Hushed Willows should have got paid up front, banner

She listened to him as he went off, the thoughts and feelings he'd held back tumbling out all at once.  Banner stood before her brother, a steady, reliable source of strength for him.  He wasn't generally so open with others, but with her.. well, the pages of his book were free to flip through.  Of course she thought he coud be a dad and a mate.  Of course she did!  How could he not see that in himself?  In all other things confidence rolled off of him in waves, but in true matters of the heart he'd always been guarded.

She sighed, her expression softening for him.

But that didn't stop the anger from simmering just below the surface.  The more he admitted, the more suspicious Octavia's behavior became to her.  "So.. what, you're just a convenience for her?" she blurted out hotly.  Banner had a hard time reconciling the Octavia she knew (which was admittedly not well) with the Octavia he was describing.  "She has her son, has the pack and couldn't control either situation.  You come along, she leans on you, and now she's pushing you away?"  Her basic run-down of events, bare bones though it was, painted a very different picture of her brother's lover.  Her green eyes bore into Stark's blue, her expression hard.  "I don't know that I buy it."

She didn't want to buy it.  There was no way.. she'd seen the affection the Alpha held for her brother.  It was real.  Wasn't it?