Seven years ago.
Cold.
That was the first thing I felt when I came to.
I lay in a soft bed under warm blankets, but my body shook like I'd never be warm again.
"She's awake." Whispers, fragmented, like they were drifting down from heaven.
I forced my eyes open. An unfamiliar ceiling. An unfamiliar room.
"You're very lucky, miss." A gentle male voice. "My yacht happened to pass through that stretch of water. We saw you floating. Another minute and you might've..."
I turned my head. A silver-haired gentleman sat beside the bed, his eyes kind, as though he were looking at a child who needed saving.
"I'm Robert Ross," he said. "Retired jeweler. And you? What's your name?"
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.
Layla Gray was dead.
Dead in that freezing ocean. Dead in Kayden Blackwood's rejection.
"I... I don't remember." I found my voice, though it came out rough as gravel.
Robert studied me, those wise eyes seeming to see right through the lie. But he didn't call me on it.
"That's alright." His tone remained gentle. "The past doesn't matter. What matters is you're alive now."
He stood and walked to the window.
"I have a proposal. After you're discharged, I'll support you—but just enough to get by. I won't make you comfortable. If you want to truly change your life, you'll need to give it everything you've got."
"What?" This sudden good fortune felt like a trap. "Why would you help a stranger?"
"Why..." Robert turned back, his gaze deep and full of memory, as if seeing someone else through me. After a long silence, he smiled. "Consider it an old man's last act of charity. But I have one condition."
"What condition?"
"Live." His eyes turned serious. "Live well. Live brilliantly. Live with purpose. Don't waste this second chance. And...Your child's life."
"...Child?" I froze, my hand instinctively moving to my stomach.
"You're pregnant. About five weeks along. It's a strong little fighter—the doctor said that even though you're quite weak, the baby seems determined to survive. Miss, you can choose... whether to keep it."
Robert delivered this shattering news gently, then turned and left, closing the door to give me space to think.
I stared at the ceiling, unable to process what I'd just heard, unable to think at all.
So in that moment of falling, Diana's words hadn't been a hallucination.
It had all happened so fast. The engagement I'd thought was happiness. The dream shattering. Being accused of murder. Being rejected by my fated mate. Dragged to the dungeon...
And then?
I'd seen beautiful moonlight. Moonlight... like his eyes. Cold and distant, though I'd fooled myself into thinking they were warm. That I wouldn't be alone anymore.
Lies. All lies.
