Filed to story: In the Shadow of the Past Luna (Lily & James)
He stands up and approaches me.
“No, Jane, I am not going to let it go. I have let you use that excuse for the last couple of days, but I am not going to let you get away with that today. You are my mate and my wife. Our emotions have been linked since the day we marked each other. I know whatever it is that is bothering you, it runs deeper than simply a lack of sleep and a concern for our son. Please just tell me!*
I cup my hands over my face and sigh.
With my hands in a praying gesture, I try once again to avoid the fight that I am sure is about to happen. Randall, please. You are such a smart man most of the time, but you need to trust me on this. If we talk now, you are not going to like what I have to say, and it is going to start a fight. Please let me process this a little bit more before we talk about it. Maybe I will change my mind or feel better about all of it.”
“NO! I told you that I am done with the excuses, Jane! Talk to me!”
he fires back.
Randall sounds angry, but after being married to him for 30 years, I know that he really isn’t. He just feels frustrated and helpless. As an alpha, those are emotions that he is not comfortable with. Ultimately,
Randall wants to know what the problem is so that he can fix it. The trick is, I do not know if he can fix this one.
“Randall, please. Give me another day or two, or until James wakes up. I promise, I will talk to you then.
Just please, do not press the issue right now, I am not ready to talk about it yet.”
“What is going to happen between now and tomorrow that will change anything? You will be even more sleep deprived, and it will be one more day that has passed without me being able to fix whatever it is.”
“I do not know if you can fix what is bothering me, Randall. That’s the thing.”
“LET. ME. TRY.”
“Tomorrow. I will let you try tomorrow.”
“NO! JANE ELIZABETH ANDERSON, TELL ME WHAT IS GOING ON, AND TELL ME RIGHT NOW!”
As he yells at me, I feel him release his alpha aura. As his mate, it does not work on me, but it definitely pushes my buttons. It is his way of telling me that he is the boss, which he is not. We are equals.
“WHAT IF WE ARE WRONG?”
I finally shout back at him in anger.
“Wrong about what?”
“Wrong about everything! We clearly failed as parents, for one. We taught our son that fated mates are important, but then we told him that we were going to force him to take a chosen mate! And then our son met his mate, and in a fu&&ing memorial event with the entire pack watching, he publicly rejected her after taunting her with all the sex and bl ow-jo bs that he planned to get from other she-wolves!”
“You cannot blame the boy for being upset with the Moon Goddess pairing him with Lily, Jane. How could that possibly be fair to him? She is weak and wolfless. And her actions led to his first mate being killed. The pack would never have accepted her as Luna. I agree that his language was less than ideal, but you cannot say that you would not have done the same thing if in his shoes.”
‘I shake my head.
“Are you sure that Lily is weak? You saw her, Randall. She was bruised and broken and yet she had. command of that entire hall! And hear any dishonesty in what she said? I still cannot get her did you words out of my head. I keep replaying them over and over again.
She said no one ever bothered to ask her about the incident that led to Stephanie’s death. How can that be? How can the entire pack blame a 14-year-old girl for a murder and yet NO ONE has ever asked her what happened?
She also said that James has been associating with a she-wolf who had more to do with Stephanie’s death than she did. Did you know there was another she-wolf involved that night?
And she said that James has made many mistakes when it comes to her. What else has he been mistaken about?
Randall, I am sorry, but my gut says that girl was telling the truth. And because of that, I no longer know what to believe or think anymore!”
Randall looks at me with fear in his eyes. I can tell that my words are hitting home; he now has questions too. But then I watch as his mind desperately tries to justify everything that has happened.
“Jane. even if there was more to the story involving Stephanie’s murder, it was still unfair of the Moon
Goddess to pair James with his first mate’s sister. Surely that was reason alone for them to reject one another. I do not think I could bear if it something happened to you and I was later mated to your sister
Cindy.”
Tears fill my eyes. “But Randall… what if we w wrong about that too? What if Stephanie was never
James’ mate? You forget that Stephanie died before her 20th birthday. We have no idea who her mate was. We all just assumed that it was James, because Margie and I wanted so desperately for that to be the case.
What if… what if James’ mate was Lily all along?”
Randall looks at me with horror. “That is impossible. Of course, Stephanie was James’ mate.”
“If Stephanie was James’ mate, that would make Lily his second-chance mate,”
I said softly.
“Yes… what is your point?”
what is your point?”
“You cannot be someone’s second-chance mate unless you yourself are in need of a second-chance mate. If Lily was James’ second chance mate, who was her first mate?”
I watch as the realization hits Randall… but once again, he tries to ignore it.
“No, that does not make any sense. Stephanie was his mate. We know that. We have always known that. Lily had to have been mated to another male first. Lily is young, but that is definitely possible.”
“It is also possible that Lily wasn’t mated to anyone else, Randall. What if…. What if Lily was his mate all along?”
Randall says nothing, so I keep going.
“Do you remember years ago how James begged us to scale back the events honoring Stephanie? He told us that he thought the events were impacting his me ntal health. We told him ‘no,”
Randall!”
As the memory comes back to me, my tears begin to fall.
“Randall, we never tell him ‘no’ about anything, but we told him ‘no’ about that! We were so afraid to offend Robert and Margie that we called him selfish and told him that he had to keep attending the events. We told him that it was his duty as the alpha heir!
What if… what if our actions forced him to be so focused on Stephanie and her memory that he was blinded to what the Moon Goddess really intended for him?!?! What if all of this is our fault?!?!?!”
Again, Randall is silent. However, this time, he grabs me and wraps me up into a hug. I melt in his embrace, especially as I feel his own tears starting to fall.
I had been so sure that saying all of my worries out loud would cause a fight between Randall and I. I am very grateful that is not how it ended up playing out.
By the end of our conversation, I still had no idea what the truth was. For all know, my worries are just the exaggeration of a tired mother who has seen too many movies and read too many romance books.
However, I cannot help but feel relieved that Randall now agrees with me that we owe it to our son, the pack, and even Stephanie’s memory to dig a little further.
(Luna Jane POV)
Another week has passed. We were all relieved when James finally woke up on the fourth day, and we were now celebrating that Dr. Miller had given us the blessing to take him home later today.
Although Dr. Miller had cleared James to leave the hospital, he emphasized to us that it was critically important that James avoid stress as much as possible for at least the next few weeks. James’ heart was still quite fragile, and his wolf had not spoken to him yet. Dr. Miller said that rejections are especially hard on the wolf counterparts, and we could expect it to take between one and three months for Luke to fully recover, much less be willing to talk to James and/or shift. Until Luke recovered, his ability to heal James would be compromised.
We decided to take Dr. Miller’s advice seriously. Earlier today, Randall alpha-ordered all pack members, except Robert and Margie, to avoid talking to James about anything related to Lily, Stephanie, or what happened on the day of the rejection. Pack members were also alpha-ordered to avoid talking about any those subjects in the pack house, because we wanted to avoid James accidentally overhearing a conversation that might trigger him. And finally, the she-wolves that James had been inviting to his room were ordered to stay away.
Our plan was to wait a few weeks, and then sit James down and have a conversation about everything in a therapeutic setting.
There were two reasons that Randall did not give alpha-orders to Robert and Margie.
not give alpha-orders to Robert and Margie. First, they live in the packhouse with us, and we knew that they were suffering right now just like we were. Limiting their ability to talk in their own home about their two daughters or what happened seemed unnecessarily cruel. Second, Robert and Margie were our best friends, and we knew that they did not need to be alpha- ordered to avoid hurting James. They had proven many times over how much they were willing to sacrifice for him.
Eager to leave the hospital, James had just stepped into the bathroom to change clothes when Margie burst into his hospital room. Her face was tomato-red with rage, and her fists were clenched as though she was ready to hit something or someone.
I admit that I still had not talked to her and Robert since the rejection. Part of it was because I was a coward; part of it was because I have a horrible time keeping secrets from Margie; and part of it was because I wanted to make sure that we had something concrete to present to Margle before we confronted her with our doubts and concerns.
When Margie barged into the room, I expected that she was angry with me because of not talking to her in so many days. Unfortunately, I was sorely wrong.
“HOW COULD YOU!”
Margie screamed. “AFTER ALL I DID FOR YOU! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS!!!!
“Margie! I do not know what you are talking about, but we cannot talk in here. I do not want James to hear you! Dr. Miller said that it is important that he avoid stress at all costs!”
I quickly ushered her into the hallway and down the hall into a small visitor’s office. After I closed the door, I turned around to face her.
“Now, tell me what is wrong Margie,”