The Assassin and The Alpha

Have you ever thought to yourself, how the hell did you manage to get yourself into this position? I know I do it quite regularly, and this is no exception. I guess I should tell you a bit about myself before I launch into the chaos that is my life and everything else I'm going to end up finding myself doing on my journey to God knows where, doing whatever it is I'm told to do.

My name is Rosetta Crowe, and I'll be the first to admit that I absolutely hate my birth name. That's why, growing up, I introduced myself as Rosa. I know my parents hated it; as they put it, that was the birth name they gave me, so I should appreciate it; however, I didn't, and I still don't. I got bullied a lot over my strange name when we moved, which is why I preferred to go by my nickname. At school, when we moved, the bullies soon learned I wasn't just a simple pushover. I would fight back when they started. Yes, I got kicked out of school a few times for it and often got grounded and everything taken away to teach me a lesson, but it never worked like it doesn't for most kids, let's be honest. I mean, how did I expect my strict parents to listen to me when I was being bullied and fighting back to teach them not to mess with me? That wasn't a reason to be in fights with boys; that's what I was always told, but I didn't care. I still fought with people; it seemed to be the only way to make them understand that I wasn't messing around.

As I got older, I got the feeling that I had turned into a disappointment to my family—well, to my mother and sister more than anything else. My dad seemed to try and reason things out with me; he wanted to understand why I was being the way I was. As much as he was strict, he was about the only one who showed me any type of love. When I was younger, we lived in a small farming community where everyone knew everyone. That was before I started fighting. I loved my life there; I had friends who accepted me for me, who would use my preferred name, and who understood why I went by that name, as most of them had strange names too. My dad used to work for a farmer, and it was enough to keep us fed with a roof over our heads; however, the farmer fell on hard times, so we had to move to a city, and that was where I'd gotten bullied. I hated it, and I was the first to admit that I missed that quiet little village where my friends had been, but all I was told was that if my older sister could make new friends, then so could I. So that's what I did. I made new friends; my only problem was that I made friends with the wrong kind of kids.

I made friends with the type of people your parents warn you about—the ones who are nothing but trouble. I had teachers come to me and ask how a sweet girl could end up being friends with the wrong type, and I always told them the same thing because I wanted to. I knew that if I admitted that the bullying was the real cause of the trouble, then nothing would be done. Nothing ever happened when I tried to tell my story; the school and teachers never did anything to save that sweet girl. It was almost like they threw me to the wolves and didn't care after that. If that's what they wanted from me, the stubborn part of me told me that we wouldn't let them down, and I didn't.

When I got a little older, my parents didn't know what to do with me; I'd really fallen through the cracks. I'd argue and fight with them, and I would stay out till all hours because I knew if I went home, I'd simply get called every name under the sun. I wasn't into drugs, and I certainly wasn't into drinking when my friends were. I still had some respect for myself, but all of that changed when I was hanging out with a group of my friends and I was introduced to this guy, whose name was Liam. I wish at that point someone had turned me around and kicked me out of the house I'd met him in, as my life seemed to go downhill after meeting him.

Liam was older by about 3 years. Yeah, yeah, I know, there should have been a massive red flag over him saying trouble was heading this way, but I was 18 when I met him, and by this point in my life, my parents had pretty much given up on me; even my dad was getting close to giving up on me. He had dark black hair and deep blue-grey eyes. I could see that behind his caring manner there was something else, but me being me, I had to know what that something was. I thought I could be the one who calmed his wild nature, like everyone thinks when they meet a bad boy. So Liam and I started dating after three months of knowing each other. When my mom and dad found out, they went crazy, and that was the final straw for both of them. They kicked me out. Liam, being my sweet and caring boyfriend at the time, let me stay with him. He held a job, and he looked after me. He even said he'd try to help me get things sorted with my parents again, and he did try, but they simply told me that I was a disappointment to them and that I should have been like my sister.

It really hurt to hear my family say that to me. I think that was the part that tipped me over the edge and sent me on my last dive into the dark abyss. Liam had told me to take a little time to heal over what I'd heard; he'd still played the concerned boyfriend, but I could also see other things creeping in. I knew he was still hanging out with our friends and a couple of my friends, who had seen the darker side of me. They had all warned me to be careful as Liam had begun asking questions about me and what I was like, and one of them had let it slip about him asking about the fights even though I hadn't fought in years. Again, I can hear you screaming at me, Red Flag!

Yes, I agree—now at least. When he found out about that, it began to feel like he was on purpose trying to get me to fight him. One day, though, he got what he wanted, although not in the way he'd expected.

I'd been out one day looking for a job to at least try and get my life back on track, and I'd come home—well, to Liam's house—to find clothes had been thrown on the floor and perfume was smelling the house out. It wasn't my perfume, as I'd only worn a rose-smelling one; this specific perfume smelled cheap and not nice, and the clothes on the floor were not mine, as I still had mine on. I went into the bedroom, already aware of what I was about to see. I know I could have just simply walked out of the house before I'd even witnessed what I knew I'd witness, but I just couldn't. I opened the door to see them in action. My anger got the better of me as I picked up a vase that was on a shelf near the door and threw it at Liam as I screamed. I remembered the way he looked at me with a wicked grin on his face, as if he'd been pushing me to get that reaction, as the woman jumped out of bed and began to look for her clothes. I moved out of the way to let her out of the room, as I'd screamed at him again. This had all been his fault.

Liam had simply laid back in bed casually and told me I'd been hiding that fighter side of me. He told me about how he thought people had been lying about my anger and past, but now that he'd seen it for himself, he knew it was all true. I remember digging my nail into my finger to keep myself from crying, as I wasn't letting him be the reason I'd cried. I hadn't ever wanted that part of me to come out again. When I'd been with him, it had felt like there hadn't been a need for me to do it anymore, but I was clearly very wrong. He told me that he'd needed to provoke a reaction from me, and since my parents' attitude towards me hadn't provoked me, he knew he'd needed to do something more extreme. I remember screaming at him that he had to do something extreme, and I'd give him something extreme. He sat up, looked at me, and asked if I was serious about wanting a job. He told me his boss was looking for new blood, and he wanted to know if I'd be interested.

I'd just laughed and walked out. No job had been worth catching the one person who I thought had my back in bed with someone else. Liam told me I wouldn't get too far as his boss had eyes on me and he'd said he wanted me, so even if I said no, his boss would get his own way. I turned and asked him what he wanted from me. Liam had grinned at me as if he were the devil himself and told me to go wait for him in the living room, and he'd introduce us. I won't lie; at that moment, I was terrified for the first time in my life. My parents had been right; Liam had been every single shade of wrong for me, and now here I was about to pay the price.

Liam had come out of the bedroom on his phone as he passed it over, and I spoke to the person on the other side of the phone. He told me he had a job position for me, and it would be good money, but I had to do as I was told, otherwise it would cause trouble. I asked what he meant. The male on the phone had said he didn't want me working as a mistress; he needed me as a distraction for Liam. I was merely to talk to people while Liam did his job, and then when Liam gave me a queue, that was when we were to leave. I looked up at Liam, worried about where this business job was going to go, but I could see from the look on Liam's face that I wasn't going to say no, as he wasn't going to let me, so I agreed.