All Chapters of Love's Healing Touch: Chapter 81 - Chapter 90

The sky was still dark with the last whisper of night when Elara came to. The hearth fire had reduced to a heap of warm embers, sending an orange golden light along the wooden walls of the cottage. She was resting in Adrian's arms, his deep steady breathing against hers. There was peace in him now—something other than the riled, protective man that had greeted her when he appeared in her world.Elara had shifted slightly to one side, enough to glimpse his sleeping profile. His face had relaxed with time, not merely with the physical mending that her love and care had wrought, but in spirit, as well. The ruggedness that had so long haunted behind his eyes had been reduced to ashes into something more vulnerable—something more open.She brushed her fingertips softly against the curve of his jaw. Adrian stirred in his sleep and drew closer, his arms contracting around her in a possessive hold. A smile crept onto her lips.But this peace, this moment, had not been discovered. It had been

The sun had risen early, and golden stripes stabbed through the hills, piercing through Elara's cottage windows' curved panes and gently falling on the wooden floorboards. The birds outside sang, their singing far away but continuous, a background to a dream not yet fully awakened. Elara stood at the stove, moving the bubbling porridge with one hand and grasping tightly in the other a small clump of wild chamomile she'd picked before dawn. She hesitated, looking down the passage at Adrian, who was still standing there. It was days since the fever had at last subsided, and his skin was now once again its usual color—but the darkness in his eyes did not hold.He had remained characteristically quiet since the village square stop, withdrawn even from his stoic withdrawal. While his physical form healed, Elara realized that something deeper—something more exquisite—was still off-kilter.By the time Adrian finally arrived, his footsteps were quiet. He said nothing, just sat beside the wind

Heavy rain slammed against the windows of Elara's cottage as if echoing the whirlwind in her chest. Adrian hadn't spoken much since coming back to the cottage, dripping wet overcoat and eyes with something so much more volatile than that rage outside.He curled forward over the couch, shoulders forward, watching leaping hearth flames. Elara hadblanketed him hot and dried out and dressed him into dry clothes as well, but she remained beside him, shivering fingers lying to stir. To touch. To soothe. But she waited back—he needed to tell her first.Minutes dragged. Possibly hours. Time blurred into the gentle hiss of fire and distant keening of wind. And then, at last, he exhaled."I was at the water," Adrian gasped, his voice roughened."I saw myself there."Elara's gaze leaped from the teacup to hang, breathless."I was a ghost," he went on, eyes unfocused. "Something which I no longer know something, and unwanted."She drew breath. "You're not unwanted, Adrian."He shifted his head, s

Adrian stood at the edge of the old stable, his hand braced on the wooden beam, listening to the soft rustling of hay as Elara moved inside. The air was thick with unspoken words. After everything—after the storm, after the kiss that still burned in his memory—he found himself once again afraid. Not of the virus, not of rejection, but of the aching vulnerability that came with loving her. Loving her deeply. Recklessly.Elara hummed a soft tune as she poured water into a trough, her hands steady, her back to him. The goats bleated gently as if sensing the tension that wrapped around them. He watched her, the way the morning light made her hair shimmer, the calm in her movements, the warmth she carried like a hearth in winter. She was the only thing in his life that made sense anymore. And that terrified him.He stepped inside. She turned slightly, her gaze meeting his. There was no accusation in her eyes, only quiet understanding—the kind that made it hard to lie to oneself. “You didn’

The storm had passed, but its echo lingered.Elara awoke to the scent of damp earth and the weight of a strange silence pressing against her windows. Outside, the world shimmered beneath the dew-drenched dawn, yet something in the air felt unsettled. The fire in the hearth had long gone out, but warmth lingered beside her—Adrian’s presence, steady and still. His head rested on the edge of her bed, having fallen asleep while keeping watch over her. His chest rose and fell gently, the tension that had gripped him in recent days finally eased.She reached out and brushed his hair back, her fingers grazing the healed skin behind his ear, a place once marked by the virus’s cruel touch. He stirred slightly, mumbling her name like it was a prayer.“Elara…”Her heart clenched. In the days since the storm, Adrian had grown closer—softer, more open. Trust was blooming between them, fragile but real.And yet, in that moment of perfect peace, she felt the first tremor of something wrong.A knock.