“Aria, are you insane?!” he roared through the phone. “What did you do to Delilah? Her ankle is badly swollen—the doctor thinks it might be fractured! All because you shoved her!”
My entire body was shaking as I whispered, “I didn’t… She fell… on her own.”
“Oh, spare me that jealous nonsense!” he snapped. “You’re angry because she joked about being my wife? You actually took that seriously? It was obviously a joke!”
A joke?
My fingers dug into the sheets as tears finally broke free.
“Ronan… the baby—”
The line went dead.
I stared at the doctor, forcing a weak, broken smile through the pain.
“Please,” I whispered. “Forget the baby. Just… save me.”
“We’ll try,” the doctor said solemnly.
When I woke up, my body felt unbearably light.
Too light.
My stomach was flat.
A nurse approached quietly and handed me a small box. Inside lay what remained of my child—tiny, fragile, never given a chance to breathe under the moon.
I broke.
My sobs wracked my entire body, violent and uncontrollable. No physical wound hurt as much as this emptiness.
In the middle of my grief, the door burst open.
A man rushed in—tall, disheveled, his scent achingly familiar.
My brother.