The Way of Fate (Book 1)

27. Raw Emotion

Chapter 27: Raw Emotion

Mika

Cold.

I was cold. Shivering, even though I could feel the pressure of a what might have been a blanket over my body. I clutched the blanket closer, trying to get as much warmth as I could from it. Why couldn't I get warm?

I had to be dead. This was my punishment. I had to live a crappy life, and now I had to spend the rest of eternity in the dark and the cold. I didn't deserve anything else.

"Mika."

His voice was like a whisper in the back of my mind. Allen. I wonder if he found me. If he would ever find me. If he was even looking.

"Mika, baby. Please wake up. You're worrying me."

I gripped the blanket tighter. Death wasn't something you could just wake up from. Didn't he understand that?

But despite everything I was telling myself, I tried listening to Allen's voice. Because he was the only man I ever let myself feel something for. He's the only man that has ever mattered to me. And if he wanted me to wake up, I was going to try my damn hardest to wake up.

And, against all odds, my eyes opened.

I wasn't dead.

The room was bright. Too bright. So I turned my face into the pillow under my head with a groan.

Pillow? Where was I? This was one of our pillows. On our bed. Last time I checked, I was outside in the middle of a snowstorm. Now I was at home, in bed. That wasn't all just a dream, was it?

"Mika?"

There was his voice again. Where was he?

I rolled over so that I was on my back, staring up at the white ceiling. The next second, Allen appeared in my line of vision.

"Hey, you," he said with a smile before running his fingers lightly through my hair. "How are you doing?"

"I'm freezing."

He chuckled lightly. "Yeah, well you do have a bit of hypothermia." He reached towards the end of the bed. "Here."

I didn't know what he was talking about until I saw him pulling another blanket up to cover my body. I was grateful, this one actually seeming to give me a bit of warmth back.

"Any better?" he asked.

I nodded before reaching for his hand to hold. I needed to know this was real - that he was real. I wasn't dreaming and I wasn't dead. Somehow he found me out in that storm.

"Thank you," I muttered, shifting my gaze away from him, unable to look him in the eye as I said this, "for finding me. Bringing me home. For not being mad at me."

Allen didn't say anything for the longest moment. Eventually, I couldn't take the silence anymore and I raised my eyes to look at him. He was staring down at the floor, his face unreadable.

"Allen?"

He shook his head slightly. "I thought I lost you," he admitted softly. "I wasn't even the one to find you. I was so worried, Mika, you have no idea."

I tightened my hold on his hand. "You won't lose me, Allen," I said just as soft as he was speaking. "Never." I tried to put as much truth into my words as I could, because I did mean them. I meant every word of it.

"I know that. But sometimes things happen that none of us want. I was afraid that that was what happened last night. You never came home and it was a bad storm. I had no idea where you were. Anything could have happened. Losing you could have happened."