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Because I let them in.
I needed my brothers. The only one missing was Bru, but I knew he was watching over our parents and Sloane so I wouldn’t have to. I needed all the people I cared about in my life right now, and it took a girl driving my Hummer today to show me my strength. Red never had to prove herself to me, but I was glad she’d done what she had.
Because she showed me what I was capable of.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Fawn
The next twenty-four hours happened quickly, but I was ready.
I’d told him I would be.
I’d made an unsaid promise to Ares in his Hummer, and it was the same promise I’d made to myself when I’d gotten in. I would put my own fears aside. I would be there for him, and that was what had gotten me in his truck that day. I’d made that promise to him, but the biggest promise had been to myself. I wouldn’t allow myself to be held back by my fears, and this situation with Ares terrified me. I used to be so scared of loving him. In fact, I’d thought it may break me a time or two, but it never had. In actuality, I was made stronger by the love, and now, not loving him wasn’t an option.
Neither was losing him.
Wolf had a lot of family come by in the next twenty-four hours. The majority of them I’d met. The Legacy parents had pretty much all made an appearance. They came to us in Queenstown Village, and I got reacquainted with them all again. There’d been brave faces, sad faces, and new ones I hadn’t seen. I hadn’t met Wolf’s grandparents, but a few of them showed up. One was his grandpa on his dad’s side. The man had salt-and-pepper hair and bronze skin, and he was also the only one to insist he’d be inside the room when Wolf’s doctors explained the brevity of his condition. I hadn’t expected to be in that room in the hospital that day.
But I’d made a promise.
Again, it was unsaid, and when Ares took my hand and tugged me along with him into that room, I went. Not even his friends Dorian, Thatcher, and Wells were in there. They wanted to be. They’d argued to be, but their parents (who were also at Wolf’s appointment) told them they should wait. They didn’t want to crowd the room, and the room was crowded. Besides Wolf’s grandpa, his parents were there, and of course, his siblings. His sister, Sloane, was on Wolf’s other side while Bru was on mine.
I’d done what I could to support Bru too in the past twenty-four hours. I gave my friend reassuring smiles and glances when I was just as terrified as I was sure everyone in this room was. Wolf had a couple doctors. Apparently, he’d stopped seeing one of them for the other, but they were both there, and they must have had recent contact with each other because they both broke down what was going on with Wolf together. They told everyone in this room everything, and even through it frightened me, I remained still. I remained calm.
I remained.
I got Wolf’s hand during the worst parts. He knew all this information, but he wasn’t dealing with his family’s reactions well. He kept looking around and cringing whenever a part of the news negatively affected the room. An example of this was when one of Wolf’s doctors explained the tumor in his back wasn’t able to be operated on in its current state. They said it had grown too large and its location was difficult. They used words like paralyzed and death, and Wolf’s mom finally accepted a tissue then. She hadn’t cried, but she’d been offered some just in case.
She accepted one this time, though. She dabbed lightly beneath her dark eyes, and Wolf looked so tortured upon seeing this, pained. He gripped his leg, but I took his other hand, claiming both. I supported him the whole time and especially when the conversation moved to talks of chemo and other treatments. Both the doctors agreed that chemotherapy was the way to go in order to get the thing smaller so it would be able to be operated on. Wolf hadn’t lied about how bad this was.
It was so bad.
Even still, I didn’t let myself break. I couldn’t. I was dying inside, but on the outside, I made myself appear the opposite. Wolf’s grandpa shed emotion too at one point in the conversation. He had a handkerchief out and hadn’t tried to hide that. Upon seeing that, Wolf’s dad rubbed the man’s shoulder.
“I’m so sorry, son,” I heard the older man whisper to Mr. Mallick, and I supposed they were both Mr. Mallick. They themselves were father and son. Wolf’s grandpa closed his eyes. “I had no idea he was hiding his treatment from you. I never would have given him the referral for another doctor had I known. I never would have…”
Wolf’s dad reassured the older man it was okay, and I did know what they were talking about. Wolf had hidden his treatment from everyone by using another doctor his grandpa had given him, and I’d heard about that. There were whispers amongst his friends, family.
He really had been trying to do this on his own.
Wolf witnessed the exchange between his dad and grandpa, and that torture radiated across his handsome face. His chiseled jawline clenched, and he asked to excuse himself in that moment. He said he just needed a few moments.
He left before that permission was granted, and more than one person in the room moved to go after him. Two were his parents, but they needed to be in this room. They were needed for Wolf’s siblings who also attempted to go after him. These people were hurting so bad, and they needed to worry about each other.
“I’ll bring him back,” I said, hoping they’d let me. I mean, I wasn’t family, but hoped they would. No one asked me directly about my presence here, but Wolf’s hand pretty much hadn’t left mine. They knew we were together again.
Even still, this was a bold ask, and I was grateful when I got a nod from Wolf’s parents. Bru smiled at me a little too, and that made me feel good that he supported me going as well.
Wolf hadn’t made it far.
The large guy sat in a chair in the middle of the hallway, his head down, his fingers in his hair. I noticed he hadn’t made it as far as his friends and his other family. I knew them to all be waiting out in the hospital’s waiting room down the hall.
I stepped lightly. Wolf did have a lot of friends and family here. He did have a lot of love, and he probably didn’t need me. Regardless, I allowed myself to be available, and when I sat down, he didn’t move. I assumed he didn’t know I was there, so I opened my mouth to announce my presence.
That was until he pivoted.
Wolf lifted his head, and the next thing I knew, it settled on my chest. His dark curls landed in my face, his musky aroma swirling around me.
