If Only

Chapter 23 - Not Your Fault

"She's going to be okay, Greyson," I affirmed, because I knew she would be. Sammy was strong-willed, even if she was soft spoken; she would get through this.

"She woke up earlier," he admitted, still not removing his eyes from her. The statement shocked me. When she first woke up it had been easy to tell she was only up on pure adrenaline, and once that faded, she crashed again.

"Why?" I asked him, and he gritted his teeth. I knew that normally meant he was about to shut down, pull back away. But this time he actually answered me.

"Don't know. But I just... I left for a second, one fucking second. Looking at her and thinking of that piece of shit... I force shifted again. Come back and she's not in the bed," he revealed, making me scrunch my brows in confusion.

"Where was she?"

"The bathroom," he clarified.

Of course, Sammy would get up and walk to the bathroom herself instead of just asking for help. Sometimes I thought she could be just as stubborn as Greyson, albeit in different ways.

"Well, she was okay, right?" I asked, looking back towards her as she layed on the bed.

"No," he responded, his voice sounding shaky through the link. I tilted my head, waiting for him to go on.

"He fucked with her so much, Zane. The shit he put in her head is just... and the way that she talked about it all, like it was so normal, like this one time he just got to be a little too much to handle. Who talks like that? Who thinks getting beat on and belittled is fucking normal?" he growled, his words ringing in my head as his tone raised inside the link.

"Always fucking underplaying things," I responded, irritation taking hold of me at the truth in the statement.

I wondered how much she had left out when she had given us all the basic rundown of her situation with Tyson. How many things he did that she felt weren't worth mentioning, or weren't that big of a deal. Because knowing Sammy, we probably wouldn't find out much more than the small information she had already divulged.

"Not anymore," he responded, the steel set of his face exemplary of his determination. I nodded my head in agreement. From now on, we weren't going to let her take all of the shit that she normally did and play it off like it was nothing.

The Luna of the Potestas Pack deserved utmost respect. End of.

"So she talked to you about it?" I asked him. He nodded his head, obviously not wishing to say much about the private conversation that had taken place between them.

I wished I could just jump into Sammy's head for a minute. I'm sure Greyson did too. None of us had a good idea of what Sammy was feeling towards him, if she could sense that connection and bond like wolves could. She felt the sparks, but other than that, we were all blind to her emotions. But if she opened up to Greyson, even if it was a little bit, then it certainly made it seem as though she could feel something.

It was about as much good news we could seem to get right now.

"We need to tell her about us," Greyson asserted, catching me somewhat off guard.

"I agree. But she can hardly walk right now. And not to mention, how? Just shift in front of her and tell her we've been lying for two years?" I said, sarcasm dripping from my tone.

I didn't even want to think about the level of betrayal she would probably feel towards us. We had come so close to telling her so many times. Every one of us had slipped up at one point, some a few more times than others. But keeping our secret from humans is one of the few laws that nearly every supernatural creature could agree on. It was just better to keep them ignorant to it all, who knew what the consequences would be otherwise. Since the law was so widely accepted, punishment for breaking it without a valid reason was extreme.

"We should at least wait until she's off bedrest. About two weeks, we can figure out how to tell her before then," I reasoned, and Greyson nodded his head in agreement. Though I could tell the thought of withholding that information from her wasn't something that sat well with him. I looked at Sammy again, my heart feeling as though it had been twisted and squeezed.

"It's not your fault," Greyson suddenly said, surely able to read the emotions coursing through me.

"Don't say that shit. We saw her all the time, we should've seen it. I should have seen it," I argued, feeling my anger increase. He stayed silent for a few moments, almost as if he was trying to figure how to respond to that.

"Not your fault, Zane," he just repeated, staring at me with that conviction he often carried in his words. His unwavering confidence that seemed to help you believe in whatever he was saying. It was a gift I assumed only an Alpha could possess.

"It's not yours either," I told him, but he didn't respond to me, and I didn't push him to.

I knew I would be blaming myself even more than I already was right now if it was Lizzy sitting in that bed. We sat in silence for a few minutes, letting our minds bombard us with all of the thoughts we couldn't get out of our heads.

"What if she never-" Greyson rasped, cutting himself off before he could finish the statement, but I knew what he was going to say.

"She will," I told him, believing it with every part of me.

"You don't know," he argued, his frustration evident. I knew he had probably had this fear from the moment he found out Sammy was human, even if he didn't want to admit the fear to himself.

"She already feels the bond, Greyson. It may take time, but she will accept you," I insisted, and he nodded his head, releasing a breath.

There was no logical part of me that could explain why I knew that Sammy would accept him, but I did. I supposed that was my instincts again, assuring me of things without any reasoning. And I planned on listening to them.

"Thank you," Greyson told me, and I couldn't help but let out a small laugh that had him glaring daggers at me.

"I wasn't sure you could pronounce those words," I smirked, which had him giving me a gesture that relied very heavily on his middle finger.

"And he's back," I joked, and he rolled his eyes, but I caught the small, tired grin that crossed his face.

The sight eased some of my worries, even if it wasn't much. We would get through this together. Greyson would be okay. Sammy would be okay. And in the end, the pack would be stronger than we were before.