80. Let's take a paternity test

My first instinct is to deny everything. I mean there was just no way he was my father. Because that would mean that Lilly was my sister.

A sister I didn’t know I had. A sister I met by coincidence when Sebastian took me as a mate.

“Look, there’s just no way I’m your long lost daughter. I was raised in an orphanage not stolen from my pack” I tell Lucas trying to still my frantically beating heart.

‘Are you sure of that?’ A voice whispered in my head. ‘You and Claire were after all left at an orphanage and according to Sarah, both of you looked to be less than a year old’

I shake my head. Trying to push away the thoughts. Not wanting to accept what my mind was whispering.

‘Why are you refusing to see the truth, your story fits with that of his and his beta’s missing daughters’

“Blue? Midnight?” I call them, ignoring the doubts in my head but they don’t answer.

It was like they shut me out or maybe I was the one that shut them out.

My eyes follow Lucas' movement when he gets up, pulls out his wallet then removes a photograph. He hands it to me. At first I refuse to take it but curiosity gets the best of me.

I gasp when I look at the picture. The face staring back at me is identical to mine, the only exception being that the woman has strawberry blonde hair and green eyes.

“That’s Hailey” Lucas whispers slowly.

I try to make sense of everything. Try to come up with a possible explanation of why I looked exactly like his dead mate.

“This is nothing, people have at least one doppelganger out there in the world” I argue against the evidence staring me in the face.

My hands are shaking and I feel like I’m being ripped in different directions.

‘Why are you fighting the truth?’ the voice whispers in my head.

To be honest I didn’t know. But maybe it was because I didn’t want to believe that I had such a cruel fate. Didn’t want to believe that someone would steal two little girls from their parents, one of whom had a father that had recently lost his mate and their baby girl was the only piece of his mate that he had.

“Wait you said that Hailey had two older siblings, A sister and a brother who were twins right? Luke asks Lucas nods his head at his son.

“And mom once told me that her mate rejected her” Lilly adds, the wheels in her head turning.

“Mom has a twin brother, Uncle Clive…grandma used to tell me that she had another child, a daughter who died. There were no photos of her though and when I asked mom, she said that her death was painful to all of them, so all her photos were taken down because it was just too hard to look at them, especially for her mate. You never told me who her mate was though and I never asked, just assumed he moved to another pack or something.” She finishes.

I turn to look at Valery. See the pain in her eyes. She wasn’t hurting because her mate was hurting.

This wasn’t just her mate’s pain. It was her pain too.

“You’re Hailey’s sister, aren’t you?” I asked softly. I see the answer in her eyes before she even replies.

“Yes, she was my baby sister” she answers with tears in her eyes. Her voice choking.

I stare at her. “The one that slept with Lucas the day he received his dead mate’s ashes?”

Luke throws me a threatening look but I don’t pay him attention. I wasn’t trying to be mean or anything.

I just wanted to make sure that the information was pieced together without any missing pieces.

“Yes” she murmurs in shame. “It’s not one of my proudest moments, but I was hurting. I had lost my sister and gotten rejected all in the span of two weeks. I didn’t want to tell anyone yet so when I went to check on Lucas and Freya I asked him if I could join him in drinking. I just wanted to drown the pain and heartache. I was horrified when I woke the next morning naked in his bed.”

“He was mine and Clive’s best friend. We never saw each other like that or ever got romantically involved. Our friendship was purely platonic. I felt disgusted with myself. Not only had I slept with my bestfriend but also my sister’s mate. On top of the pain, I was dealing with the guilt of what had happened between us. We agreed to forget it ever happened, that was until I was late and a trip to the doctor revealed that I was pregnant”

I realize that she still carries the guilt. Just like Lucas.

“That’s when your parents asked you to become mates?” I asked and both she and Lucas nodded.

I could see the sense of their thinking. Lucas was drowning in his sorrow and pain. Being the Alpha and a single dad he needed a Luna. Valery was a good friend. She was rejected by her fated and was carrying Lucas’ baby so it made sense to mate them.

They had a foundation to build their relationship. I’m sure their parents were hoping they would heal each other.

“You were pregnant when Freya was kidnapped, what happened to the baby?” Luke is the one that asked. Suspicion in his eyes.

“Yes, I was six months pregnant. As for the baby, you’re that baby Luke” Valery replies with a small smile that doesn’t reach her eyes.

“You were born ten months after Freya, your older sister. We were happy but still overshadowed by the death of my sister, our guilt at sleeping with each other and the disappearance of Freya and Abby…it was a painful period for not only us but the entire pack”

Lilly looks from her parents to me then back to them again. Different emotions flickering through her eyes.

“If indeed Lauren is dad’s daughter then it means not only is she my sister but also my cousin?” she says it more like a question. As if she can’t even begin to fathom what she was uttering.

Not that I believe for one second that Lucas is my father but if he was that would be totally messed up.

Being siblings and cousins at the same time is just… It just doesn’t sit right. It’s all kinds of messed up and wrong.

“Look, like I keep telling you, you’ve got the wrong person.” I tell them before turning to Lilly. “You know my story, know that Claire and I grew up in the orphanage. So I can’t be your sister slash cousin”

She frowns a bit. “Yeah but didn’t you tell me that you and Claire were left at the orphanage door step together?”

She turns to face me fully. “I mean think about it Ren, two baby girls about five months or so appear at an orphanage together. They’re not related at all so that’s particularly strange right? But what’s even stranger is that thousands of kilometers from the orphanage, an Alpha’s and a Beta’s daughters have mysteriously gone missing and no one can find them. Even more of a coincidence is that the Alpha’s daughter had red hair just like one of the girls that arrived at the orphanage”

I swallow because she had just voiced the thoughts that I have been battling.

“Yes but there’s a flaw in your reasoning. If Claire is the beta’s daughter then shouldn’t our DNA test have confirmed that we were related given that she was the daughter of your Hailey and Valery’s brother?”

Lucas did say that the siblings were the children of the betas.

“Not necessarily. My twin brother isn’t our beta. He found his mate in a different pack. She was the only daughter of the Alpha so that meant that the title fell on whoever her mate was. Clive changed packs and Lucas picked John and Olivia to be our beta couple” Valery explains.

If that was the case then Lilly's conclusion now made more sense. Valery's explanation would explain why Claire and I weren’t related.

“Is that true Lauren? That you arrived at an orphanage with another girl?” Lucas asks, pulling me from my thoughts, hope rising in his eyes.

I nod. “Yes, the woman running it said they found us at the doorstep and we refused to be separated, so we grew up together and became sisters even though we weren’t related by blood”

I then shake my head. “But it doesn’t make any sense though. If everything is true then why would someone take us only to leave us in an orphanage? There was always the possibility that we could be found”

“I don’t know, we’ve never quite figured out why someone would take Freya and Abby except for maybe revenge. Lucas and John were the leaders of the strongest pack in these parts so they had a lot of enemies. Any of those enemies would have paid someone to take the children not only to hurt Lucas and John but also to weaken. A person is most vulnerable when they’re grieving and in distress.”

Valery answers my question.

“I still think you have the wrong person” I insist.

Lucas stands up and looks at me. The same hope still swimming in his eyes.

“Deep in my gut I know you’re my daughter. My wolf feels the connection to yours…but if you’re still doubtful then we can get a paternity test”

I didn’t want to but didn’t I owe it to myself and him to get it done. Maybe after it turns out negative he can finally let the issue go.

“Okay” I agree. “Let’s get the test done. Today if possible” I finish and he nods his head.