Chapter 177
[ 1,079 words ]
Sebastian’s POV
My body had healed days ago. As an Alpha, fast recovery was built into my DNA. Broken ribs, internal bleeding? Nothing for wolf genes. Yet here I was, still holed up in this sterile hospital room like some pathetic invalid.
I couldn’t face the pack house. Every corner held memories of Emilia. And the penthouse? That reeked of whiskey and self-destruction.
The body heals. That was the easy part. It was everything underneath that wouldn’t close up.
Moon Goddess. If you’re going to give me supernatural healing, how about throwing in some emotional recovery while you’re at it? Or is making me suffer your idea of a joke?
You’re the one who tied Emilia and me together as fated mates. Did you know it would end like this? Did you laugh when you bound my soul to a woman who’d tear it apart?
Emilia showed up every day now. Her scent used to calm Ryder right away. Now it just reminded me of everything I’d lost. Everything that had been a lie.
I didn’t have the energy to fight with her anymore. She’d actually had the nerve to blame me for not looking into her past closely enough. Said I didn’t understand her, that I jumped to conclusions. Moon Goddess, the nerve of this woman. She’d called herself “practical” from day one, and I’d stupidly taken that for honesty. Turns out “practical” was just code for “opportunistic liar.”
I needed out of here. Tomorrow, I’d discharge myself and move into the office. Work myself to the bone. Anything to stop thinking about her.
“Sebastian, you can’t keep going like this,” Ryder rumbled in my mind.
“I’m fine. I’ll get over it.”
“Then stop taking so many damn pills.”
I went quiet. He had me there.
The sleeping pills I’d bullied my doctor into prescribing had side effects. Nausea, no appetite, brain fog. But they were the only way I could sleep without dreaming of her. Without reaching across the bed in the middle of the night and finding it empty.
If Mila found out I was back on them, she’d lose it.
Lunch sat untouched on the tray beside my bed. Food had stopped meaning anything. Just fuel my body didn’t even want.
I lay curled on my side, staring at the wall, when Emilia walked in.
“You didn’t eat lunch,” she said.
I kept my eyes closed. Maybe she’d take the hint and leave.
“Do you feel like roasted potatoes? I can go get some for you.”
Roasted potatoes. Of course Mila had put her up to it.
I didn’t answer, but Emilia didn’t seem to need my permission for anything anymore.
“If you don’t say anything, I’m taking that as a yes.”
I could hear the smile in her voice, and something in my chest ached.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can. And don’t worry, you don’t need to thank me.”
The door clicked shut behind her.
“You could have just said thank you,” Ryder muttered.
“I never asked her to do any of this.”
Two hours later, I checked my watch for what had to be the tenth time.
Where the hell was she?
It shouldn’t take two hours to get roasted potatoes. Even if she’d gone to that place across town that made them the way I liked, crispy outside, fluffy inside, with that specific herb blend, it was a forty-minute round trip at most.
I reached for my phone and pulled up her contact. I could send her a mind-link. Quick, direct, straight to her head.
Except that would look like I cared. Like I was worried about her.
Which I wasn’t.
I was just… worried about the potatoes getting cold. That’s all.
“You’re an idiot,” Ryder said flatly.
“I’m practical,” I shot back, throwing Emilia’s favorite word back with all the sarcasm I had.
Fine. A phone call. Totally casual. Normal. Not worried at all.
I dialed her number.
Straight to voicemail. Phone off.
My jaw clenched. Who turns their phone off in the middle of the day? What if there was an emergency? What if someone needed to reach her?
What if she needed help?
No. I wasn’t going down that road. She was fine. Probably just… her battery died. Or she was in a tunnel. Or…
“For Moon Goddess’s sake, just call someone,” Ryder growled. “Your pride isn’t worth her safety.”
I glared at nothing. “I don’t have pride. I have standards.”
“You have issues.”
I waited another thirty seconds, then sent a mind-link to my sister.
“Tiffany. Hospital. Now.”
Her answer came right away, edged with alarm. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Just get here.”
Tiffany burst through my door twenty minutes later, breathless. “Sebastian, what happened? Is it your injuries? Did something rupture? Should I get the doctor?”
“Emilia went out two hours ago and hasn’t come back.” I kept my voice flat, uninterested. “Go find her.”
Tiffany’s face went from confusion to disbelief to plain exasperation. “That’s it? That’s the emergency?”
“Did I stutter?”
She threw her hands up. “Let me get this straight. When she was actually here taking care of you, you barely looked at her. But now she’s been gone two hours and you’re calling in search parties?”
“I’m asking you to check on her. That’s hardly a search party.”
“Oh my Goddess.” Tiffany pressed her palms to her eyes. “How are we even related? How did a straightforward person like me end up with a brother who’d rather suffer than admit he gives a damn about his own wife?”
“I asked you to go, so go. Why are you wasting time talking?”
I grabbed the pillow from behind my back and threw it at her head. She dodged, barely.
“Fine! I’ll find her!” She caught the pillow and threw it back, hitting me in the chest. “But when I do, I’m telling her exactly how worried you are. And I’m using the word ’panicking,’ just so you know.”
“You will do no such thing.”
“Try and stop me!” She was already out the door.
I sank back against the mattress, my wolf pacing.
“You could have just said you were worried,” Ryder said.
I ignored him and sent a mind-link to Beta Fynn.
He answered right away. “What’s up, Alpha?”
“I need you to pull together everything you can find on Emilia. All of it. Every major thing that happened in her life before she came to Silver Moon Pack.”
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