When He's Ruthless (The Olympus Pride 4)

Les took his mate’s hand in his and gave it a squeeze.

Noelle cleared her throat before continuing. “When I went to your old cabin and saw you collecting your possessions, I wanted to say so many things. I wanted to plead with you not to go. I wanted to tell you that I loved you. I wanted to ask that you let me fix what I’d broken. But I instead blurted out things I should never have said; things I never meant. I don’t know if you can forgive me for any of the things I said or did. But for what it might be worth, I am sorry.”

Blair heard the ring of truth in her voice; knew her mother’s regret was real. The raw honesty in her tone was sometimes painful to hear, especially during the moments she spoke of Marianna.

If Noelle’s self-flagellation was merely a bid for sympathy, Blair would have sensed it; could have held onto her mad. But Noelle wasn’t raking herself over the coals for manipulative reasons, she was doing it because she was desperate to mend things, and that made it hard for Blair to remain detached.

Really, she should have expected that her mother would be so candid. Blair could count on one hand the number of times that Noelle had issued an apology—she didn’t easily admit to being in the wrong. But one thing that could be said for Noelle was that she never did a half-assed job of apologizing.

“Did you ask Macy to lie to Blair?” Luke asked. “Was the whole thing your idea?”

“No,” replied Noelle. “I was being truthful when I said that Macy approached me at the mall. She was all attitude as she smugly boasted that she’d been sleeping with my daughter’s intended mate. I didn’t believe her. My feeling was that she’d been put up to it by her Alpha female, who stood not too far away wearing a little smirk.”

Blair frowned. “Why would the Alpha have done that?”

“Hyacinth once had her eye on your father,” said Noelle, to which Les flushed. “So did I at the time, but he hadn’t yet agreed to take me as a mate. I didn’t like her interference, so I … expressed that.”

“In other words, you humiliated her,” said Luke.

“In a spectacular fashion,” Les told him.

“When I invited Macy to come speak to you, I expected her to back down or for Hyacinth to step in,” Noelle told Blair. “Both females looked as if they wanted to backtrack, but neither did. So I found myself taking Macy to our territory. While I was quite certain you wouldn’t believe her claims, a part of me thought it wouldn’t be so awful if you did. Because then you’d remain in the pack, and I could keep you safe. But if you had believed her—and I truly mean this—I wouldn’t have been able to keep my mouth shut; I’d have told you not to heed her. As much as I wanted to keep you close, I didn’t want to see you in pain.”

Again, honesty coated every syllable. A knot in Blair’s gut fell away.

“I’m sorry, Blair. Truly.” Noelle slid her gaze to Luke. “And I’m sorry for the way I treated you all these years. I couldn’t find it in me to welcome you into Blair’s life. In my mind, you were an interloper who prevented me from keeping my own daughter safe from the world at large. An interloper who could incidentally force me to once again fail to protect my child. I made you pay for my own fears and shame.”

Pausing, Noelle swallowed audibly before adding, “And yes, perhaps I resented how close you were to Blair. I felt her slipping through my fingers, and I couldn’t handle it. That’s not a justification for the things I did, it’s merely the reason why I did them.”

Les looked as if he’d place his hand over Blair’s but then seemed to think better of it. “Your mom and I had managed to convince ourselves that our motives weren’t quite so selfish, which is yet another thing that shames us. The truth of the matter is that what we did, how we acted, was wrong. And we apologize for that. Do you think you can forgive us? Or at least give us a chance to earn that forgiveness?”

Blair’s mind was genuinely blown from all they’d told her. There was so much more behind their actions than she had first thought.

She wasn’t a mother herself, but she could imagine that the loss of a child would be something that affected a parent’s relationship with the rest of their children. She could see that, yes, it would be so easy to fall into letting your fear of losing them drive you to behave in ways that both Noelle and Less had behaved. Their actions still weren’t excusable, no, but they were understandable.