In the days following my episode, Val had vanished again. One of the doctors had told me that was probably for better and I had to force him to tell me anything else.
"What do you mean by that?"
The man looked uncomfortable, and tried to back out of the conversation. I snatched his hand- lab coat and all and glared at him. The man looked around the room with shifty eyes before he muttered an answer.
"I haven't seen our Alpha look like that in a very long time."
My heart throbbed and I let go of his hand. After the fog of it all had cleared, I realised I hadn't been thinking straight. Yes, my home had been destroyed and my parents were killed. But in some strange way it was inevitable and even my father knew that. I could sense it from the way he resigned himself to death. The guilt-ridden look in his eyes. Some sick feeling in my stomach told me he knew what he had done- that he knew exactly what had happened to Rosaura and he knew what fate was coming.
I shivered at the thought of it.
Since my re-enterance at the hospital, Frankford had come to visit me every day. Some days he brought Emerald and Donte along, and today he had brought his nephew.
"You know our hospital doesn't have unlimited resources right, kid?"
I spotted Frankford's hulking body and scrunched my nose at him sarcastically.
"Ha-ha. Hilarious Frankford. You should get into writing get-well cards."
A similarly hearty laugh identical to his own sounded from behind him and I glanced up. He was roughly my age, brown stubble around his chin with a suspiciously familiar hairline. I stared at the man, then at Frankford, then back again.
"Is he your son?"
Both of them shook their heads and the man stuck a hand out to introduce himself. I took it, examining his face down to the sharp nose ridge and dark eyes.
"I'm Jesse."
He had a gold lip ring and floppy hair a lot like Donte's. Despite Frankford being old as dust, I could see the resemblance. They had the same nose and head shapes. Both stood wide shouldered and husky.
"Are you sure you aren't like a clone?"
Frankford grinned and shrugged his shoulders. They sat at my bedside together casually and started more formal introductions.
"He's my twin brother's son, actually. Passed away in one of the raids some years ago."
Frankford had a unique ability to speak about awful experiences like the difference between strawberry or grape on toast. In a strange way it made things easier. He wasn't judgemental or bitter or sad, he was just Frankford.
"Twins. That explains it."
Jesse nodded and shot me a sly and knowing smile.
"Where's your mate?"
I met his eyes, irritated, unable to tell if he was screwing with me or not. Everyone seemed to know Val had vanished and most everyone seemed to know it was about me. Rather than admit anything, I shrugged my shoulders and resigned myself to studying fluorescent light bulbs.
"Don't care."
"Liar."
Frankford got two buzz sounds from his phone in his pocket, slipped the device out and fiddled with it. I was glaring at Jesse now, about to tell him to screw off when Frankford interrupted us.
"Hold on kids, I have to take this."
With Frankford's lumbering body leaving us alone, I scowled at him.
"What do you-"
Jesse nodded his head and raised his hands like he wanted to surrender. When I closed my mouth he paused for a moment before continuing.
"It would be impossible for you not to care. It's biologically unavoidable, no point in denying it."
I frowned. Then ran a tired hand over my face. It seemed strange the doctors were still holding me in hospital, given that my episode had concluded days ago. I turned back to Jesse, who had pulled a cigarette out of his pocket, the same brand Frankford smoked on every so often. I thought about Frankford's use of the term 'some years' ago and wondered if what he really meant was that he raised the kid on his own.
He tapped it, dark nail polish gleaming as he met my eyes amusedly.
"From what I understand, Liam and Val are right back at it near Sleeping Hollow."
I groaned irritatedly and protested, practically yelling at him.
"The doctor told her not to fucking go out again for a month!"
Jesse met my eyes with a wisdom beyond his years. He raised a brow and took a long, slow drag from his cigarette. I could sense his witty all-knowingness coming and my face went red from equal parts embarrassment and annoyance.
"So you do care."
I glared at him again- which was becoming the standard expression I addressed him with. Then I averted my eyes to his cigarette and the smoke alarm above us. I'd never heard the smoke alarms go off here, and where I was from we didn't have very many.
"Should you be smoking here?"
Jesse laughed, the hearty honest kind that filled up a room. He was good-looking surely, but an asshole. The biggest difference between Jesse and Frankford was that the old man knew not to pry- and probably how not to set off smoke alarms in the hospital.
"Don't be a square, Liana."
I scowled, throwing the hospital blanket off and standing upright in the bed. Jesse opened his mouth to question me when I pulled the smoke alarm off the wall. I took the batteries out and let them drop to the bed before putting the thing back. The last thing I needed was to get drenched head to toe over some guy who I could barely tolerate.
"Dont be an asshole, Jesse."
Jesse grinned while I plopped back down near him and questioned him curiously.
"How do you know my name?"
Jesse looked bewildered and confused. Finishing the last bit of his cigarette and putting it out. Then he leaned towards me and scanned my face. Realising I was seriously asking him, he sat back again.
"Well for one, Frankford talks about you a lot."
I almost smiled, glancing up through the slit of glass on the hospital doors where Frankford was chatting away seriously on the phone with someone. Jesse followed up with a voice that sounded like he was trying not to be sarcastic but the answer was still obvious.
"You do realise you're our Luna now, right?"
I rolled my eyes despite it being the first non-crude or abrasive thing he had said since our introduction. Technically, being mate to the Alpha made me Luna, yes.
But you wouldn't let me mate her yet, Everest exclaimed.
I ignored my wolf and met a shit-eating grin from the ever abrasive Jesse.
"No way! You mean to tell me you guys havent-"
I cut him off the quickest way I could think of. I slapped him directly in the face with the rough hospital pillow. Just as I did so, Frankford had strolled back in- completely lost as to how we had ended up like this.
"Jesse- what the hell did you do?"
Suddenly, the horror of his realisation spreading to Frankford struck me and I blinked at the amused face of Jesse with a silent plea. Jesse answered his uncle without a beat.
"Oh you know me, Unc. Just teasing. Who called you?"
I thanked him with my eyes and met his cucumber cool look that said this-is-definitely-not-over. I snatched the pillow I'd beat him with back and stuffed it under my arms to try and ease the queasiness in my stomach. Frankford blinked in my direction and answered cautiously.
"Vallory and Liam are having to withdraw from the woods again. I don't think anyone has been injured but things aren't looking so hot. Liam said Val- well…"
Frankford didn't finish what he was saying when he saw the look of anxiety and terror brimming in my eyes. He was a smart man, and not keen on cruelty.
Jesse nodded in understanding and then met my eyes without a trace of humor at all. He looked at his uncle then back at me. The air was thick with something, all three of us tense and sobered by realisation. Until Jesse cut through the tension with an idea.
"You know," he paused at a warning look from Frankford. "You just might be able to make Val leave before she gets herself killed… if you went there to chew her out in person."
Frankford looked like his eyes would pop out of his head.
"Are you fucking crazy? She would rip my head clean off. We cannot take Liana to Sleeping Hollow- not unless you want to see an early and excruciating death."
Jesse seemed tickled with joy at the idea somehow, ignoring his uncle's advice and warning. My chest was pounding and it was hard to tell if it was from fear or excitement.
"That's why you wouldn't be the one to take her, Unc. Better if you act like you had no idea we were going. Right, Liana?"
I shook my head, exasperated. Frankford was right, this was a stupid idea- a very stupid idea. It was also impossibly tempting. I met Frankford's eyes.
"You're right, she's going to kill us. But I have to- you know that I have to go."
Frankford ran a hand over his balding head and shot an accusing finger at his nephew.
"You are a terrible influence."
He looked again, seriously at the both of us.
"Do not let anything happen to her, Jesse, or I swear to god you're toast."