Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled 'This could change your life'.
-Helen Exley

 "Yes?" I ask, opening my front door just enough so I can see the man behind it. Two fierce german shepards stare at me, determining who I am to them. 

Suddenly Luci shoots into my, growling and barking loudly at the man. A bad feeling enters my chest, but I restrain the half wolf anyway. "Lucifer, stop. Down. Keep watch." I tell him, but something must really be wrong about this man because Luci barely settles down so I grab a leash off a hook next to the door to keep him from rushing the man.

The two dogs don't even growl at me until I narrow my eyes at them, making me realize something. They're trained by being hit and probably yelled at.

I've studied animals and their behavior, specifically so I can identify things like this and so I know how not to get hurt at my grandparent's farm.

This man hurts these dogs.

Snapping my eyes up to him my lips turn up, showing off how sharp my canines are. "What do you want?" I growl out, keeping my foot snug against the door so he can't barge past me like Luci did. I whistle out a tune my dad taught me, so I can find him in public places, one that makes him come to me.

And he does before the man even answers, blue eyes darkening as he takes in the situation. "Who are you?" His growl is almost identical to what mine was. 

"I'm Richard Lewis," Lincoln's father doesn't share any of his son's features, save for his height and frame. He is not a good person. It seems like Dad already caught onto this as well. "And you have something of mine here."

As my room door creaks open, I'm aware of both Link and Asher coming into the room and stopping behind me the second one of them recognizes the redhead's father.

And holy hell, 'Richard' is nothing like Arthur Weasley. A muggle too.

"I'm sorry Dick," I say sardonically, moving my body in front of Lincoln which let's my dad fill the rest of the doorway up while Luci growls between us. "Are you under the impression that your son is somehow property? He is a human, for starters and over eighteen. If he is all you came for, you can get off my property now."

"I'm not going anywhere without my son." Richard pokes my forehead, trying to intimidate me. "Got that?"

Not so sadly, that was his mistake, as my dad grabs the man's collar and shoves him back, a move that makes all three dogs go beserk.

Richard smirks as I growl back at them, telling them to stop. "They only respond to irish. The boy's stupid mother raised them."

"Oh, faigh fucked le iasc, dur." I tell the stupid man in irish to go get fucked with a fish. "And don't ever call his mother stupid again. Tohole."

My mom's and Uncle Nolan is the one who taught me so many languages. 

"Seas sios. Bi deas." I tell the dogs, who almost instantly calm down and show the emotions they really want to me -who now since I speak the same language that their 'master' does sees me as in charge. 

Basically, happy drooling idiots at seeing me.

From shock or something at my vulgarity and commands, Richard drops their leashes.

As I drop down to coo at them and pet them- -show them I won't hurt them. Luci sniffs them before tacking the one I can tell is the female- -Dad steps in front of me and blocks the man from seeing me.

"My dogs -my son!" Richard says, clearly annoyed. "Give them back to me. I own-"

"They're family pets. You've said so yourself, seeing as your son's mother raised the. Meaning that your son," My dad's tone is cold as he says this, nothing to do with Lincoln but everything to do with his father. "Can watch over them just fine here. He's legally an adult, he will come back home when he says he can and if you don't like him deciding that then I'm stating now, he'll leave when I say he can. Meaning right now, he's under my protection meaning he's more my son then yours at the moment. My property, my people. Now you could charge me with kidnapping, but my wife is the best lawyer money can buy so I don't suggest it. But if you don't get off my land I can and will charge you with assault, child and animal abuse, for touching my daughter and those dogs. Get lost, Dick."

The size of the vein popping out of Richard's forehead seems to double, the pale skin Link inherited turns a deep red and I wouldn't be surprised if he simultaneously combusted. 

Richard glares harshly at the Devil -who continues to stare coldly right back at Richard before the man scoffs, cursing under his breath as he stomps back to his pure red corvette. 

The tense atmosphere completely defuses when he pulls out of the driveway, and with all three dogs inside Dad shuts the door.

"God what a massive dick. No pun intended." I grunt, crossing my eyes while I stare at the two german shepherds and the half wolf. "We have to test them, make sure the theories right."

"I know, I'm going to go outside and do it there." My dad tells me, turning to Lincoln. "And you, there better be something you want to tell Elle about your father."

Link is blank as I meet his eyes, but without trying I can sense just how scared he is, and so can Dad.

"If you tell me everything, tell Elle everything, we can make sure your father doesn't do anything again. It doesn't matter how much money your family has, Emmeline is the best. I promise you'll be okay afterwards. Now, what are these dog's names?"

"Nora and Bones," Asher answers instead, making my eyes go straight to the ground. "Nora is the girl with the black tail. Bones is the guy with the emotion dots."

Dog eyebrows.

Tsk.

"Okay. Nora, Bones." My dad grabs their leashes, making them stand. "and Asher. You're with me."

"Me? Why me?" The nice guy asks, sounding more than alarmed. "What are you doing to them?"

"Testing them, and I don't see anyone else in the room named Asher. Come on, get your ass moving." This time the golden boy doesn't say anything, but leaves with my dad. 

"Wait Dad," I call him, causing him to pause. "Make sure Luci is with you unless they react too bad."

"First question, is your mother still alive?" I ask Link. 

People answer differently when they know they're being recorded, which is exactly why I'm secretly recording it right now.

"Yeah." 

The redhead is so reluctant to talk to me, to anyone about his father.

I know that Asher knows, but for something like a court case about possible child abuse I need to hear it from the source.

"Does your father hit her?"

"...only when -the cops already know. My father paid them off." Link says, grinding his teeth together.

"Nobody can pay my mother off of doing the right thing, and being a person who went through abuse herself nothing can stop her from putting a guy like that away." I say, watching as surprise lights up his features. "You have to tell me what he does."

"I don't like how nice you sound. You're never this nice to me. And how did you even know something was wrong anyway?"

"Keep up Weasley," I scoff. "It was obvious."

"No it wasn't." Lincoln snals, agitated. "Otherwise I would have gotten it."

"Luci. He has amazing instincts. My own instincts. They way he would refer to you, Nora and Bones as property rather than living things and a human. The way he tried to intimidate me, and his reaction to not getting the way he wanted. He barely overlooked me, tried to ignore me completely or make me scared enough to let him do whatever he wanted. But when my dad got involved he got angrier, and didn't know how to deal with someone who has more authority to him. When my dad said his wife is the best lawyer, Richard scoffed and looked like he couldn't believe it for a second. That means he doesn't respect animals, how they're controlled by motion but trained in another language, leads me to believe he not only neglects them but abuses them as well."

To say he looks shocked at this would be a understatement.

"The way he talked about your mom and how he subconsciously treated me lets me know that he doesn't treat women well either, the way he tried to intimidate me with a touch before five minutes even passed means he doesn't think twice before violently touching a female. Which also means that spousal abuse is more than likely. If someone is willing to abuse their wife and animals, I wouldn't put child abuse far past them either. Not to mention the way you act when someone is threatening people, specifically girls, around you. You move in front of them, arms out, but only speak up if things get really bad. Taking blows if necessary. You don't talk about your parents or family life in public at all, or even to me. Which means either you're just really private and picky about who you rant to or you've learned how to keep your mouth shut."

All this obviously makes Lincoln mad, I can tell he feels shameful -or guilty, and generally upset.

"Don't feel bad, please. It's not easy to put all this together, I'm just freakishly good at reading people. So is my dad, he was able to pick up on it faster than I did. He's probably been suspicious for a while given how much he actually said to your dad and how little he touched him." I sigh, this whole topic making me sad.

I fucking hate it when people hurt who I care about.

"How little he touched him?" Link says incredulously. "If he thought my father was hurting me, wouldn't he...I don't know, like hurt him or something?"

"Well..." Licking my lips before explaining, I can see how much Link hates this. "If Dad found out when he met him that child abuse was going on Richard would probably have bad injuries right now. The only reason he doesn't is because Dad knew beforehand and just can't prove it. But now that you're in on the secret that he's trying to, against a millionaire nonetheless, prove abuse, he needs you to say what your dad actually does."

"Oh." Weasley pauses. "Did you think I was being abused."

"Um...no? Not to the extent it probably is, but just noticing things about you made me think something wasn't right about your home life. You don't act like your wealthy, which means you probably ashamed you are. Given who your father is, a dirty rich corrupt businessman named Dick, I'd say your money doesn't come from good places." 

And based on Link's scowl alone I'd say I'm right.

"So, does your father abuse your mother?" I ask, hating to have to do it.

"Yes."

"How?"

"Physically. Hitting. Mentally. Twisting her thought so she thinks she deserves it. Verbally. He yells at her, cussing at her and calls her names."

"Does he abuse the animals are you? Nora, Bones?"

"Yes. Hitting them when they bark out of line. Kicks if they run from him or hide when he needs them. Starving them so they'd try to bite and seriously hurt people he lets them, just to eat. I don't see this thought, I'm guessing. One of the body guards told me about the starving. I only see him hit them."

My anger grows, but I continue to steadily question him.

"Does he abuse you?"

"Yes. He hits me, but rarely. He isn't a good person, not a good father. I have a older sister but he loves her, his favorite child. She's perfect in his eyes." Link explains.

"How long has he abused you, your mom and the animals?"

"The animals for as long as I can remember, my mom when I turned around nine and me when I started to stand up to him at eleven. He doesn't hurt my mom anymore, I don't think he will again."

"And just to be clear, I didn't know about this before hand and I'm not making you say any of this, nor are you reading from anything or have any other agenda from saying this other than a lawful prosecution." Just for when they play it back in court.

"No." The redhead snorts at me. "Fucking weird question. I'm not reading or forced or anything, my mom doesn't even know about this. Neither does my father. I do have a agenda if this actually happens, I want him to suffer like he's made us all suffer. Even if it's through lawful means. He deserves to be put away for a long time."

I hum in reply, pulling out my phone and stopping the recording. To him it probably looks like I'm checking the time. "You did good today Weasley, you kept all your emotions in check. How long many times have you done this before?"

Lincoln, surprised, stares at me for a moment. "Once with a school teacher, once with the police and once with Ash. Now with you."

"Link?" I say, surprising myself at how calm and nice I sound.

He's right, it is weird.

"Yeah?"

"The sun's going to explode but everything is going to be alright. I'm sorry about your family, it seems like you didn't get a good one. But-"

"But?" 

I give him a withering look for interrupting me, making his lips twitch up into a mock smile. "But, I want to let you know despite all that stacked against you you turned into a good person. I trust you."

"You know Eliza," Lincoln laughs a little, shaking his head. "Despite all the things stacked against you you are a good person. I don't think you ever aren't one. I trust you too, which probably isn't a good thing."

"Trust me," I smirk. "It's not."