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Home?
But she had no home.
She watched, her body frozen in place, her mind spinning as the figure became a man running through the snow towards her.
His face became visible, blue eyes piercing, determined, full of accusation... Or was that fear?
Her heart slowed from a gallop to a crawl as he reached her. Flinging off his gloves, he cupped her cheeks; the warmth burned her skin and seared her soul.
‘Juno, you little fool, you’re freezing,’ he said, the hot breath making her eyes water. ‘Are you okay?’
But she couldn’t make sense of the words, the pain so real and vivid now, the numbness starting to consume her.
Why had she never been enough? Why couldn’t she be loved?
‘Talk to me, tell me you’re okay.’ The voice begged, bullied, but it was so far away now she could hardly hear it.
She just wanted to sleep. To be warm again. To be safe. To be loved.
So she closed her eyes and let herself fall.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
‘IF THE PREGNANCY is weakening her, you must terminate it.’ Leo grabbed the doctor’s lapels, his fear starting to consume him. ‘Do you understand me? I don’t want you to take any risks with her life.’
‘Yes, Your Majesty. I understand.’ The doctor disengaged Leo’s fingers, her eyes kind. ‘But as I told you, the pregnancy is not an issue. Princess Juno had mild hypothermia. But we have warmed her body gradually, and are monitoring her vital signs and she should—’
‘Why hasn’t she woken up then? It’s been nearly twelve hours since I brought her back to the palace.’
Twelve hours that had felt like twelve years as he’d sat by her bedside and willed her to open her eyes, to talk to him. To forgive him.
The fear had become so huge he hadn’t been able to eat, or sleep. The truth was he was barely functioning.
He could still recall every minute detail, which had played over and over again in his mind since the moment he’d reached her in the clearing.
The way her eyes had lost focus, the chill on her cheeks, how she had gone limp and then collapsed into his arms. The flight home had been a blur as the terror that he might have lost her, that he had driven her to this, became too huge to control.
The hours that had followed had stretched into eternity as he’d struggled to keep the fear at bay, not leaving her side, as the doctors worked to keep her comfortable, to assess her condition. And she slept.
Why had he been too scared to tell her the truth?
‘Your Majesty.’
He turned to see the nurse from Juno’s bedside standing at the entrance to her room.
The terror engulfed him all over again.
‘Is she dead?’ he murmured, ploughing his fingers through his hair, the despair destroying him.
‘No, Your Majesty, I believe she is waking up.’
‘Juno, please wake up.’
Juno could hear a voice, a deep husky voice, beckoning her out of the darkness. Her eyelids felt so heavy, she didn’t want to lift them yet, the lethargy that permeated her body so warm and comforting. But the voice was so insistent... And so familiar.
She forced her eyelids open, to see his face.
‘Leo?’ she whispered, her throat like sandpaper.
