The car ride back to the hospital was tense. My car had been left behind, despite my protests. I’d merely been tossed, literally, into the back of the black truck. Dean sat in the front passenger seat, his eyes focused on my phone. From where I was trapped in the middle seat, between the Leprechaun and the T-shirt guy, I could see that he was scrolling through my photos. Picture after picture of my sons flared up on the screen and I narrowed my eyes.

The driver was one of the lackeys, who’d lingered behind the main five in the conference room. There was another car following us with the remainder guys. I fidgeted where I was, my knee bouncing up and down rapidly as the forest blurred past us like a green blob.

A hand gripped my knee, fingers biting into my skin and my leg stopped jumping. “Enough,” the one to my left snapped as he squeezed my knee. When I looked up, his grey eyes were focused on me.

I swallowed the lump down my throat and parted my lips to tell him to release me when another voice beat me.

“Jared.”

I knew that voice and my eyes immediately darted to the front to catch a view of Dean’s lips narrowing as he stared back. But he wasn’t watching me, no his eyes were swivelling from the hand touching me to the man doing it, who I now knew to be Jared.

“Don’t start,” Leprechaun sighed as he reached down and swatted at Jared’s hand. Jared tightened his grip again before slowing releasing me.

The tension didn’t fade as quickly as I’d hoped after that. Dean continued to hold eye contact with Jared while I found myself scooting closer to the other guy away from the impending confrontation.

Obviously sensing it as well, Leprechaun spoke up. “What was your name? You never gave it,” he said, turning those green eyes on me. “I’m Nathan.”

“Alyssa,” I mumbled back.

“Alyssa,” he repeated, rolling the name off his tongue as if tasting it. “Now, can you tell me what symptoms your sons had? Why did you bring them to a hospital?”

“I…”

Leather creaking alerted me to the fact that Dean had turned further in his chair and now I had those oceanic eyes zeroed in on me. Next to me Jared huffed and leaned back into his seat, eyes sliding shut as if unbothered.

“They wouldn’t wake up this morning,” I answered slowly. “They were both on fire, I couldn’t cool them down. Then there was the coughing. It was horrible, I’d never heard anything like it before.” I shuddered and pursed my lips. “When I got to the hospital the said my sons were dehydrated, feverish, platelet counts were low, low blood sugar, nutrients, excreta. All things pointing to having been neglected. But I haven’t! They’ve been fed and cared for and happy. I’ve done everything right by them! So I don’t understand. I-I just don’t unde-” my words jumbled into a hiccup as I fought against a sob. My cheeks were wet and I angrily scrubbed away the tears.

“We’re not judging you,” Dean’s voice was soft, hesitant almost and it compelled my eyes to jump up and meet his. “It’s not your fault.”

“Have they ever been sick before? Can you remember?” Nathan wondered.

I paused to dwell on it, feeling my brows furrow over my eyes as I shook my head. “I…No, no they’ve never been ill. Bruised and some cuts from falling but no, no sickness.”

As Nathan and Dean shared a look, Jared prodded my arm. “Are you certain he’s the father?”

I blinked at his question, as did the others. “Of course I’m bloody certain. I never had sex with another in the time it took me to find out I was pregnant.”

“But you’ve had sex with others since then?”

“And so what if I have?” I bit back, twisting my upper body so I could face him and glowered. “My sex life has nothing to do with any of you. All I need is for Dean to do what is needed to save my children then he can get the fuck back out of our lives like he’d prefer. Now shut the fuck up, and drive faster.”

The rest of the drive was painfully silent after that, save for Dean barking commands now and then to the driver. Yet as soon as we pulled up to the Hospital, they all flowed into this weird formation, with Obsidian eyes taking lead.

I trailed after them as they marched into the building. Without stopping when confronted by a nurse, the man prowled on and headed in the direction of the room I’d described, rather badly. I didn’t let myself ponder too much on how they seemed to know exactly where to go because before I knew it we were outside the room.

Each of them stopped before me, blocking my view. They didn’t go in and I frowned, pushing past them to grab the door, only for my hand to still. As I peered in the window, I saw nothing. No machines, no beds, no chair. No Damon and Ryan.

“What…?” I breathed, jerking the door open and stumbled into the room.

“What is the meaning of this?” Dean snapped, striding in after me. He gripped my arm and forcibly turned me around to face him. “What game are you playing? You said-!”

“They were here,” I whispered, his own words not affecting me. “Damon, Ryan…I’d left them here. But-But what could have-?”

“Shut up!” he hissed, shaking me with one hand. “Have you fucking played me?! What is your problem?!”

“Dean, Dean!”

Hands ripped me from his hold, while others coiled around his arms. Nathan held my shoulders gently as my arm fell to my side, tingling from the sudden release in pressure.

“Take a moment and calm down,” Obsidian eyes hissed at the other man. “Use your nose, you idiot.”

I frowned at his words but found myself searching in my bag, instead of questioning him. My fingers trembled a little as I snagged my phone. The screen was blurry as I quickly went into my recent calls and rang my mother. I pressed the phone to my ear, scrubbing my eyes as it rang.

“Hello?”

“Mother, where are you? Why are you not at the hospital?”

The voice that answered me was unlike the woman I was talking to earlier. It wasn’t sweet or motherly, it was cold. “Alyssa? Why are you calling me?”

“W-what?” I stammered, twisting around the room. “What do you mean? Why did you leave? Why aren’t you with Damon and Ryan?”

She signed over the line. “I don’t know why you’re speaking as if we’ve been in contact at all, but if you can’t mind your own kids then that’s your concern.”

Click.

“Mo-?”

The line was dead. She hung up. She hung up on me. What? I stared at the blank screen on the phone and found that the world was tilting around me. I crashed to the floor, knees crashing against the granite painfully. How could this be happening?