Chapter 24 #3
I let the apology sit between us instead of rushing to make him feel better. Then I turn my face into his neck because I still want him, still need him, still know he was scared too. "I need you to help me rest without making it feel like I've failed."
"You've got my word."
"And I need you to let me lead inside the house when I say the house's the thing keeping us alive."
Luther draws back enough to look at me. "You don't need permission for that."
"I know." I touch his face, thumb brushing the deep line beside his mouth. "I needed to hear you say it anyway."
He says it again, more quietly, and this time I believe it.
When we return to the room, Maceo's in the chair beside Blake with the laptop open.
It's not dramatic. He hasn't announced a takeover.
He's simply put on his glasses, opened the shared drive, and started sorting the mess Blake's carried alone for too long.
The laptop's angled away from Blake's bed, and the screen brightness is low.
Blake watches him with an expression that's part grief and part irritation and part reluctant understanding.
"You're in my chair," Blake says.
Maceo doesn't look up from the file tree. "I know."
"My folders aren't intuitive."
"I know that too."
Blake's eyes narrow, then soften when Luca leans down and kisses him before the protest can gather strength. It's a gentle kiss, careful around the oxygen and the exhaustion. When Luca pulls back, Blake looks less ready to argue and more ready to cry again.
I come to the foot of the bed and rest one hand near Blake's shin, close enough that he can feel me through the blanket. "Choose whether you want to argue with one Alpha or all of us."
Blake looks from me to Luther, who's taken the chair on the other side of the bed, then to Luca beside his shoulder and Maceo at the laptop. He's tired enough that the fight leaves his face in visible increments. "I'm choosing sleep."
"That's the first sensible business decision you've made all week," Maceo says, and his voice is so dry and gentle that even Blake lets the corner of his mouth move.
The day folds itself into small acts after that.
Medication. Water. Half a bowl of soup. Rosalie guarding the tablet from a chair where she can see both Blake and the counter.
James asking Maceo if contracts've got patterns the way code does, and Maceo answering him seriously.
Samuel pressing the plastic tower piece he brought from home into Blake's hand so Blake can "hold the promise" while he rests.
Luca tucking the blanket higher around Blake's ribs every time the monitor chirps.
Luther answering calls in the hallway with a voice so controlled that no one on the other end can mistake who stands between them and this room now.
By evening, Blake's asleep again, deeper this time.
Maceo's gone to the hospital's family lounge with the laptop and two file boxes Luther had someone bring over.
Luca's curled in the chair beside the bed, one hand still through the rail and resting against Blake's wrist. The kids are heavy-eyed and sticky from dinner, warm against me in that boneless way children get after fear finally loosens its grip.
I ate with them on the floor instead of standing over them with a half-cold plate in my hand, and the choice still feels strange enough that I notice it.
Luther watches me from the bed's other side. "Lie down, Gray."
I almost tell him I'm fine. I almost say I will after I check the kids, after Luca sleeps, after Blake's next vitals, after Maceo returns.
Then Blake shifts on the bed, eyes half-opening through the medication.
He looks at me, and I see the uneasy recognition in his face.
He knows the shape because it's his too.
The endless after. The next task. The refusal to stop because stopping feels like inviting the world to take more.
A small sigh slips through my lips as I toe off my shoes. Luca lifts his head when I climb carefully onto the wide hospital recliner they've pushed near Blake's bed. He comes to me without being asked, tucking himself against my side with a soft sound of relief that I feel more than hear.
Rosalie follows first, then Samuel, then James, each of them arranging themselves around us with the exhausted certainty of children who finally believe the adults'll stay where they can see them.
Luther covers us with a blanket from the warming cabinet and sits on the edge of the chair long enough to kiss my forehead.
"You're allowed to sleep," he says.
"So are you," I tell him.
He looks toward Blake, then the door, then back to me. For once, he doesn't argue. He settles into the chair beside us, close enough that his hand can rest on my ankle under the blanket.
Love, I think, looks different when it stops asking one person to be the answer.
Blake's fingers move weakly against the blanket, searching. Luca reaches without opening his eyes and catches them. Blake exhales, as his gaze drifts from Luca's hand to mine.
"I'll try," he whispers.
I hold his eyes from across the small, crowded room. "So will we."