The gray colored Savant wanted to escape, but too much anchored her to Phoenix Valley. Unfortunately, it was the very things that anchored here that made her want to escape. Today, she wanted to avoid her responsibilities as a subleader as this pack, as a mate, as a mother, and as a friend. Today she wanted to be an individual. Today she wanted to be herself, within herself and without herself. She wanted to think, but she did not want to analyze things too closely. She just wanted to be for an hour or two, without having to worry about someone else’s feelings.
Geneva immediately was able to identify her feelings as selfish, but she did not much care. She needed a few minutes to back away from the things that caused her conflict and hurt her. Earlier in the month, she had claimed to find some sort of inner peace with herself, but today she grappled to sustain it. Since her confrontation with her son over her past a few days ago. She had been able to accept that her first love, Jordan, was gone, and that their child had died with him. But that did not mean that she was not affected by the fact that it had happened. She still ached for them. And while she would not trade her life right now for anything, she longed to see their faces one more time. They were indelibly written upon her soul, and nothing could erase them. It hurt that her family had such a hard time accepting the fact that she had loved before, but that did not change her heart. She still loved Jordan and Shae very deeply, although differently than she loved Jefferson and Pripyat. She did not think that her mate and son realized that she could love her dead mate and child without it detracting from her love for them. She knew that she was a good mate and a damned good mother. Just because she loved others did not mean that she loved Jefferson and Pripyat any less. The depths of her heart were vast; her ability to love had not dried up. Her love knew not the measures or follies of time; it did not work in a linear, one way street kind of way. She could love those in the present and still expand and grow the love she preserved for her mate and child now. Things between her son and her were not horrible right now by any means, but she was sick to death of having to defend the fact that she had loved and lived in a time before Jefferson and Pripyat.
Geneva left Phoenix Valley without a word to anyone else. If anyone looked for her patrolling the borders or within the ranch house, they simply would not find the woman. Because today she could not find peace within her home. Instead, she sought out the only other comfort she knew. Although Naniko had left Phoenix Valley and now lived within an entirely different pack, that had not changed or damaged the bond between the two females. Right now, she wanted to be in the presence of someone who loved and trusted her without doubt or conditions, and she felt that she could find that comfort in Naniko.
The woman’s lime green eyes traced what she remembered as the borders, although she was not completely certain of the boundaries completely. Without a sense of smell, she had to rely on memory, and she had only seen her white furred friend once since she had settled within the caves. The frail wolfess slid bonelessly to her knees, kneeling on the ground. She hadn’t the energy to call for Naniko now. Instead she’d just wait for her friend. She had to do rounds for the borders some time, and Geneva was not in the frame of mind she needed to return home and face the ones she loved the most.
WC 662
