Chapter 146

Mira

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

Beatrice stood next to me on the doorstep, Dominic’s voice muffled behind us. She had put back the barrier between the house and the outside world, separating me and Dominic.

I had asked her to do it.

I knew it would be hard to restrain him, and harder for me not to give in and run back into his arms. Something was still pulling me away from him, and I needed to follow it.

“I’m not sure of anything anymore,” I said to the wood door in front of me. “But this is where I need to be.”

Before I could raise my hand to knock on the door, it opened. Aubrey stood there, confused and surprised to see both of us for different reasons.

“I thought I felt something,” she said to Beatrice. “Come in, please.”

We followed her in, and I was grateful she didn’t ask about the bag in my hand or the crazed look I must have had on my face. I could still smell the blood on Dominic’s clothing, the blood that had clearly been spilled from Malachi.

Without thinking, I reached out to Dominic in my mind and tried to find the memory of the event of his death. All I found was red rage and something sticky sweet between my fingers.

“Mira!”

I slammed the door shut in our minds, cutting off his connection to me. And then I felt the tears come into my eyes. I barely made it into the living room when I collapsed down onto the couch and folded over my lap, sobbing.

The heaving breath that came out of me was raw and desperate and didn’t seem like a release as much as an extraction of something rotten.

I felt Aubrey and Beatrice, standing just to the side of the couch and looking at me. Neither spoke, but they must have been communicating about what to do.

“I’ll put the kettle on,” Aubrey said.

“That sounds like a two person job,” Beatrice said, always snarky.

But then I was thankful for the solitude, only the echoing of my sobs off decadent walls of the room. After a minute or so, I felt a presence join me in the room and sit next to me on the couch. An arm wrapped over my shoulders, soft hands comforting me.

“It’ll be okay,” Sasha said softly.

We stayed that way, in silence, until I had no tears left to cry.

– – –

Weeks went by, and I was busier than ever.

Knowing that only my work would save me, I gave every part of myself and every moment of my time to helping the community. It seemed the gods kept pushing me in the direction of the greater good, and I accepted this part of my Fate.

My one life was no longer important, but I would dedicate it to improving the lives of others. It didn’t matter if my single heart was breaking along the way.

First, we turned Malachi’s headquarters into a medical outpost for the travelling team. Insistent on removing every trace of him, we tore walls down for storage and locked up areas that might induce trauma. Donations were made of furniture as possible, and the rest we burned in the front lot as a sacrifice to the gods.

The fire was my idea.

With the evil doctor gone, more of his underlings came out of the woodwork asking for our help.

Whatever spell he had cast, it seemed to have died with him.

Unfortunately, we found more teenagers locked away across the region and every time I hoped they were the last. Luckily, we had facilities that could support detox and rehabilitation and all the therapies they might need to reclaim themselves.

Then, we looked at our own ranks. The travelling medical team benefitted not only from the repurposed buildings and supplies left behind. Rogue attacks diminished so dramatically that the team could focus more on charity and community.

The helplines were strengthened and connections improved as we took hold of Malachi’s private servers.

Recruitment was up, and we rewrote contracts to include more time off. Morale was high, and it felt like a new age was dawning among Werewolf Packs and the medical staff that supports them.

I took a special interest and responsibility in checking in on the young victims who had been taken by Malachi and his team, and spent most of my time travelling between treatment centers and individual Pack compounds when someone was ready to return home.

Seeing families reunited brought tears to my eyes every time, but with it came a sense of accomplishment and a warm feeling that something I was doing mattered. I was a sponsor, a mentor, a confidante, and a friend to anyone who needed me. The teens had me glued to my phone with their incessant texting, but over time it shifted from needing help to trying to make me laugh with memes and silly videos.

I was open about my own experiences with Malachi, as a youth and then in his recruitment and attempted grooming of me. I never tried to take leadership over any of it, but all it took was one interview with a survivor saying I was the savior that my poster child persona was solidified.

A newspaper called me ‘Saint Mira,’ while others still harped on my former moniker as ‘Doctor Luna.’

While I tried to ignore my past and the people in it, the press made sure to keep reminding me. It was hard not to click on articles talking about my meteoric rise in the community– from wolfless orphan to Luna to fearless activist in a matter of months– and in moments of weakness I found myself scrolling through comments.

I wasn’t proud of it, but my ego still needed a boost from time to time.

It was late one night, the only light in my room from the square screen of my phone. I was staring at one comment left on an article about my work. The comment was shutting down a troll that had said I was full of shit, and this person was confirming that I was everything they said I was.

He didn’t use his real name, but I knew who it was.

Dominic.

Was he keeping tabs on me?

Against the advice of the voice in my head, I did a quick internet search for my estranged husband, just to see what he was up to. It seemed he was also busy– meeting with other Alphas and cleaning up the mess the Rogues had left in their wake.

I swelled with pride to see the world loving him as I did. It gave me hope that he would be okay, that maybe we both needed this space from each other to find our own success.

Maybe it would lead us back together someday.

My heart swelled at the thought, and a heat rushed through my abdomen. I could almost remember what he tasted like, the last time my lips touched his.

I went to images, I needed to see his handsome face. There were several from some recent events, and he looked stern. I didn’t make it through many before I was choking on my breath and had to turn my phone off.

In almost every picture, he was standing next to Celeste.