Chapter 28 – Oh, god… what am I going to do?

Lucy’s POV

We make it back to the Alpha house at about two in the afternoon and my nerves are all over the place. I feel sick again, but I know I’m not actually going to be sick as I’ve already emptied out the contents of my stomach back at my house. In front of both Beck and Justin; an experience I won’t be able to live down easily, I’m sure.

I have no idea what to expect when I step foot into this house, and so I nervously stand here biting my lip as Justin opens the door and lets us all in.

“You okay?” Beck asks, picking up on my nerves immediately, which is not good.

If there’s one thing I can’t do when I come face to face with the Pack, its show my nerves. It’ll just add more fuel to the fire, proving to everyone that I have one more weakness for them to pick on. Especially Baldwin; I don’t think I can deal with his sneering comments right now. I’m tired enough as it is.

“Yeah,” I reply to Beck, doing my best to put on a brave face. “Just want to get this over and done with so I can go to sleep.”

He nods in response, although I’m pretty sure I haven’t fooled him. Then again, not a lot gets past Beck.

“Everyone should be in the dining room still,” Justin says, leading us in that direction.

Okay, you can do this… I tell myself. You have to do this.

The second the three of us enter the room everyone turns to look at us before falling silent, stopping David mid-speech.

I can’t do this.

“Lucy!” a familiar voice cries out before, suddenly, I’m being practically crushed by Amy as she pulls me into a hug. “Oh my god we were so worried!” she exclaims. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? What happened?”

“I’m okay,” I assure her as she finally decides to let me go, only for me to be pulled into another (less bone-crushing) hug by Jess.

By this point, quiet unsettling murmurs start up around the room as people begin to slowly speculate to each other.

Beck stays by my side as Justin heads up to the front of the room to go and talk to his dad, probably wanting to explain to him what’s going on.

“What the hell happened to you wrists?” Amy asks when I pull away from Jess, causing me to look down at my arms to find that the sleeve of my hoodie has pushed up slightly, just enough to show off the raw redness of my skin.

They don’t hurt as much now, though, probably because they don’t have the ropes still rubbing against them anymore. At the minute, it just feels like a hot dull ache of pain as opposed to the burning sensation before.

“They were tied up,” I reply, looking from my wrists and back to my two best friends as I pull the sleeves back down to cover them. “I’m seriously fine though.”

“What happened?” someone else asks, and I look up to find Richard and Louisa heading over to me as well.

“Um,” I say as Louisa pulls me into a hug too, not quite sure how to answer. “Well, I was kind of just on my way back from Beck’s when-”

“Lucy,” I immediately glance over when I hear David’s voice calling me from the front table. A few other people turn to look as well and I sigh to myself, knowing that I can’t put this off much longer.

“I’ll explain later,” I say, turning back to Louisa with what I hoped was a reassuring smile before making my way over to the table.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Wendy says, relief evident on her face as I approach.

I give her a quick smile before turning to David, waiting for the bombardment of questions that I’m sure is about to happen.

“Are you okay?” is all he asks, taking me by surprise slightly.

What, no what happened or why?

“I… yes,” I reply, kind of getting fed up of being asked that now.

“Here, have a seat,” he then says, motioning to the chair that Justin would normally sit at if this were anything like a regular Pack meeting.

I don’t turn down the offer, not even caring what people might think of me sitting here as my legs are still feeling weak and I’m completely worn out.

“Thanks,” I say, sitting down. It’s only then that I notice a certain rogue stood across the room, his arms being held behind his back by Max although he shows no signs of struggling.

When our eyes meet, Devlin gives me a slight nod in acknowledgment, and I give him a small smile in return.

He stuck to his end of the deal, and I have every intention of doing the same.

“Are you hungry?” Wendy asks, snapping my attention back to the matter at hand. “I’ll be happy to quickly whip you something up if-”

“I’m okay,” I interrupt, the thought of any kind of food at the minute making me feel queasy. “Thanks for the offer, though.”

“Are you sure?” David asks. “When was the last time you ate?”

“I, uh, I ate before coming here,” I admit, deciding to leave out the fact that I also brought said food back up again.

They both seem worried enough as it is, which kind of surprises me, and I don’t want to add any more problems to the mix.

“Okay…” David sighs. “So, Justin has told me that you’ve met Kailen, is that true?”

“Yes,” I reply honestly. “He kidnapped me in the woods and took me back to my old house.”

David nods at this, seeming to think something through before speaking again.

“I’m going to send everyone home,” he tells me, and relief immediately floods through me. “That way we can get this sorted out without anyone butting in.”

“Thanks,” I say sincerely. At least that’s one of my problems down for now.

“You go make your way into my office, the rest of us will meet you there,” he tells me.

Silently thanking God that I don’t have to deal with anyone else right now, I quickly nod and stand up, although there’s one quick stop I have to make before I leave the room.

As I make my way towards the back of the room, my eyes scan the room for Jess before I spot her stood off to the side with Amy. Then, I glance back over at Devlin and find that he’s already watching me. I give him a quick nod of assurance before heading over to my two best friends.

“Hey, Jess, can we talk real quick?” I ask as soon as I’m near enough for them to hear.

“Sure,” she replies before asking. “How did it go with the Alpha?”

“Good, David’s going to get rid of everyone so we can talk in his office,” I explain.

“Thank God,” Amy says. “I swear to God I am so close to ripping Baldwin’s head off it’s not even funny.”

“Yeah,” Jess chips in. “Did you know he didn’t even want to send out Dean and Justin to rescue you?”

“Wait,” I say with a frown. “What?”

“He said that we shouldn’t risk two of our best fighters for you,” Amy explains, visibly tensing as she glares in the teacher’s direction.

“Wow,” I murmur in disbelief. “I mean, I know the guy hates me but that’s taking it to a whole new level, even for him.”

“Tell me about it,” Amy practically growls before Jess speaks back up, the smirk on her face an extreme contrast to Amy’s fierce glare.

“Justin seemed to put him in his place though,” she says, which also causes Amy to relax slightly.

“Hell yeah he did,” Amy agrees. “You should have seen Baldwin’s face, it was priceless.”

“Really?” I ask, glancing over at Justin to find him in deep conversation with David and a few others.

Justin stood up for me against Baldwin… again?

My mind quickly flies back to the lake cabin and the kiss, so I force myself to look away before anyone can notice me staring.

Oh god… what am I going to do?

“Yeah,” Jess replies, her smirk still firmly in place. “It seems that someone has definitely got it bad for you.”

“Speaking of…” I reply, wanting to change the topic and so deciding to bring it back to what brought me here originally. “I need to talk to you Jess.”

“About?” she asks, her voice suddenly turning a little wary.

“Devlin,” I reply simply, watching her reaction closely.

She sighs in resignation before glancing over at him. It’s apparent that his attention is already on her, though, as her cheeks turns a shade darker and she immediately looks away again.

“What about him?” she asks, rolling her eyes when she catches sight of Amy’s gloating gaze. They both know that I’ve jumped ships and am now all for her trusting Devlin.

“I think you should give him a chance,” I tell her, looking straight into her eyes as I do.

“Why?” she asks. “What happened to ‘it’s my decision no matter what’?”

“He saved my life,” I remind her. “Jess if it weren’t for him then I would be dead right now, I’m not even exaggerating.”

She sighs and glances back over at him quickly before returning her attention back to me.

“I know,” she admits. “I know that he risked a lot by helping you, Lucy, but…” she trails off and shakes her head before continuing. “You said it yourself, you nearly died. Shouldn’t we be worrying about that right now?”

“He’s a good guy, Jess,” I say truthfully. “Trust me on this one. He saved my life… he went against the rogues! There were multiple ways he could have gotten me out of there that didn’t involve turning himself in. He did it for you, Jess, to prove to you that he’s not one of them. Just… think about it, yeah? He at least deserves that much.”

Suddenly, a number of shouts fill the room and the three of us look up to find a huge commotion erupting at the front near the table. Voices scream over one another to try and be heard by David, who is now sat at the table with Justin looking all but ready to resign.

“What’s going on?” Amy asks, sounding confused and worried at the same time.

“They want him dead,” a voice suddenly says from beside us. I quickly turn my head back to find Beck stood a few feet away, watching the chaos with a grim expression.

I have to say I’m slightly surprised he stuck around. From the moment he arrived he’s been stood at the back of the room closest to the door and I know if it weren’t for me, he would’ve left straight away. He really hates the idea of being in a Pack, hence the whole title of being a ‘lone wolf’.

“Who?” I ask, not sure whether I want to know the answer.

“Lover boy over there,” he explains, nodding over in Devlin’s direction.

My heart drops into my stomach as I realise what’s happening.

They still see him as a traitor. They still want him dead.

Oh, god… what do I do?! What can I do? I have to do something! He can’t just get executed!

“How’d you know?” Amy asks in a shaky voice.

“What?” he asks. “That they want him dead or that he’s your sister’s predestined mate?”

“Both,” Jess answers, her face pale and her voice quiet.

“Well, he’s a rogue for starters,” Beck says with a shrug. “Not exactly the most trustworthy of titles if you ask me.”

“But he saved my life, doesn’t that count for anything?” I ask, completely appalled at the Pack’s behaviour.

“It should,” Beck says, his voice equally as grim as his expression. “Although I’m pretty sure that asshole over there couldn’t care less.” He points over at Baldwin who, not so surprisingly, is right at the front of the crowd apparently sending a number of demands David’s way.

I can’t pick out what exactly he’s saying, though, as the yelling in the room has gotten so loud that it’s just merged into one loud indecipherable noise.

“As for the other thing,” Beck continues. “I highly doubt there’s much that could get a rogue to go against his own people. Catching on to the last bit of your conversation helped me to put two and two together.”

“Enough!” David yells out, seemingly finally having had enough of random demands being shouted at him. “Everyone calm down!”

“How can you tell us to calm down?” Baldwin yells right back. “There is a rogue on our land and you’re just telling us to go home! What’s going to happen to the bastard? Are you just going to let him go so he can run back and squeal to the others?!”

“No,” David replies, the force behind his voice making me believe he’s about three seconds away from blowing his polite façade completely and exploding on everyone in the room. “That’s not what I’m going to do. I’m going to hold a meeting tomorrow to decide what we do with him. Until then, you go home. Everyone is tired and stressed and definitely not in the right frame of mind to be dealing with this tonight. Go home, sleep, we’ll keep him locked up here until tomorrow night.”

Slowly, everyone begins to disperse, grumbling to each other in agitated voices as they pass by the four of us as we all stay firmly planted to the wall at the side of the room.

Devlin’s still being held in the back corner, looking more than slightly defeated for the first time I’ve ever seen.

Jess and Amy are both frozen, staring out at the front of the room still. It’s only then that I notice what they’re looking at.

Baldwin is yet to move from his spot at the front of the room, a mere three feet away from the table.

David snaps.

“That is an order!” he yells as he slams his fist down on the table in front of him, his voice cracking like a whip. Jess, Amy and I all jump at the sudden harshness in our Alpha’s voice, but Baldwin just sneers slightly before turning away and leaving the room. As he leaves the room, however, he doesn’t hesitate to slam the door shut, causing the three of us to jump yet again.

So, yeah… that just happened.

Now, there are only twelve of us left in the room, and I feel myself relaxing slightly as the tension seems to be hurriedly dying down.

Wendy moves over to sit next to David and immediately his muscles visibly relax, the ‘I’m-going-to-rip-everyone’s-head-off’ expression dissipating back into an exhausted and mildly strained one. Now that, right there, is what being a mate is all about. If you can make each other feel better simply by being around each other then you know you’ve got it right.

Wendy quietly says something to him before he looks over at me. I freeze, half expecting him to snap on me as well. After all, this is my fault.

The rogues being here in the first place, the fact that I was taken, and the Devlin situation is all because of me.

However, instead of yelling at me like I originally thought, he simply says, “I’ll meet you in my office in a few minutes so we can run over what happened, I just need to sort a few things out first.”

I quickly nod in compliance before turning and leaving the room.

Oh, god, today has been such a mess…

(Hey guys!!! Here’s chapter 28, I hope you like it :) in all honesty I struggled quite a bit on this one so sorry if it’s not that great. Also, sorry for it being so late!!! I’ve had mock exam week at college and have been stressing over revision, as well as my mind going blank the second I tried writing this chapter. Anyways… I decided to take half term to get back on track so the updates should hopefully be more regular now :) I’m looking to try and get chapter 29 up by the end of the weekend if I’m lucky.

Speaking of, chapter 29 is going to be a Justin POV :D I don’t think it will be that long but it’s more to just give an insight on how he’s feeling and shizzles. I’m looking forward to writing it so I hope you’re looking forward to reading it ;) So… yeah, sorry for any mistakes in this chapter. I have had a quick read through but also just want to get this posted up ASAP because it’s already been too long of a wait.

Erm… yeah, so thanks for reading and don’t forget to Vote/Comment/Add as any and all support is much appreciated :D That’s really all I have to say for now so byee!!!)