A Pure Hearted Mate

Chapter 34: Unpacking Grief

[ Third Person P.O.V ]

As a werewolf Leo is starting to feel more desire for reproduction than that of human beings. When a werewolf truly falls in love that instinct awakens even more intensely. This is why no matter what mate is thrown his way he wants to only touch and be touched by only one person, Autumn. Same could be said for her in a normal state. This means her issues becomes his. Her pain becomes increasingly his, and with grief. It becomes a barrier between them as lovers and he tries to find the right balance to work around and help her grieve. That's where Leo is and the same situation. He had just stopped kissing with Autumn and started to get ready to go to bed. They go into the bed and for the first time in a long while they both slept soundly.

But on the night of the day after the funeral, Leo wakes to the feeling of Autumn on his chest and nuzzling his neck and was gripping him tightly. She whined and whimpered in a high pitched sound that her wolf was supplying as he realized she was starting to cry. She was having a bad dream.

He quickly hushes her and wakes her " Autumn, " and she stops crying and whimpering when her eyes jolted awake. She looked around quickly with her eyes holding tears still. Leo gently brushed some of her tears away asking " What was the nightmare was about? " That was when she said in a quiet voice " I had this recurring thing of the whole day of when Mom died. " She was silent before said sadly " I guess part of my Mom's voice haunts me still, and I can't help but hear voices filling me with guilt. "  Leo held her close knowing how hard it is to loose a Mom and told her not to feel guilty for what happened. He felt her pain by how she was acting so scared, that it felt like it was braking his heart. He nudged her face with his and kissed her softly trying to coax her into feeling better. That was when he kissed her gently before trying for them both to go back to sleep.

" Don't worry, lets try and get some more sleep. " her eyes were dry now and Leo's embrace made her feel better and protected. She then said quietly before trying to get comfortable again to try and get back to sleep " Okay, "

In the morning, she didn't really do much for the day and mostly attended to Jace and Grayson. But she started to withdraw herself, and spent time alone to reflect and thoroughly process her unhealthy guilt. But soon as she started a couple days later, she found her mind digging up something that caused her greater pain. She didn't have enough time to remember when she was so distracted trying to get over her Mom. That Alpha Andrews current situation was still unsure of what is to await him.

But she's still messed up with what she'd gone through. She stays in bed a lot and stays under the covers trying to deal with the fear that came with the experience. With Leo doing his Alpha work and trying to deal with Alpha Andrews in his custody. Autumn hasn't seen Leo very much during the day. When she does he's doing work at his desk of which he has notice when she's laying in bed often. Almost a week of this has concurred and neither one has really talked about their lingering silence towards this, but both are fairly aware that neither thinks they want to deal with the consequences of bringing up the cause of this.

For by the end of the week, Leo had gotten news of what's to occur. The Alpha King had decided that there will be a court hearing and having Leo bring Alpha Andrews to the Alpha King's pack court house for his sentencing. Of which, all the Alpha's should be prepared to attend as members of the jury as his peers as fellow Alpha's. He will be detained and will be sentenced. But the thing that Leo didn't want to talk about most with Autumn was what the Alpha King had asked him. If Autumn, being both the cause of their fight, and also the victim. He requested to know if she'd be open to state a testimony or maybe righting a letter to him as he will be the judge.

For now, Leo has at least a couple weeks to tell Autumn and have her decision and he is well aware that bringing up him is something that might be unpleasant for her. For now, he has no idea of the thoughts regarding Alpha Andrews and how he had no clue just how true that was.