Doesn’t he know I’d follow him to the ends of the earth?
“Stay with me, Juni.” he whispers. “Don’t leave me. We have forever, I promise. Just stay with me.”
“I’m sorry,” I can’t get my voice to sound anymore above a whisper. My breaths are labored, wheezing from my chest, and I’m cold. So fucking cold.
“She’s losing too much blood,” I recognize Roman’s voice, but it sounds far away, muffled, and I can’t see him.
“Juni,” Silas shakes me when my eyes try to close, the heaviness too hard to fight.
“It’s okay.” I whisper, but then the world goes black, the sound of his voice screaming my name following me all the way into the void.
Chapter Forty-two
I stare at the blood on my hands. It’s dried now, making my skin feel tight and trapped beneath my nails, the color of rust.
Juni’s blood.
My heart is on a table, surrounded by doctors trying to save her life.
She lost a lot of blood, but they kept her stable until they got her to the hospital. Now I’m waiting for them to tell me I can breathe again.
She’s been in surgery for over an hour now, and I haven’t heard a peepfrom any of her doctors.
I thought I’d lost her when she slipped unconscious back at the cabin. The only thing that kept me sane was the feeling of her pulse thumping slowly against the tips of my fingers. It felt like forever waiting for the emergency services to arrive.
Darcy is in the same hospital, though I know nothing of her condition. She was awake when she was taken away with a police escort, but she didn’t make a sound. Not a single word.
Dropping my head into my hands, I try not to break, but I feel it in my chest, the crack, the unbearable pain that comes with the idea of losing her.
A hand touches my shoulder. “She’ll pull through.” Roman says gently.
I thought I knew pain. I’ve felt it enough over the years, both the emotional and physical kind, but no one warns you what it’s like to have your heart on the outside of your body or how it would feel when it’s taken from you.
It takes nearly three hours for a doctor to come and find us. My body aches, my chest hurts, but I bolt up from the chair the moment he steps into the room.
“Mr. Knight?” He looks at me and then at the clipboard in his hand.
“Yes,” I rush out, “Where is she?”
“Resting,” he tucks the clipboard under his arm. “We were able to retrieve the bullet and repair thedamage, but she did require a transfusion for the blood loss.”
“Can I see her?”
“I can only allow one visitor at a time, but yes, you can sit with her. She’s still asleep, and it may take a few hours for the effects of the anesthesia to wear off.”
“Where is she?”
“Room seventy-four.”
I don’t wait around. I shove out the door and search for her room, my heart in my throat. The moment I see her, hear the steady beat of her heart monitor, and see her mess of blonde hair, I break.
The door clicks closed behind me, and my feet scuff across the sterile blue floor before I collapse into the chair beside her bed and grasp her hand. She still feels too cold; her skin looks too pale, but her chest is moving. She is breathing. Her heart is beating.
I bring her hand to my mouth and kiss her skin, my cheeks turning wet as tears I’ve held back stream down my face.
At some point sleep claimed me, lulled under by the steady beat of her heart monitor, but now the room is dark with only a small, dim light on behind the bed.
“Silas,” her voice has my spine straightening, and my heart speeding up. Whipping my head around, I see her sitting up slightly in the bed; her eyelids heavy, but she’s awake. “Hi.” She squeaks.
