Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 294

Ch. 64

Cassandra

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Having finally managed to catnap now that I’m reassured Liam is recovering, I startle when my phone buzzes in my pocket. I fumble a few times before tny fine motor skills come back on line and I manage to pull it out.

Jack: Heard about Liam. Pack channels move fast. Is he okay? Do you need anything?

An appreciative smile forms on my lips. We haven’t known each other all that long–the easy company of a few casual dates, some shared laughter and a kiss or two. It’s really sweet of him to check on us at all, let alone offer to help.

Better this morning, I type. Thank you for asking.

His response comes quickly: I’m so glad to hear that. I was worried. Thursday still on?

Something that almost feels like butterflies flutter in my stomach.

Yes, I type. I’m looking forward to it

I put the phone down, still smiling to myself. Jack knew I had a son before he even asked me on that first date. But knowing something and actually becoming invested in it when a relationship is so new are two different things. It feels good to know there’s hope that, eventually, someone could love me for me and accept Liam too.

I check on Liam again, resting now, his breathing even. I haven’t done a great job of giving him what he deserves in the past but that’s all I want now. A life that keeps getting better, more stable, preferably with fewer emergencies and waiting rooms with plastic chairs at two AM. I want him to have people around him who show up and stay. And a mother who has stopped running and started just–being there.

He deserves that. I’m working on giving it to him.

“I’m bored, Mama.” The complaint is the first words out of Liam’s mouth when he wakes up.

He’s wiggling and restless but after employing some finely honed negotiation skills, he agrees to let me read to him. I’m reading to him–the wolf cub story. Again. Because even sick and tired and in a medical wing he wants the wolf cub story–when I see movement in my peripheral vision.

Noah. Just standing in the doorway. Watching.

He’s not coming in. In fact, the look on his face is that of someone who isn’t quite sure how he got here and is deciding what to do now. I peek at him surreptitiously over the top of the book. But I don’t dare speak.

He looks at Liam first. Not at me–at Liam, checking him over. His brow furrows, the little crease between his eyes deepening, as he completes his assessment. Then Liam looks up from the story.

“Hi,” Liam grins widely, giving him a shy wave.

“Hi,” Noah smiles back at my son. “How are you feeling today?”

Liam scrambles out from under the covers and I have to grab the back of his shirt to keep him from leaping toward the Alpha. Something moves through Noah’s expression. I don’t have a full name for it–something that crosses his face at the sight of Liam sitting up, coherent, holding his wolf cub book with both hands.

Then his gaze drifts to me, an apology in the space between us. I can feel it–the thing that he knows should be said, that he wants to say but doesn’t quite know how. And that’s enough for me. I don’t need him to say the words. So I nod in acknowledgement of his unspoken apology and will him to understand I’m accepting it.

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He nods back, a silent thank you for not insisting he say the words. And he leaves.

Dam falls back asleep after the story, proving he’s not quite back to his normal, energetic self. My own bone- deep exhaustion threatens to drag me under too but I can’t quite force my eyes to close.

I sit in the quiet room and think about Noah instead. He stayed all night–I know he did, he was there when Liam woke up and probably has no idea how much that mattered to my little boy. He brought me water in the waiting area because he thought I needed it. He called Dr. Lukas despite his distrust of me. He did the right things, all of them, efficiently and without requiring acknowledgment.

So what if he couldn’t bring himself to actually apologize for doubting me. I’m not angry about it. I don’t have the right to be angry–what he assumed in the doorway last night is something I earned.

He saw me use Liam before. Of course he wondered. Any hesitation on his part was the natural result of who I was and what I did, and I don’t get to be angry that he’s still holding some of that. He could have refused to help me at all and that would have been entirely my fault.

He knows he was wrong this time. I could see it on his face–the water, the staying, the quality of the silence in that room. That’s enough for me. More than I deserve, really.

I’m going to quit obsessing about it now. I mean it.

I’m in the hallway an hour later–stretching, getting coffee, finally allowing myself a minute alone to work out the kink in my neck–when Cole appears.

“How is he?” he asks and I’m a little surprised by the real concern in his tone.

“Better,” I say, watching him warily because I can’t quite work out what he’s doing here. It’s no secret Cole is not my biggest fan.

“Good.” He nods one then starts to go.

I’m surprised when he stops abruptly. “Noah told me. What he assumed. When you came to the door last night.”

Cole is looking at the wall. Not at me–at the wall, as if the wall is the appropriate place to direct this. He blows out a long breath, scrubbing a hand over his face, then he finally turns to look at me.

“Look,” he sighs, “Noah is not just my Alpha. He’s also my friend. Which means my loyalty will always lie with him, even when that means he doesn’t agree with me about what that looks like.”

I couldn’t actually say what expression I’m wearing. Something between shocked and flat–out stupified, I would assume. But Cole doesn’t wait for a response from me.

“He was wrong,” he announces with absolute certainty. “He knows he was wrong, he told me so. I just thought you should know that.”

He leaves me standing in the hallway with my jaw hanging open.

He knows. I know what that’s like, knowing you were wrong yet not quite able to bring yourself to admit to it. The space that knowledge occupies–inside a person, unspoken, taking up room. Looking for its way out.

It was nice of Cole to say it for him. But Noah has to find his own way to it. And if he doesn’t, it really doesn’t make a difference at the end of the day. It changes nothing between us.

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