Juliana's POV

I stared at the clock on the hospital wall until the numbers stopped making sense.

Seven hours.

That’s how long I waited. Hope, stupid, clinging hope, held me hostage through every minute. I thought maybe Marcus would walk through the door with a weak apology or at least feigned concern. Maybe he would come in fumbling with guilt, realizing that I could have died carrying his child.

But he didn’t come. He didn’t call. No flowers. No message. No nothing.

I wept. Quietly. Bitterly. The kind of cry that doesn't make a sound but leaves your body aching afterward. The IV line in my hand felt like a chain. The machines beside me beeped with cold indifference.

The nurse tried to comfort me. “Sometimes people don’t know how to process medical emergencies,” she offered.

No. Marcus knew exactly how. He just didn’t care.

The nurse asked if I would like her to call my emergency contact again. I nodded. “Call my father.”

I didn’t even have to give her his number. It was already on file. A decision I had made months ago when Marcus stopped showing up to appointments.

A few hours later, I heard his voice echoing down the hallway, firm and full of purpose.

“Where’s my daughter?”

I tried to sit up, but the pain in my lower back protested. I winced. My hand went to my stomach. My baby kicked, as if reminding me I wasn’t alone.

The door opened. There he was. My father.

A little grayer around the temples, a little heavier in the walk, but still the same man who used to chase monsters out from under my bed when I was five. He stepped inside, saw the bruised look in my eyes, and his expression crumpled, just for a second.

Then he crossed the room, knelt beside me, and wrapped me in the safest arms I had ever known.

“I’m here,” he whispered.

I broke.

“I thought I was going to die alone,” I whispered into his shoulder. “He didn’t come.”

My father didn’t ask who. He didn’t need to.

He just pulled back and looked at me with something fierce and terrifying behind his eyes. “You’ll never be alone again. Not as long as I breathe.”

He signed the discharge papers himself.

I expected him to suggest stopping by the house to pick up my things. I even opened my mouth to bring it up.

But he shook his head.

“You’re not going back there,” he said, matter of factly. “We’ll get whatever you need later. That house doesn’t belong to you anymore. It never really did.”

The hospital staff wheeled me out in a chair, and for the first time in weeks, I didn’t feel like a patient.

I felt like someone’s daughter again.

The ride to my father’s estate was quiet.

No music. No small talk. Just the hush of luxury leather and winding roads. I kept one hand on my belly, the other pressed against the cold windowpane. The ache in my chest hadn’t left. It had only rearranged itself into something sharper. More focused.

My father helped me upstairs to the room I used to stay in before I got married. It had been repainted, redecorated, but the warmth remained. The scent of cedar and lavender wrapped around me like a second skin.

I sank into the bed, exhausted. Not just physically, but emotionally. Mentally. Spiritually.

It was past midnight when my phone rang.

A number I didn’t recognize flashed across the screen. I hesitated. A strange chill slithered down my spine.

“Hello?” I answered softly.

Silence. Then a voice, “Miss Rivers… are you ready now?”

I didn’t ask who it was or how they got my number.

Because deep down, I already knew.

It wasn’t just a question. It was a door. And I had been waiting for someone to open it. I stared out the window at the full moon.

“Yes,” I said calmly. “I’m ready.”

A quiet beep signaled the call had ended.

My father, who had been reading in the chair by the window, looked up at me with furrowed brows.

“Ready for what?” he asked, setting the book down.

I smiled at him, slow and eerily calm, the way people do before they burn down something they used to love.

“You’ll see, Dad,” I said. “In fact… everyone will.”