The hospital was quiet when they arrived, the supernatural ward on the third floor even more so. Finn walked Lilith to the elevator and then stopped.
"I'll be in the car," he said. "Call me when you're ready to leave. And Luna?" He hesitated. "Be careful."
"Careful of what?"
But Finn just shook his head. "Just be careful."
He left before she could ask what he meant.
Lilith took the elevator up to the third floor and walked the familiar path to her mother's room, her footsteps echoing in the empty hallway. The nurses recognized her now, nodded in greeting but did not stop her. She had been coming here for months, long before the Blackwood Alphas, long before the bonds, back when her life was simpler and lonelier and made more sense.
Her mother's room was at the end of the hall, the door partially open. Lilith pushed it wider and stepped inside, and the familiar sight of her mother lying motionless in the hospital bed made her chest ache the way it always did.
