Chapter 5

The healing room fell into an uneasy silence.

The healer quietly closed her medicine kit and muttered under her breath, “I’ll come back later.”

The soft click of the door shutting behind her left only Kane and me in the room, with a heavy tension hanging in the air between us.

"Still mad at me?" he asked, stepping closer. His voice had softened, but the usual commanding edge in his eyes remained.

He reached up like he was going to touch my cheek—gentle, hesitant—but I turned my head away, avoiding him. His fingers hovered in the empty space for a second before they slowly dropped.

“I never meant to hurt you,” he said quietly. “But Lilian's condition was critical. I couldn’t be in two places at once.”

I closed my eyes, not wanting to see the guilt—or lack of it—in his expression.

Then his voice dipped lower, calculated and cautious. “Julia... I came to ask for a favor.”

I opened my eyes, already knowing what was coming. “Let me guess—Lilian again?”

He didn’t deny it. He didn’t even look guilty.

“She’s been having trouble keeping food down,” he said, like it was the most reasonable thing in the world. “She asked for your blueberry pie. Just until she gives birth. Then everything can go back to normal. We’ll go back to us. I’m doing this for our future. Can’t you understand that?”

I stared at him, stunned by how easily the words rolled off his tongue—how casually he asked me to bake a pie for the woman he betrayed me with.

Something inside me felt hollow. Numb.

But I nodded anyway. “I’ll have someone send it over once I’m discharged.”

Relief swept over his face like I’d just given him the moon. He leaned in and kissed my forehead. “I knew it. Deep down, you still care about us.”

I didn’t react.

The day I left the healing center, I gave my recipe to the head chef and had a servant deliver the pie to the estate.

Then I started packing.

A few days later, Kane came home unexpectedly in the afternoon.

“Is Lilian still in the healing wing?” I asked.

“She’s getting her follow-up tests,” he said, avoiding eye contact.

I didn’t pry.

He reached for my hand. “Don’t worry about packing. I’ve planned a trip to the snow mountains. Just you and me. We’re leaving now.”

I didn’t have time to ask questions. He was already leading me out the door, his grip firm, his pace urgent.

The drive was quiet—eerily so.

He didn’t make his usual small talk. No smug smiles. Just the sound of tires against asphalt and his steady breathing.

By the time we pulled up to the cabin at the base of the mountains, night had fully fallen. The sky was pitch black, stars hidden behind thick clouds.

“I left something in the trunk,” he said, stepping out. “Wait here.”

I nodded and stood at the door, clutching my coat around me, watching as he disappeared into the darkness.

The wind picked up. Minutes dragged by. My fingers were starting to go numb from the cold.

I pulled out my phone and called him.

“How much longer?” I asked softly. My breath fogged the screen.

There was silence.

Then his voice came through—low and cold. “I’m not coming back.”

I froze.

“…What?”

“There was something wrong with the blueberry pie,” he said flatly. “It was laced with an inhibitor. Lilian nearly miscarried. Did you really think no one would find out?”

My throat tightened. “You think I poisoned it?”

“She only ate your pie that day,” he said, like that was all the proof he needed.

“You didn’t even ask me,” I whispered. “You just decided.”

A pause. “You’ve changed, Julia.”

My voice cracked. “So have you.”

Then—click. He hung up.

I stood there, alone, the wind howling through the trees, yanking at my coat like icy fingers. And then I heard it—a low rumble, deep and threatening.

The mountain groaned.

An avalanche.

Panic surged in my chest. I turned and ran, but I didn’t get far. The snow came down like a tidal wave, swallowing everything in its path—including me.

I hit the ground hard, buried under a suffocating weight of snow. My limbs ached, my breaths came shallow, my fingers trembling as I fumbled for my communicator.

I dialed his number. Once. Twice. Four times.

Seven.

Finally—someone picked up.

“Kane,” I gasped. “There’s an avalanche, I—”

“Hello?” A woman’s voice.

Lilian.

“The signal’s bad. Who is this?”

I tried to speak, but then I heard Kane’s voice in the background. “Who’s calling?”

“Wrong number,” Lilian said sweetly. “Don’t worry. Keep reading to the baby.”

The line went dead.

My phone slipped from my hand, disappearing into the snow.

And so did I.

The last thing I remembered before the darkness took me was Kane’s voice from that night, whispering like a promise: “Julia, in this life, you’ll never escape me.”

Now, he had left me to die—buried me himself.

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