CHAPTER 260

CHAPTER 260
 Liam's POV

The bright fluorescent lights of the hospital waiting room felt like they were burning into my brain as I paced back and forth. The sound of Mia's head hitting that metal rod kept echoing in my mind, along with the sickening crack it had made.

She was trying to protect me. She got hurt because she was trying to stop us from fighting.

"This is all your fault," Xavier said, his voice raw with emotion as he sat hunched forward in one of the plastic chairs. "If you hadn't been there, none of this would have happened."

"My fault?" I whirled around to face him, anger and guilt warring in my chest. "You're the one who swung that rod! You're the one who couldn't control your temper long enough to have a civilized conversation!"

"We told you to stay away from her," Nathan said, his face pale but his voice steady. "We warned you what would happen if you kept pushing."

"And I told you that I don't take orders from hypocrites," I shot back, my wolf pushing forward with barely contained rage.

Sean stood up from his chair, his hands clenched into fists. "Hypocrites? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you three abandoned her for years," I said, my voice getting louder with each word. "You hurt her, rejected her, made her feel worthless, and then disappeared from her life completely. And now you want to waltz back in and act like you have some claim on her?"

"We made mistakes-" Xavier started.

"Mistakes?" I laughed bitterly. "You destroyed her. You broke her heart so completely that she had to rebuild herself from scratch. And where were you during that process? Where were you when she was crying herself to sleep, when she was struggling to raise three children alone, when she was convinced she wasn't worthy of love?"

The silence that followed was deafening. I could see the guilt written all over their faces, but I wasn't finished.

"I was there," I continued, my voice dropping to a deadly whisper. "I was the one who held her when she had nightmares about you. I was the one who convinced her that she deserved better. I was the one who showed her what it felt like to be valued and cherished."

"By lying to her," Sean said quietly. "By pretending to be someone you weren't."

"At least I was there," I replied. "At least I tried to make her happy instead of making her miserable."

Xavier stood up slowly, his alpha presence filling the room. "You want to know why we left? You want to know why we stayed away?"

"Enlighten me."

"Because we knew we'd destroy her if we stayed," he said, his voice breaking slightly. "We knew that our need for revenge, our obsession with finding our father's killer, would consume everything around us. Including her."

"So you made the choice for her," I said. "You decided what was best for her without giving her a say in the matter."

"Yes," Nathan admitted. "And maybe that was wrong. But at least we were trying to protect her."

"Protect her?" I scoffed. "You were protecting yourselves. You were afraid of having to choose between her and your vendetta, so you chose the easy way out."

Before any of them could respond, we were interrupted by a stern-looking nurse who had clearly had enough of our arguing.

"Gentlemen," she said firmly, "this is a hospital, not a boxing ring. If you can't keep your voices down and maintain some semblance of civilized behavior, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

We all mumbled apologies and took our seats, but the tension in the room was still thick enough to cut with a knife.

Mia saved me. In that warehouse, when she could have left me to face the consequences of my actions alone, she chose to help me instead. She saw past the monster everyone else sees and found something worth saving.

The thought made my chest tighten with emotion. No one had ever done that for me before. No one had ever looked at the Alpha of the Shadowmoon Pack and seen anything other than a threat to be eliminated.

But Mia had. And now she was lying unconscious in a hospital bed because of the chaos that seemed to follow me everywhere.

An hour later, a doctor finally emerged from the treatment area, and all four of us jumped to our feet.

"She's going to be fine," the doctor said immediately, and I felt like I could breathe again for the first time since the accident. "She has a concussion, but her healing abilities are remarkably strong. Much stronger than typical for werewolves."

Of course they are. She really is special, just like everyone says.

"Can we see her?" Xavier asked.

"She's resting now," the doctor replied. "I'd prefer to limit visitors for the next few hours. Perhaps one of you could come back later this evening?"

The brothers immediately started arguing about who should be the one to stay, but I'd already made my decision.

She asked me to go back to my pack, to prepare for the meeting. I need to honor that request.

"I'll come back later," I said quietly, interrupting their debate.

They all turned to look at me with surprise.

"You're leaving?" Sean asked.

"Mia asked me to return to my pack," I explained. "To prepare them for the emergency meeting. I need to do what she asked."

Even if it kills me to walk away from her when she's hurt.

But the truth was, I couldn't face going back to the Shadowmoon territory unprepared. Mia had given me hope that things could be different, that my pack could finally have a place in the legitimate werewolf community. I couldn't let her down by showing up with a pack that was still bitter, angry, and unprepared for integration.

"You're actually going to honor her wishes?" Nathan asked, suspicion evident in his voice.

"Unlike some people, I listen when she tells me what she needs," I replied pointedly.

I started to walk away, then turned back to face them one more time.

"If anything happens to her while I'm gone," I said, my voice carrying the full weight of my alpha authority, "if she gets hurt again because of your inability to control yourselves, I will hold you personally responsible."

Without waiting for their response, I walked out of the hospital and into the night.

The drive back to Shadowmoon territory took three hours, giving me plenty of time to think about what I was going to say to my pack. They'd been living in exile for twenty years, convinced that the world would never accept them. How was I supposed to tell them that things might finally be changing?

And what if I'm wrong? What if this meeting is just another trap, another way to humiliate us?

But as I pulled up to the gates of our compound, I pushed those doubts aside. Mia believed in me, believed that my pack deserved a chance at redemption. That had to be enough.

The guards at the gate looked shocked to see me. Word spread quickly that the Alpha had returned, and by the time I reached the main building, a crowd had gathered.

"Welcome home, Alpha," my beta, Marcus, said as I stepped out of the car. "We weren't expecting you back so soon."

"Things have changed," I said, looking around at the faces of my pack members. "Gather everyone in the main hall. It's time we talked about our future."

As I walked toward the building that had been my home for two decades, I could feel the weight of their expectations on my shoulders.

Don't let me down, Mia. Don't let this hope you've given me turn out to be just another cruel joke.

Because if this meeting was a disaster, if the other alphas rejected us again, I wasn't sure I'd be able to pick up the pieces this time.

But for her, I was willing to try.