special connection.
Jake was likely the parent that Clarke would listen to all the time.
And that made Clarke, in Abby's eyes, a mistake-defiant, not worth the totality of her love.
It meant that in Abby's eyes, Harper and Charlotte, were the daughters worthy of her love, not Clarke.
Whatever Clarke could do, no matter how good or well-meaning, would never be enough in Abby's eyes.
And that was likely even without Clarke's serious anger problems.
So, even if Clarke wasn't furious all the time? It was likely that Abby would have pushed her away, ages ago.
Either way? Clarke's mates were right to do what they were planning on doing.
That was who they were, the twenty-seven of them.
Clarke's soulmates.
A vampire would know it's soulmate as soon as they saw or smelled them.
The vampire who had attacked Abby? Had been Bruce. He had smelled Clarke, and had hoped to make her more like them, before she was even born.
Unfortunately, he was interrupted before he could give Abby the venom that was required for such a thing.
It was in no way a surprise to any of the vampires who were Clarke's mates, that she despised Abby.
They had been watching Clarke very closely over the years.
And again, Abby had earned every ounce of Clarke's rage.
Every furious act that Clarke committed against Abby? Abby more than deserved it.
One could argue that perhaps Abby had treated Clarke differently, because some part of her suspected that Clarke's behavior was the side effect of Abby having been bitten while pregnant with Clarke. But Abby's abusive behavior could not be excused.
Abby even, within earshot of Clarke, and knowing that Clarke was in earshot, had one time called Clarke, when Clarke had been only six years old, "an ungrateful little brat, who seemed to want to kill her even before the brat had been born."
That? Calling Clarke an ungrateful brat, implying that Clarke had tried to kill Abby when being born-it most likely remained burned into Clarke's memory. And it most likely still haunted her occasionally.
Clarke might have hated Abby.
But so did all of her mates.
They hated Kane, and Kane's two children, Bellamy and Octavia, too.
It would be all the more satisfying when they killed all of the people in this house, outside of Clarke.
Pepper typed in what she needed and said, "And sent," she nodded to the computer, closing it and getting up off of the log, "She should be getting the email, soon."
They heard Clarke gasp, and heard her typing away at her computer.
They then heard her get up from where she was seated.
Clarke likely was checking the time and location of where the rock band event was taking place.
They then heard her run to the other side of the room, likely getting everything ready.
Several of the vampires had smirks on their faces.
Good. Clarke would be leaving the house soon.
Then, when Clarke was there at the event, surrounded by witnesses, and she had spet at least two hours there, that was when they would act.
Clarke opened up the window to her room, and began to climb out of the window, with her things in tow.
She climbed down the side of the house, and jumped at the last step, down and onto her feet on the ground, and walked around the house, down the road, in the direction of town, where the event was taking place.
The vampires watched as she descended down the dirt path, away from the house.
They all looked at each other, sharing a frightening grin, their teeth too sharp, their eyes glinting animalistically.
They had made sure to go behind trees, whenever Clarke looked out her window, or whenever she snuck outside when the rest of the household didn't want her to go out.
They knew that she occasionally saw them. But she likely had told herself that she was hallucinating.
They knew also that she wouldn't trust any therapist or psychiatrist. Abby, like everything else, had fucked up any chance of Clarke trusting people in that particular position.
They would wait. Two hours.
And when it was time, after that?
They would go into the house, tie the group of six up. They would kill both Charlotte and Harper quickly. They then would move on to Abby, Kane, Octavia and Bellamy, and then? The vampires who were Clarke's mates, would take their slow, agonizing, sweet time, torturing all four Abby Griffin, Marcus Kane, and Octavia and Bellamy Blake to death.