Page 139 of His Prince

All I do is wait.

Wait to finally marry.

Wait for Mikhail to fall in love with me.

And now, wait for him to come back to the living.

All I do is wait.

We move up the steps to my bedroom, and I see Bane standing near the doorway, his face contrite, a bouquet of bones in his hand, each painted a pretty color.

“For you,” he says. I take it, feeling as if I’m attending a funeral.

“Thank you,” I manage to say as the gift falls to my side. I can’t even appreciate it because as soon as I walk into the guest room where he’s laid out, I feel faint. I’m held up by my father’s strength, Bane on the other side of me, pulling me forward.

I can’t…I can’t find the air in this stifling room.

“It’s too dark in here. Too hot,” I snap. “He needs to be able to breathe. Open a window. Please.”

George hesitates, looking at my father, and he must get a nod because the windows are thrown open and a gust of wind moves through the humid, ghastly room.

“He’s not dead yet. Don’t treat him as if he’s in a morgue,” I murmur as I move to his side. He’s hooked up to all kinds of machines, the beeping of the monitors grating on my nerves.

“Technically, a morgue would be cold,” George says but bites off his words when my dad whispers something to him.

He disappears with Bane trailing after him, the two of their voices echoing from the other side of the door as they walk away. But I don’t even really notice it. All I can see is my husband, pale and unmoving, the infernal beeping the only thing telling me he’s alive.

Beep. Beep.

I curl into him and press my wet cheek to his bare chest, feeling the way it moves up and down, artificial and yet so alive. The warmth of his skin heats my face as I carefully lean against him.

“Please come back to me,” I whisper, my lips at his ear. I don’t want to live without him, refuse to go on without his presence in my life.

But he doesn’t move.

He doesn’t reply.

The ghost of my broken spirit mingling with his.

I watch his chest lift and fall, the aggravating beep of the machine a twisted sense of relief.

I haven’t eaten, haven’t showered. I’ve done nothing but lie here, pressed against his side, waiting for him to wake up.

If you die, I will go too.

I’ll follow you into the afterlife.

I reach out and touch his cheek, my movements sluggish and tired, my eyes swollen and sore. I don’t want to go on without him.

No one can make me.

“Angelo.”

Mikhail. His voice.

But then I blink awake and realize it’s my father lingering beside me.

“You need to eat.”