by Maia Dylan
He had also called his parents to check on the children. This time Ty hadn’t been quite so thankful that the pack information line had been so swift with the news. His ears were still ringing from his mother ripping him a new one over the phone. Ty may have been an adult, but he hated having his mother yell at him, especially about something he knew she was right about. The conversation had ended with her demanding he “make this right with my future daughter-in-law” and slamming the phone down in his ear. Yep, that was going to take some smoothing over, too.
Ty made his way up to the floor where his mate was still being cared for, then stepped into her room. Faith was curled into a tight ball on the bed and was apparently sleeping. Ty didn’t like the defensive way she protected herself in her sleep, or the shivers and whimpers she made. His brother stood up and motioned for him out into the hall.
Ty followed his brother out into the waiting area, sat down, and waited for him to speak. Trent looked exhausted. He had changed clothes since the last time he had seen him, but he had obviously slept very little. Guilt slammed into him as he understood that his brother had been looking after their mate alone, protecting her and comforting her all on his own. Christ, he had a lot to apologize for and vowed then and there to be the best damned triad partner to his brother, and mate to Faith, as he could be.
Trent snorted and shot Ty a hard look. “About fucking time you made that vow, you prick.”
Trent had obviously heard his inner vow, and Ty guessed that their bond was strengthening. Cool. But there were times when a wolf simply had to man up and apologize out loud.
“I’m so sorry, Trent. I am committed to this partnership and to our mate, and I will prove to you that I can be the partner you need to protect and cherish our mate.” Tyler spoke quietly, his gaze intent. Trent seemed to look into his eyes as if searching for something. He must have found it, for he nodded and then took a deep breath.
“I don’t know how to get through to her, Ty. She just sits there and stares out the window. She has spoken to no one. They poke and prod to check things, but she makes no complaint, just sits there and stares out the window.” Trent closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall. “I think we’ve lost her for good, and it’s fucking killing me.”
Ty heard the despair in his brother’s voice, and his heart clenched at the thought of not getting Faith back. He had never heard that level of despair in Trent’s voice before. He had always been the glass-half-full type to his glass-half-empty.
When they set their minds to something, they never failed. Hell, they were the Grey River alphas. That fact alone meant that they were a force to be reckoned with and that nothing could get in their way. Was it going to be difficult to bring Faith back from wherever she was, locked in her own mind? Yeah, it would. Were they going to simply sit back and accept that? Fuck. No.
“Trent, are you a wolf or a pussy?” Tyler growled at his brother. His wolf grinned at the blaze of fire and rage that filled his brother’s eyes. The man grinned, too, as his brother sent him a rather rude hand gesture. “Then what do you say we get our shit together at home? Get our mate’s room finished, learn everything we can about what is happening with her, and then bring her back to us?”
Trent grinned slowly, and Ty watched as a determined glint appeared in his eyes, no doubt mirrored in his own. The Jamieson brothers were finally going to claim their mate.
Chapter 4
A week later and Trent was pleased with the progress they had made at the ranch. When Faith had disappeared, they had halted all work on their home. The suite that would be theirs once they had claimed their mate had been left only semi-completed, the door locked, and if truth be told, both he and his brother had refused to think about what that room represented to them. It simply had been left.
Now, thanks to the Greyson triplets, the room had been completed, the custom-made furniture installed, and the huge custom-fitted adjoining bathroom was currently being tiled. Once Ty had sufficiently groveled to their mother and she had forgiven him, she had stepped in to coordinate it all for them while they spent the majority of their time at the hospital.
He wished there was a similar story of success there. Faith had healed well from her bruises, cracked ribs, and contusions, and there was a healthy glow to her beautiful skin, but she continued to keep herself locked away somewhere they couldn’t reach her.
After hours spent with Chris and then later on the phone with a trauma specialist, Dr. Rowena Whitley, they determined that Faith was suffering a form of post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. The events she had endured at the compound had pushed her into retreating into her own mind. Dr. Whitley believed that Faith’s mind had shut down in order to protect her from not only remembering those events but also having to deal with the fact that she was free.
“Freedom can be the straw that breaks the camel’s back for patients like Faith,” the doctor explained via the phone in Chris’s office. They had taken to having daily conversations with her to get as much information as they could about her condition and ideas on what they could do to help. “In that compound, she had resigned herself to that life. As horrific as it was, it now seems the norm to her. She has probably suddenly had to come to the realization that with her freedom comes a lot of uncertainty about the future. Everything that she had and knew back then has changed for her, and she has to find her place in this new world now.”
“Well that’s easy to answer.” Ty spoke with confidence. “Her place is in our home, preferably pressed between my brother and me.”
Trent grimaced slightly as an uncomfortable silence filled the room. “Tyler, you moron.” Trent spat the words at his brother along their bond. “She lives a vanilla life. Probably in a world with no werewolves and certainly no fucking polyandrous relationships!”
Ty cringed slightly.
Then a distinctly feminine giggle came from the phone’s speaker. “Well, lucky old Faith,” came the amused voice. “But you are both going to have to convince her of that—both that it is something that you want, as well as that she is worthy of it. Victims of rape often feel that they brought it upon themselves, that they should have stopped it, fought harder.”
“What the fuck?” That was in stereo as both brothers growled the words incredulously at the same time.
“That’s insane, Doc. She has done absolutely nothing wrong! She is not the one at fault here. I am,” Tyler spat with self-disgust.
Trent’s jaw dropped at the self-loathing in his brother’s tone. He had thought that perhaps Tyler harbored a little guilt but had no idea that it was eating him alive as much as it seemed to be.
“Tyler Jamieson, you shut that shit down right fucking now, or I swear to God I will get my ass on the next fucking flight to Houston, drive to Grey River, and kick the shit out of you myself!” Apparently the doc had a potty mouth. Tyler’s jaw dropped as well, and the two brothers stared in disbelief at the phone. In the week they had been talking with the doc, she had never even uttered a “damn” or “darn.” Now suddenly she was channeling a sailor on shore leave.
They heard her take a calming breath before continuing. “Faith doesn’t need you wallowing in your own pool of self-pity. She needs her men to be strong. She will need to lean on that strength in the coming days but will need you to lean on her, too. Now I thought that perhaps you and your brother would be strong enough to handle this, but maybe I was wrong and you are not worthy of her.”
Trent smiled sadly. “You know, Doc, for someone who has never met our Faith, you are awfully protective of her. Thank you for that. And you are not wrong. In fact, you are right on two counts. We do need to be strong for Faith and—”
Ty cut him off, illustrating how similar they thought, as he continued with the exact words Trent would have used. “We definitely do not deserve her, but she is ours. We are hers. And we will spend every day of the rest of our lives trying to be better men and be what she deserves. That I promise you.”
A sniff
le came before the doc spoke again. “Just make sure you do. I may not have met your Faith, but I have a very, very good idea of what she has been through. I feel like I have gotten to know her through my discussions with you and feel that she and I would be great friends if we were ever to actually meet.
“She deserved so much more than what she has had in the past two years. I only hope that you are able to give her a future that will cause these recent events to fade so much into the past that she can barely remember them. Every woman deserves to be happy, even those who are broken.” The last part was whispered so low, if they weren’t wolves, they may have missed the words and the hurt in them. The doc had her own painful past it would appear.
“We couldn’t agree with you more, Doc. I think you and our Faith would be great friends, and if you ever have need of a break, you head on down to Grey River,” Trent said.
“Or, if you ever need help, with anything or anyone, you give us a call, and we’ll be there,” Tyler offered.
There was silence again on the end of the phone. Trent and Ty shared a curious look. Had she hung up?
“Rowena, are you still there?” Ty asked gently.
“Yeah, I’m still here.” Rowena’s voice was very soft. “Thank you for your kind offer, and you never know, I may take you up on that.”
They talked more about Faith and what they needed to keep doing in order to help her, but Trent felt a little uneasy. There was definitely something up with the good doctor.
After they hung up, the two brothers sat in Chris’s office coming up with a plan. Chris had mentioned to them that morning that Faith would be physically well enough to leave the hospital in about a week’s time, as long as there was going to be someone with her to help her. However, if she was still in the catatonic state she was in now, then they would potentially have to look at a care facility. Not something that either of them were prepared to entertain until the last possible moment.
“So we have a week to try and bring her back to us. If we can just get her back to being in the moment, then I think some time with Rowena would be of real benefit. She will need to talk through some of the shit she has had to endure. Then we just have to convince her to forgive us and come home with us” Ty spoke with determination in his voice.
“You say that like it’s gonna be easy.” Trent ran a frustrated hand through his hair.
“Hell no, it won’t be easy. Nothing ever worth having in life is easy.” Ty shot him a wry grin. “Mom has been telling us that for years. But we have a mate. We are going to claim our mate, and make a life with her, I will accept nothing less. So we go in there, we wake her up, we convince her to forgive us, and we get her to move home with us. The game plan hasn’t changed. For right now, we continue to talk with her and convince her to break the barrier she has erected around herself.”
“Yeah.” Trent’s eyes shimmered a slight blue. “The barrier our bond with her disappears behind doesn’t seem as heavy as it was a week ago. But I still cannot feel her behind it.”
Ty nodded as he, too, tried to sense something behind the barrier. “We just have to continue to believe that Faith will come back to us. Rowena said it would take a while and that it might simply be that one day she is unresponsive and the next she will come back to us. We just have to make sure that when that happens, we make damn sure not to give her an excuse to go back.”
Trent nodded in agreement. His wolf was excited that they would finally have their mate in their den, somewhere they could keep careful watch over her, and which she could finally fill with her scent.
The brothers went back to the hospital room to watch over their mate. When they got to the door to her room, they paused as an unfamiliar scent came to them from the doorway. Panicked, they pushed forward into the room silently, wolves on the surface, determined to protect their mate. They stopped abruptly and were surprised to see young Sophia beside their mate.
“So Carla has finally accepted that we are free of that place, Faith. She told me to tell you how grateful she was that you saved her, even though you knew you were going to be punished.”
The brothers stood silently as Sophia brought Faith up to date with the rest of the children, a part of them hoping that this would be enough to bring her back, but there wasn’t a flicker of acknowledgment from her.
Sophia had Faith’s hand in hers and was stroking her fingers as she spoke. “Staying at the Jamieson ranch is fun. We spend a lot of time with Mrs. Jamieson in the kitchen. Boy, can that lady cook, Faith! She makes the best salted caramel peanut butter cookies.” Sophia sighed at that thought, and Trent’s wolf agreed. Their moms cookies were the best! “You have to wake up soon, Faith, ’cause we miss you. Well, I better get back. I didn’t tell anyone I was coming here, and they might—”
Trent growled low at that, making Sophia aware that they were not in the room alone anymore.
Sophia dropped Faith’s hand and spun with a look of such intense fear in her face that Trent’s growl stopped immediately. Her little body shook, and the scent of her fear poured off her. Trent knew as her eyes darted around the room that she was looking for an escape.
“Hey now.” Trent kept his voice soft and warm, trying desperately to appear nonthreatening. “It’s OK, Sophia. It’s just us. You’re OK. You’re safe.” He raised his arms like he would if he were calming a frightened animal. A whimper of fear came from the girl, causing his wolf to whine and drop its tail.
“Please, don’t hurt me.” Sophia’s voice trembled, and at her words, Trent wanted to find Parks and pull his spine out through his nose. From the feelings of hatred and retribution pulsing along the bond from his brother, Ty felt the same way. Trent had been so focused on calming the little girl that when an arm stretched out to pull her back, he hadn’t expected it at all.
His gaze flew to the figure that now stood in front of Sophia. Still weak and legs trembling, Faith stood and pushed Sophia behind her protectively. He and Ty surged forward as she swayed on her feet, scared she was going to fall and hurt herself. Both stopped at the angry growl that erupted from her. Her face was red with anger, teeth gritted, and lips pulled back in a snarl. Nothing and no one had ever looked as beautiful as their mate in full-on protective mode.
“Holy fuck, she’s gorgeous.” Tyler’s voice throbbed in awe down their link.
Trent nodded in agreement as all blood in his body traveled south, and his cock hardened to a painful length. Jesus, any more and he just might break the zipper!
“Touch her, and I will cut you. I will kill you.” Faith’s voice was gravelly from disuse but throbbed with sincerity.
“Sweetheart, it’s Tyler and Trent.” Ty spoke softly. “We would never hurt Sophia, Faith. You are both safe here.”
Faith’s head snapped back as the words must have registered, but she said nothing.
“Baby, I know we have a lot to talk about.” Trent moved forward slowly. “I know you are scared and a little disoriented, but no one here is going to hurt you or Sophia.”
“You growled at her,” Faith accused.
“Yeah, baby, I did,” Trent agreed, “but she left the ranch without telling anyone she was leaving and with no one to protect her. I was a little freaked out by what could have happened, and I was a little angry at her.” As Faith’s gaze narrowed, he rushed to add, “For putting herself at risk like that! She means too much to us to put herself in danger like that.” Trent waited to see how Faith would take that, hoping against hope that she would see it for the concern it was.
“Trent.” Ty’s voice came across their bond. “Look at the bond. It’s changed, but I still can’t sense her behind it.”
Trent took a quick internal glance and saw that the barrier had changed color. It was a vibrant purple instead of the dull black it had been up until this point. It glowed, and as he moved nearer to it, he could almost feel heat coming from it. Then he pushed his senses out. He felt nothing behind it.
“It’s like her mood is represented by that wall. She
must have some serous psychic ability to be able to erect and maintain such a barrier,” Trent sent back to his brother. When he returned his full focus back to their mate, she was glaring accusingly at him. Shit, had he missed something?
He glanced at his brother, who shot him a glance and shrugged.
“If you two have finished talking among yourselves,” Faith growled. “I believe I had asked you to leave me alone.” She gave a dismissive wave of her hand, which definitely riled the wolves in the room, then turned to get back into her bed. Apparently she had forgotten that she hadn’t moved from that bed in a week and that her body was weak. Her legs gave out beneath her, and with a startled gasp, she headed for the floor.
Trent rushed to catch her before she hit hard, but his brother beat him to it. Fast bastard.
“Gotcha,” Ty grunted. “Let’s get you back into bed and settled, shall we, sweetheart? Sophia, could you please straighten the bedsheets so Faith will be more comfortable when I settle her in?”
Trent smiled as he realized that by giving her a job to do, Ty had snapped Sophia out of her fear, and she had jumped to the task. Within minutes, they had Faith settled, had called the ranch to advise their now-distraught mother that they had Sophia and she was safe, settled Sophia in the chair beside Faith, and called for Chris.
Chris entered the room with a smile and swept up to Faith’s bedside. “Well, look who’s looking peachy this afternoon! How are you feeling, Faith?”
Faith smiled at the doctor, and Trent felt a surge of hurt flitter through his heart at how easy that smile came.
“Um, I’m OK, I think.” Faith tucked a wisp of hair behind her ear and looked down at the bedspread, twisting the sheets between her fingers. “I’m not really sure what’s going on, but I definitely feel better than I did this morning.” Everyone in the room frowned a little, and Faith raised her head at the silence in the room. “What?”