Chapter 45
Peighton
Warmth arrives before sound does.
A slow, creeping heat draped around my back, like someone tucked me against a furnace.
The bed shifts and the heat leaves.
The world is black first. Heavy. Thick. As if my eyelids are made of stone. A distant voice filters through the dark, distorted and echoing, like hearing someone call through a tunnel underwater.
“… swelling is down, but she’s not stabilizing as fast as we hoped…”
Another voice, deeper, ragged around the edges.
“Make her.”
My heart stirs at that sound. My husband. The shadows flicker. My eyes drag open for a fraction of a second. Everything blurs into gray shapes. A tall figure pacing. Another standing. The doctor’s voice is timid. Gustav’s voice is not. It snaps like a brittle branch.
“You said she would wake.”
A soft response. A careful explanation.
“It could be days… weeks… trauma of that magnitude… her skull fractured so badly.”
Something crashes. Wood splinters. Metal clatters. The doctor flinches hard enough that his silhouette jumps in my blurred vision.
I try to breathe a little deeper. Try to lift a hand. Nothing obeys. The darkness pulls me under again.
When awareness returns, it comes with the sensation of lips brushing the back of my neck.
Slow. Desperate. Worshipping.
I cannot see, but I know exactly who is holding me. His chest is at my back, solid and warm, the familiar hardness of his arm caging me against him. He squeezes me closer like his body remembers how to love even while his mind frays.
“Please wake up,” he breathes against my skin. “I miss you. I love you. I need you. Myshka.”
His voice is wrecked. Nothing like the brutal bravado he shows the world.
I want to tell him I’m here, that I’m trying. My throat burns when I try to swallow. Something tugs at my arm. Tubing. Needles. IVs.
Panic sparks in my chest.
How long have I been here?
My breathing changes. He notices instantly.
“Peighton?” he whispers, hope flickering like a candle in his voice. His palm slides up my stomach, flattening over my ribs, as if checking whether I’m real. “Peighton, moyá devushka, can you hear me?”
I try to speak. Only a tiny breath escapes, and the strain is too much. Everything tilts. The world slips sideways, and I fall back into the dark.
The next time I surface, daylight pours through tall windows. My lashes are heavy but part enough to see him slumped in a chair near the glass, head tilted back against the wall. His posture is rigid even in sleep, as if he’s guarding the room from threats that dare approach.
His hair is longer. Shaggier. His jaw shadowed by a dark, untrimmed beard. He looks exhausted. More than that — haunted.
I want to speak, but my mouth won’t move. My arms feel like lead. I try to blink slowly, hoping he will notice. Nothing comes out except a small, fragile exhale.
The door opens.
Keira steps inside, her face drawn, eyes puffy. She turns to Gustav. He already awakened like my watchdog.
“Gustav. You need to walk,” she says quietly. “Stretch your legs. Eat properly. I’ll watch her.”
“No,” he says. “I’m not leaving her.”
She tries again, voice soft. “Just ten minutes.”
“No.”
His tone ends the conversation. Keira steps back without pressing further and leaves us alone.
He drags his chair closer to the bed. His hand finds mine.
He lowers his forehead to the back of my fingers, holding his breath like any wrong move might break me.
I want to curl my hand around his, but my body still doesn’t respond.
The darkness steals me again.
Music wakes me this time.
Soft piano notes. Slow, steady, achingly beautiful.
The air smells faintly of antiseptic and fresh linens.
An older nurse is helping Gustav dress me, lifting my arms carefully through the sleeves of a nightgown.
She moves with calm confidence, but every time I’m shifted, Gustav’s hands track her movements possessively, guiding, adjusting, protecting.
“You’re a good husband,” the nurse murmurs, fastening a button. “Most men would have left her to rot.”
His reply is gravel-dark. “She was my light in a very dark world. It was brief, but she burned herself into me.”
“She won’t turn out like your mother, dear,” she assures.
“No, she has to live,” he replies softly. “She promised she would not leave me. That we would not leave each other.”
The nurse pauses. Tears gather in her lashes. She wipes one away quickly and excuses herself. The door clicks shut behind her.
Gustav sits on the edge of the bed and brushes his knuckles along my forehead. The touch is featherlight. Loving. Ache radiates through my chest. He takes my hand and kisses each knuckle, slow and reverent, as though my fingers are sacred relics.
“I beg you,” he whispers. “Wake up and come back to me. I am half a man without you.”
My body fights hard for consciousness. I force air into my lungs. He presses my knuckles to his lips again, but freezes when he catches my lashes fluttering.
His eyes widen.
He stops breathing.
He stares at me with raw fear, as if he is terrified this is a hallucination. I try to move my lips. They crack. No sound comes.
He leans closer, voice so quiet I barely hear it. “Devushka…”
I swallow fire and try again.
“Gustav,” I rasp.
He makes a sound, one I’ve never heard. Relief and pain woven together. He cups my head with both hands and kisses my forehead, my cheeks, the tip of my nose, every inch he can reach without jostling me.
“Thank you,” he breathes against my skin. “Thank you for coming back.”
I smile weakly, tears slipping down the sides of my face. “How long… was I asleep?”
He hesitates.
“Five months.”
The breath leaves me in a startled gasp. Five months. My body feels foreign. My limbs thin. I try to move, but he beats me to it. He takes my palm gently and... lowers it onto my stomach.
“Peighton,” he says softly, voice breaking at the edges. “You are pregnant.”
Warmth floods beneath my hand. A swell. Not small. Real.
A sob rises in my throat.
Gustav pulls me into the safest hold he can manage without hurting me.
“Doctor says the baby is well.” His face buries into my hair and he speaks with deep sincerity. “It must have happened at the pool. A miracle.”
“A miracle,” I repeat under my breath, breathless. So much for the pill, though this news is so fresh, I might be happy it failed… I’m not unhappy.
“I was terrified our child would never know you. I tried to keep you warm. Keep you comfortable. Keep you alive.”
More tears fall. His or mine, I can’t tell. Everything hurts, but none of it matters. I curl my fingers around his and press his hand more firmly to my belly.
“I’m here,” I whisper, and add with sincerity, “I’m here for both of you.”
And for the first time since leaving the United States, I feel home.