Chapter 151

Justin’s POV

Russo stared patiently at me. “You can fix things between you and Helen just like repairing the damage she did to you, not the physical but the emotional. By stabbing you in the back, whether it was her fault or not, the damage was done. So just like this, the damage is done whether you meant to or not. And it’s going to be slow fixing it. You are going to have to gain her trust.”

I snorted. “Well, that’s ironic.”

He chuckled. “Yeah, it is kind of. But you’re going to have to regain Helen’s trust and show her that you will treat her the way a luna ought to be treated. You will have to show her that you’re willing to let her be an active part of her life, your life together, and the life of the pack. Just like she’s going to have to continue to prove to you that she’s not going to hurt you. You’re going to shy away from her. She’s going to shy away from you, and it will be a hot mess for a while. But in the end, if you guys both put in the work, I think you can fix what’s between you. As I said, neither of you is dead, so you still have time.”

I paled at that. “Not as much time as you seem to think, little fae. If my father or the Huntsman has his way, we’ll both be dead before we can fix this between us. I have to get back and start making some progress.”

Russo held out a hand. “I’m going to give you one last piece of advice. Decide what job you want to give her when we get back. If you can’t stand the thought of her going out into active conflict, then have something else she can do. Otherwise, she will keep running off because she doesn’t feel useful.”

I rolled this idea around in my mind. The fae might have a point, and I could give Helen a job that wasn’t that dangerous. But what could I do that would keep her out of harm’s way at the same time as allowing her to feel productive when all she wanted to do was run off and save those pixies?

“What are you thinking about, Justin?” Russo asked.

“Trying to think of a job that will keep Helen safe as well as give her something productive to do. I can’t just let her run off and rescue the pixies on her own, but I know that’s what she really wants to do.”

“What she really wants to do is take down the Huntsman,” Russo pointed out. “Perhaps you should focus on finding a way for her to do that.”

“If we can get rid of the Huntsman, then saving the pixies will be that much easier,” I agreed.

“Might I offer a suggestion,” Russo asked

I growled, thinking of all the other unsolicited advice he’d thrown out at me. On the other hand, most of it made sense.

“Fine,” I agreed. “What’s your suggestion?”

“I think that Helen keeps trying to head for the library. It seems like there’s something there that she wants to research. Why don’t you make it her job to find out all the information about the Huntsman? She can take statements from any spies you have, she can do any research on the books in the library or on the Internet, and then she can feed all of what she gathers back to the actual warriors to go out and take action.”

“Then she will feel productive,” Russo said. “She’ll feel like she had a hand in whatever is going down, yet she won’t be anywhere near the actual fighting.”

I rolled this around in my head while I thought it over. You know, that might actually be a good plan, but what do I do with her when she runs out of things to research? Then she’s going to want to go right back out to the action.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not that intimately acquainted with your mate. I don’t know what she plans or what she wants because she doesn’t confide in me, but she and Randy have clearly developed a close relationship. I suggest that you send her to work on researching the problem right away. Meanwhile, you can go get information from Randy on how to keep her busy after that job is done. If anybody knows what she’s planning, it’s probably Randy.”

I gave him a genuine grin for the first time since I’d run off. “You know what, fae? You might actually be pretty useful.” It felt good to smile.

Helen’s POV

I paced around the porch of my new house, not daring to go in. Now that I was here, following through was making me hesitate. Where all of this sudden apprehension came from, I didn’t know. Because I swore half an hour ago, I was firmly resolved to have this place of my own. But now I was second-guessing my choice, wondering if this was such a good idea.

Moving out was definitely going to make Justin’s lycan furious with me, and he was already mad. What sort of retribution would he take this time?

Randy put his hands on my back, between my shoulder blades. “You need to calm down, luna.”

“Was I wrong?” I asked him, turning to face him. “Is this a stupid idea? Was I just overreacting?”

Randy let out a huge sigh. “I wish I could tell you that you were overreacting. I really do. But in this particular case, I don’t think so.”

I sat down on a porch chair, burying my face in my hands. I let out a sob. “I just left my mate.”

Randy came over and sat next to me in another chair, keeping a hand on my back for comfort. “You didn’t leave your mate. You specifically didn’t reject him. That’s huge. But I don’t think that it was wrong for you to need space, to demand that you be allowed to live separately from him for a while. He was hurting you, and I couldn’t stand it.”

“It was just his lycan,” I said, sounding pathetic even to my own ears.

“I don’t care what his excuse was. He shouldn’t have been hurting his mate,” Randy countered.

“But he’s an alpha and my mate,” I wailed. “I should obey him. I tried to. I want to. But it’s so hard because I also want to be a good luna and a good friend. And I think I’m stronger than he gives me credit for. And he won’t believe the truth. That hurts more than being chained up in the basement.”

Randy’s eyes widened, and his eyebrows raised. “Seriously?”

I pressed my hands to my heart, looking at him sincerely. “Yes. It hurts when he rejects the truth and rejects me. And he might not say the words, but rejecting me is essentially what he’s done. He won’t be near me because he says he can’t trust me, and I’ve tried so hard, Randy. I’ve tried to make the truth obvious, and I started stopping. He just won’t listen.”

“All the more reason why I think that your decision to come here and have your own space is a valid one,” he said. “I think that Justin is confused. I think he needs some time away from you to sort his feelings and come to grips with reality.”

I turned a pathetic look on him. “Do you believe me?”

He rubbed my back a little, comfortingly. “I’ve always believed that you didn’t want to stab Justin, even if you had control of your body. Sometimes we can do things that aren’t really what we want when we’re pushed to the breaking point.”

His hand stopped rubbing on my back, bunching into a fist. “But now that I’ve heard the testimony from the other people who were manipulated like you, I don’t think you were confused anymore. I think that you were manipulated, just like you said. And even though I never blamed you from the start, now I really think that Justin is in the wrong. And the fact that he’s ignoring the truth makes me so mad . . .”

His fist scrunched even harder, and he took it off my back, smacking it into his other open hand. “I just . . . Justin’s my alpha, and there’s only so much I can do.”