An understatement truly of what had occurred slightly after all of the werewolves and hunters had returned to the packhouse after the attack was over.  Blake had already been gone with Henry at the jail interrogating Malachi when Phillip had taken one look at Finn and recognized the human to be his Mate.  Finn, who had been watching Phillip rush around the pack organizing people working alongside Red and Monroe to keep order, had seemed thrilled though a little confused by the notion.
                          
Blake had helped Finn understand what it meant to be Mated to a werewolf, even if she was still figuring it out for herself.  Each and every day, she learned more about what it meant to be Red's Mate, just as he learned what it was to be the same for her.  Blake was grateful to have him in her life, especially during the midnight hours when the nightmares crept in.  Usually, it was Malachi who haunted her – images of his broken and bloody body, courtesy of the wounds Henry had inflicted upon him, chasing her through the woods flashing across her eyelids until she was either startled awake or Red woke her up.
                          
Sometimes Blake would whisper to him of the dreams that plagued her and often he did the same whenever he was subjected to seeing his deceased packmates crying out for help in his own nightmares.  Often though they would just hold each other.  Not speaking or doing anything remarkable to chase the chill of the nightmare away.  Simply holding each other until the trembling stopped or dawn began to peek through the curtains in Red's bedroom.
                          
Red was an easy person to love, Blake had realized and her favourite days in the pack were the ones they spent together.  She had begun working at the Diner once more and teaching hand-to-hand combat and weapons training three times a week for anyone who wanted to attend but Red was always there in the background.  
                          
It wasn't uncommon for him to walk Blake to the Diner before heading off to do some work himself.  On particularly slow days, he was prone to lingering around, instead taking a seat at the counter and chatting with his packmates as Blake flitted about the restaurant.  
                          
He had become her assistant during the training sessions but he wasn't the only helper she had.  Finn, Juliet, and Li had each taken on roles when they were able with the novice classes whereas Hix and Phillip had become Blake's official co-trainers with the advanced weapons class.  Even Lucas, who had removed himself from the pack activities to spend a few weeks with his Mate, Hope, as he grieved the loss of his brother had recently approached Blake and asked if she needed an extra set of hands during her classes.  Blake had readily agreed.
                          
Life for Blake seemed to be settling into a new pattern of normalcy though there were some things between them that still needed to be discussed.  
                          
Like her hunting.  It was ingrained into her and Blake wasn't sure that she could give it up even if she tried.  At one point, she had hoped that finding out the truth about her parents' deaths would be enough to quell her need to hunt but sometimes she still felt it like an undercurrent in her bloodstream.  Knowing that there were still innocent people being murdered by supernatural creatures weighed heavily on her but so too did the knowledge that there were people like Red's mother and Katie Vega who were innocents themselves and had been killed simply for being what they were.
                          
It was a conundrum that she was still trying to figure out but some elements of a solution had begun to piece themselves together in her mind.
                          
"Monroe joined us for breakfast this morning," Blake told Henry then, switching subjects.
                          
"Really?"  She nodded and he whistled through his teeth.  "How'd that come about?  Does she seem okay?"
                          
Blake hesitated.  "She seemed better.  I don't know that I'd say she seemed okay.  To be honest, I'm not sure what happened.  I was in Red's room when I saw Hix slip a note under Monroe's door."