To Suffer With

Chapter Three - Justified

My eyes open slowly, tiredly as if they're not ready yet. My surroundings are unfamiliar, bright lights above me make me blink a couple of times and I can hear a loud continuous beeping. I turn my head wincing and catch sight of my own arm with tubes coming out of it. I lick my lips wishing for water.

"Finally," someone comments from beside me. That voice I recognize it. I turn slowly to its source. Roman is watching me from where he sits casually on an armchair beside my bed, his legs are outstretched with his feet resting on the end of my bed. He's hard to look at, he's a shock of color in a room devoid of any. There's a window behind him but the curtains are pulled shut and no light leaks through. It was night, the same night or a new one?

Hospital, that's where I must be. What the hell had happened? I look back to Roman my only source of information, hoping he could read the confusion in my face. I wasn't sure if I was ready to talk yet.

"You had some internal bleeding," he explains, "but nothing not easily remedied," he said with a shrug as if we were discussing nothing more important than the weather.

I bring my hand to my forehead, my head pounding. My fingers run down to my neck and I stop in surprise to feel the bandages around it. A heartless wolf, claws extending flashes through my mind. The fear was slowly returning increasing as my memories came flooding back.

I look up trying to figure out what I was going to do only to find Roman now standing looking down at me. His blue eyes studying me make me want to sink into the mattress and disappear.

"I'll get the doctor," he tells me, reaching over my head to press a button on the wall.

I turn my head away from his gaze wishing that I had a few moments to myself to sit and process. I knew what I needed to do, I needed to get better recover and then figure a way out. There wasn't a chance in hell that I was resigning myself to life as a werewolf's mate.

A rhythm of knocks echoes through the room and I turn quickly to see a white coated man standing at the door. The doctor, that had been fast. Though from the man's nervous glance behind me I could understand why. One did not make Alphas wait. Especially not psychotic ruthless Alphas like Roman. The doctor's eyes find mine and I can't help but feel sorry for the man. He looks exhausted.

"I see you're awake," he comments coming to stand beside my bed, "how do you feel?" he asks me, his eyes focused behind me. On the screen that was displaying my vitals.

I lick my lips wishing that someone had offered me some water. "Like I got thrown against a tree and almost killed by a psychotic werewolf," I tell him, my voice sounding raspy to my ears.

The doctor is unnerved by my words, he looks across to the other side of me where Roman is standing as if he is waiting for retaliation. I turn my head slightly so Roman is in my field of view. The doctor need not have worried, he's not even paying attention his eyes are downcast to where he reads something on his phone. I don't know why but somehow that was more off putting.

"What happened?" I question the doctor drawing his attention back to me. Hopefully, he could give me something better than Roman's shitty explanation.

"When you were brought in, there was some severe trauma to your body. The worst of it being to your abdomen. The impact caused some internal bleeding not severe enough to warrant surgery but serious enough that we're going to keep you in here for the next couple of days to monitor your condition and make sure we keep on top of your pain," the doctor explains to me.

I process his words slowly as if my brain can't quite comprehend anything. I was happy that I wasn't dead but somehow that feeling made me feel extremely guilty. I was only alive because Roman thought I was his mate, if he didn't, I'd be dead with the rest of my friends. That's what I think I should want to have fallen with them, but man was I so grateful to be alive. I can feel the tears in my eyes beginning to fall in betrayal. The doctor's watching me with this pity in his eyes that makes me feel so pathetic and small. He reaches out as if to place a comforting hand on me, but it is stopped mid-air as a low growl echoes through the room. I guess that got Roman's attention off his phone. The doctor backs away from me, his attention no longer focussed on me but on the werewolf beside me.