Rise Of A Shattered Luna (Natalie) by Kave Derry novel Chapter 68

Chapter 68 A Secret Between Us

Natalie’s POV

“Mommy,”

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The word hit me like a physical jolt to the heart. It clearly wasn’t the voice of the nurses, nor was it Baron’s baritone.

I fought my body.

My eyelids felt sealed shut, glued together by exhaustion and medication.

My limbs were heavy, uncooperative things that no longer felt like they belonged to me. But I forced myself upward through the darkness.

Slowly, the world bled back into view.

White ceiling.

Blinding lights.

The steady beep of machines.

And then-

Her.

Standing at the edge of my bed like something fragile and miraculous that had wandered out of a dream and into my ruined reality.

She was small.

Too small.

Her skin was pale and luminous, untouched by sorrow. Her hair fell in soft waves around a face so achingly familiar that my

heart twisted in my chest. It was like staring into a mirror when life was without pain and

fire.

Her eyes.

My eyes.

Clear. Blue. Watching me with a depth that didn’t belong in a four–year–old’s body.

The mom

lids.

OUT eyes met, my nose tingled, and a fresh wave of hot, stinging tears

s swelled over my lower

Jusie? Susic?

My voice scraped out of me like broken glass dragged across stone. Every syllable burned,

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Chapter 68 A Secret Between Us

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out anyway.

Her lips curved immediately.

“You woke up.” she whispered, as if she had been waiting for this moment for years instead of minutes.

I tried to move.

I wanted to sit up… I wanted–no, needed–to pull her into my arms and press my face into her hair and confirm that she was real and warm and mine.

The attempt sent a violent spear of pain through my torso.

My vision flashed white.

“Mommy, don’t move!”

Her voice sharpened instantly.

A small hand pressed against the one narrow strip of skin on my wrist not covered in bandages. Her touch was cool.

“You’ll pull your wounds,” she said softly. “Does it hurt a lot?”

I couldn’t answer, I was too busy staring at her.

She leaned forward carefully over the high railing of the hospital bed. Her tiny fingers hovered in the air, searching for a place she could touch that wouldn’t cause me to scream.

There wasn’t one.

Her brows knit together in concentration. Then she puckered her lips and blew.

Soft.

Cool.

Little breaths drifting over the scorched skin of my arm.

The gesture was so small. So insignificant against the deep, throbbing fire beneath my bandages.

And yet it shattered me completely.

A sob tore from my chest before I could stop it. Hot tears slid down my temples, tracking into the

cheeks.

“You’re my daughter.” I whispered. “You are… aren’t you?”

She nodded without hesitation.

“Mm–hmm.

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Chapter 68 A Secret Between Us

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Susie nodded, her eyes wide and clear, filled with a wisdom that seemed too heavy for a child her age.

She hovered there, her tiny fingers twitching as if she wanted to reach out and pull me into a hug.

But she hesitated, her gaze roaming over the bandages and the raw, discolored skin of my neck.

But there wasn’t a single spot on my body that wasn’t a minefield of pain.

“Mommy, who did this to you?”

Her voice had changed; the sugary sweetness was still there, but it was laced with a tiny pout, as if she were asking who had been mean enough to break her favorite doll.

But underneath that innocence, there was a flicker of something else–a shadow in her eyes that reminded me terrifyingly of Baron.

“You don’t need to know what happened to me,” I whispered, trying to pull the corners of my mouth into a smile, though it felt like my face might tear. “I’ll take care of it myself. I’m just… I’m so sorry you have to see me like this. Do I scare you, Susie? Looking this way?”

The thought of her having nightmares about me, of her being repulsed by my skin, was a pain worse than the fire.

But Susie didn’t flinch. She shook her head so vigorously her curls bounced.

“Nope. Mommy’s really pretty. Daddy’s whole studio is filled with paintings of you. I know you’re a total beauty.”

I froze.

Daddy’s whole studio is filled with paintings of you.

The words echoed in my mind, over and over. I thought back to my conversation with Baron and the way he had looked at me when I asked if we had met before. He had asked, “You remember now?” with such a raw, desperate hope.

My heart twisted with a sudden, agonizing wave of guilt.

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