Hushed Willows The nightmare scenario has happened.

Stark was so lost to his thoughts that he hadn't realized Pepper was approaching. Maybe he should have taken that as a hint to stay in the packs borders - if he was so easy to sneak up on clearly he shouldn't have been milling about. The dark Alpha jumped when Pepper nosed against him, turning to face her with eyes that were bloodshot. "Pepper, I -"  but he couldn't even try and produce any joke or quip or hum of anything happy, because he felt greatly like he'd forgotten the entire world and what it meant to be anything at all. Stark was gone right then, swept away to some other place in some other time and the emotions choked him. 

"Octavia died,"  Stark admitted - and maybe it was the first time he'd said such a thing out loud, maybe he was just weaker than he thought, but the moment the words left his louth his law clicked shut and he bit down on his own cheek to stop the rise of anything else. An irrational thought came to him, wondering why it was her, why it wasn't himself, but he couldn't have taken her illness from her. In reality he was fortunate to have shared as long with her as he had and now he had to face the days without her - facing the reality there would be no happily ever after. 

Fairy tales didn't come true, afterall.