A/N Hello Readers :) Thank you for joining me again :) I hope you are all enjoying the story so far, I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has favourite-ed this story, and everyone who has reviewed, even the bad ones make me think more carefully about what I am writing, and so are useful to me :) In response to Lulubu, who sadly did not leave me a way to get back to them, sometimes people are pushed in to making terrible decisions by grief and anger, and it is how they get themselves out of those situations that showcases their true strength :) enjoy :) x

James was sat on the floor of the heads common room, watching Lily sleep. After evicting Black from the room, he had gone to his room and collected a potion from the first aid set he kept in his room for the full moon, and given it to Lily. She had avoided his eyes as she drank it, looking at her feet.

"I think it's about time you tell me what has been going on."

Lily had looked up at that, her hands shaking as she put the potion flask down on the coffee table.

"Not yet. Please James, I need to think, I need to sort it out in my head before I can tell you. I'm just not ready."

"But you will tell me?" She had looked down again, her hands rubbing against her wrists anxiously. "Lily please, Black is bad news, whatever he has to do with this, I can help you. I can see from your eyes that you don't want to be with him, you are terrified of him! I'm not going to stand by while he pushes you around. Please Lily, let me help you."

The nod that he received in return was barely visible, but he had definitely seen it.

"Ok then, I'm just going in to my room to put on some more clothes, and then we are going to talk." He had, of course forgotten until this point that he was only wearing semi buttoned trousers and boxers. Lily seemed to realise this at the same time and blushed a bright red, making James chuckle to himself as he walked out the room.

He took a little longer than he had intended in his room, pacing up and down as he tried to place the pieces together. All the answers he came up with seemed far too implausible, he had no idea what Lily was going to tell him when he went back out there. And that scared him shitless. Whatever had happened to Lily was obviously much worse than he had ever imagined.

Eventually he persuaded himself to go back out there, to face his fears and help the girl he loved, but obviously he had delayed too long. Lily was fast asleep on the sofa.

And so he had sat down and watched over her for the last hour, sitting up slightly every time she made any movement or noise. For the most part her sleep had been calm and relaxed, but now she was starting to show signs of troublesome dreams.

"no...please not...no" she never said anything more than that, so James got no hint as to what she was dreaming about, but the despair in her voice told him it was bad.

Walking over to the sofa, James slowly reached out towards her, but his hand never connected. Before he could even think of a spell to counteract her, Lily had woken, whipped out her wand and wordlessly blasted him across the room.

A few seconds later James came around, gazing around him in confusion. Lily was sat in front of him, tears streaming down her face as she fussed over him. She only slightly brightened when she realised he was conscious.

"Oh James thank god, I'm so sorry, you scared me, are you hurt?"

He laughed slightly as he stood, feeling no worse for wear.

"Gotta try harder than that Lils, only knocked me out for 5 seconds or so. But it was a very powerful spell, if I wasn't used to knocks from bludgers I'm sure I would still be on the ground right now. So, who might attack you in your sleep that you need to knock flat on the floor?" The seriousness had crept back in to his voice, and it made Lily even more nervous. He wasn't going to drop this.

While he had been in his room Lily had tried to think of a lie she could tell to please James, but there was nothing she could say that would persuade him to drop it other than the truth. Shame crept over her as she tried to formulate the words to explain what she had done. After hearing this, he wouldn't want her any more. Sure, he would help her, because he was as good as anyone could be, but at the end of it he wouldn't love her anymore. He would be disgusted by her. She had been so ashamed that she had faked sleep when he came out of his room, but she found the fact that he dutifully watched over strangely calming, and had soon drifted off in to a restless sleep filled with dark alley ways and car crashes.

"Can that come later in the story?"

She had come to the conclusion that she simply had to tell him. She had to avoid looking him in the eyes so she couldn't see the disgust, and just tell him.

"Ok flower, however you want. Shall we sit?"

James was trying to make her more comfortable, but no matter how kind he was it didn't seem to help, she still avoided his gaze. She nodded slightly, tucking her knees under her on the sofa so that he could sit next to her. He angled his body so that he was facing her, but she remained facing the opposite side of the room.

"This summer my parents died. It was a car crash. The muggle police said they didn't stand a chance, but I guess my sister Petunia thought differently. She blamed me and my magic, switching between 'you could have saved them' and 'this is your fault' regularly. Eventually she got tired of seeing me around the house and kicked me out, dumping all of my stuff on the front door and changing the locks. This was only a few days before the start of the summer break. I didn't know what to do, where to go, Rowan and Alice had their own issues this summer, and I was still mad about your bet with Sirius, so the only place I could think of to go was Diagon Alley. I had no money and no way of getting any, so I ended up on the streets that night. That was when Edmund found me..."

James listened in horror as she delivered her tale in monotone. How Edmund had tricked her in to working the bar for him, and then the night he had forced her to go beyond her normal bar duties because of his letter.

"Lily...I'm so..."

"Please James, let me finish."

She continued in her monotone voice as James sat with his head in his hands, silent tears streaming down his cheeks. The love of his life had been tortured and abused, forced to work for a man in fear of the lives of those she cared for. And it had all started because of him.

He listened in silence as her tale continued, until she got to the point where she tried to get out of her deal at Hogwarts.

"Lucius Malfoy? In league with Voldemort! This is exactly the kind of evidence we need! My parents have been after the Malfoy family for months, but they haven't been able to get any solid evidence, Lily you have to tell Dumbledore, and then we can take them all down."

"But he didn't actually give any real evidence. All I have it half sentences heard from outside a door, there is no real proof, trust me I have thought about it."

"So you just did what he said instead? Continued even though he was working for Voldemort!"

"We don't know that James, we have no proof! The Dark Lords name intimidates everyone, Edmund would be a fool not to be pushed by just the mention of him. But maybe I wanted to find some more proof."

"What do you mean, find more proof?"

She looked up at him then, still looking nervous.

"You're crying..." James shook his head, refusing to wipe away the tears on his cheeks. "I'm not an idiot, I can see your tears. I'm sorry James, I've disappointed you, and I am so ashamed, but I had to keep you safe, you and your family, Rowan and Alice, Remus Sirius and Pete, because you are the only ones I have left. I know you are never going to look at me in the same way again, but please do this for me. Don't tell anyone."

"Don't tell anyone?" James could feel the anger rising in his voice. "Don't tell anyone so that they can continue to degrade you? What happens when one of them goes too far and rapes you Lily? You have no power in this, all Edmund has to say is a few words and you will be damaged forever, you can never get that back Lily! And you are willing to do it all to protect people who can damn well protect themselves!"

James would have been pleased to see anger taking over the lack of emotion in Lily's voice, if he hadn't been so distraught himself.

"Damaged? Is that how you see me? Because who could ever love someone who tries to protect the people they love. For Merlins sake Potter, you are so up your own arse, do you really think you could take on Voldemort himself if he came after you? There is something bigger than me going on here and I'm damned close to finding it out. So if you don't care about me anymore, leave me alone. I don't need your help."

He stared at her in silence for a few seconds before taking a few steps closer to her, and talking in such a quietly calm voice that she had to lean closer to hear.

"Don't you ever think I don't care about you Lily Evans. What you have told me tonight has destroyed me, simply because I have failed you. All I have ever wanted to do is protect you, and now I find out that I pushed you further in to danger. You shouldn't have to do this, it's not fair, you are so innocent, you should be allowed to escape all this. You have never done anything to attract the attention of the dark forces, and now you have been pushed in to the middle of it all. You shouldn't be the one to go through this just to find evidence. I have to save you Lily, because I love you. I can't watch you do this to yourself, I just can't..."

His babbling rant was cut off my Lily's lips pressed against his.

A/N This chapter was really hard to write for me, so sorry for the delay, please review because I have found my motivation dwindling once more, and need some boost! Also, please contact me if you wish to help me with BETAing, I don't require any experience, just someone who wants to read the chapters before anyone else :P xx