50 NOW I'M REALLY IN TROUBLE

Once home I sprinted up the stairs and shut myself in my bedroom. I pulled open the bathroom door and stripped off my clothes. The sweatshirt went into the laundry basket, the dress and my bra... They were stained red.

I tried to save them, maybe washing them out in the sink, the the water turned red so quickly, and after a while, I wrung them out and dropped them into the bin.

Then I started the shower, setting it immediately at full blast. I knew that if anyone wanted to follow me up to my room to talk about it, the sound of the shower would turn them away.

I didn't want to talk about it.

On the bright side, the alpha power surge I had trouble holding down just now was all used up. I didn't have to hold back anymore.

It didn't feel like I had anything left to hold back. I felt hollowed out and deflated.

I washed with the bottles of happiness and was surprised to be comforted by the now familiar scent. Then I rinsed, dried off, wrapped the towel around my head, and crawled into my bed.

The problem with my bed was that I did a lot of my thinking there, almost as much as in my shower, but I didn't want to think about anything right now.

I took out my diary, but I didn't feel like writing.

I stared at the blank page.

I wanted to start with wry humor. That usually helped me deal with difficult emotions, but I can't think of anything funny to write.

Maybe I should get the main points down. My brain felt like a ball of tangled yarn. Okay, let's unwind:

Alpha Lorent was an abusive angry controlling father who was nearly killed by his own son who had run away.

The same Alpha Lorent was also polite and friendly, loved his mate, missed his son, wanted to contribute to the destitute home, and healed me.

And that same son was taken by rogues and sold for vampire entertainment at our nearest not-so-friendly neighborhood coven, Ventali's Coven, also known as Ven's.

But I think the son wasn't just taken, Alpha Lorent said he wouldn't have left (if I were his son's girlfriend, ahem) so the son had run away and then got caught by rogues?

The rogues were probably the same ones we met at the woods of the destitute home. Because they had unusually expensive weapons, because they answered my question as if they did know something about my "boyfriend" being sold there recently.

This "boyfriend" was one of the guys Jessica let me picked first from the illegal picture her cousin took of the Lorent brothers last year.

It all came round in a full circle now. Except that it didn't leave me with any conclusion.

Luna Edith was crying and she made me think that might be how my own mum might cry if I broke her heart. And because of that, I wanted to make her tears stop.

And then after I came back from the woods with blood soaked through my cardigan, I saw my mum crying, except it was my own mum and I felt a hundred times more horrible. But I couldn't make my mum stop crying either. Except that I was back, in one piece.

Luna Edith's son would never come back.

I never wanted to see my mum's crying face again. That much was for certain. But, I was the Alpha and inevitably, there would be days I would have to go out and fight for my pack.

Perhaps I could consider doing so in a way my mum won't even notice.

Like have a white wolf heal me and a hot shower everytime I get back. I wonder if Savy's potential white wolf could heal the way Alpha James' wolf had.

Alpha James' wolf looked a lot like my mate's. Maybe all white wolves look similar. I think of my mum's wolf. Mum's wolf is smaller, but also had brown tea colored eyes. Her wolf looked even more related to Alpha James'. So I guess for white wolves, it's more of the type of power they have inherited that showed their bloodline?

Which meant that Savy would only be able to help lighten my feelings, and not my blood loss.

Maybe I'll wear long sleeves all the time. Then as long as my face wasn't injured, my mum would be none the wiser.

Savy could help me keep a straight emotionless face at all times. That could be useful too.

What was I thinking again?

Oh yeah, I was trying to detangle my thoughts. I think I got the biggest knots out.

So now I had space to wrestle the other issues... Like the fact that I'm in really big trouble now. This wasn't like poking my nose into dad's office when he is meeting another Alpha even though I was told to not hang around.

This was more like running into a rogue attack even though I could't shift and the rule was for unshifted wolves and female wolves to run to safety.

But they got Savy! And after we got Savy out, and Chris too, I couldn't leave without Brenda... Could you? Really? Once the rogue got Brenda back into the warlock lands, we wouldn't be able to follow. I had to stall him.

I remembered my mum's crying face... And Mrs Beta and Laura and Esther... These ladies who watched me grow up and taught me and fed me and cared for me all these years.

Was it selfish of me to run into danger to save others if it would invariably hurt the ones who love me?

I remembered how my father looked when he saw the fading bruises Maria the vampire had left on me. The pained expression adding years to his face.

I had told myself I would be more careful then.

But I'm an Alpha. I healed fast. If it wasn't for the Wolfbane, I would have healed right then in the woods. As Alpha James had said, they were not deep cuts.

I was made with an Alpha wolf for a reason. I wanted to be the one to protect my pack's happiness. What I needed was a way to make sure no one would know I was hurting. Then I won't ever see them cry for me again.

But how could I do this? At this point, I could only think of keeping a secret disinfectant and bandage supply in my room... it's very close to my original plan for Ben actually. Who knew bandages and disinfectant could be such an all purpose counter-plan?

I wanted to ask Savy to help me think of something better, but I didn't want to drag her down with me.

Talking about dragging others down with me, we had a meeting after dinner. They would want to hear my third dream. I didn't want to tell them about it, but I couldn't escape this.

I had thought of two ways to deal with tonight's meeting;

OPTION 1: TELL THEM I FORGOT THE DREAM

OPTION 2: PLAN VERY CAREFULLY WHAT I WOULD SAY AND HOW I SHOULD ANSWER (so I don't give any embarrassing details away).

I'm going with OPTION 2, so I'm going to just take out a sheet of paper and write an official report of my dream on it, and answer some of the questions I think they might ask.

I just needed to remember that dream... After the run in the woods with the rogues, I really didn't remember what happened anymore.

No wait, I remembered. Sigh. I guess OPTION 1: TELL THEM I FORGOT THE DREAM wasn't going to happen naturally for me. No, of course the goddess won't make things so easy for me.