When Two Winters Met (Henrietta and Yosef) novel Chapter 387

Joaquin finally understood why Winona had been acting so strangely around him.

It turned out they really did have a shared history.

He had entirely forgotten about the incident, but her story brought it all rushing back in vivid detail.

The revelation made her sudden proposal infinitely more interesting.

Joaquin chuckled, a slow smirk spreading across his face as he arched a brow. "Fascinating. Are the Leland siblings just destined to be knights in shining armor? We're always stepping up to play the hero."

Winona ignored the teasing. "Anyway, just think about it. If you're simply looking for a suitable marriage alliance and that's why you're bothering Henrietta, you might as well lower your sights a fraction and choose me."

The Stetson and Sargent families were practically on equal footing anyway.

The only real advantage Henrietta had was being the sole heir to her family's empire.

"So," Joaquin drawled, "you see this as a life-saving debt?"

Winona didn't quite know how to answer that.

The incident had been deeply traumatic, leaving a heavy psychological scar.

The dog had pinned her to the ground. If Joaquin and his brother hadn't shown up to chase it off...

Nobody knew what the outcome would have been.

Would she have been mauled beyond recognition?

Would she have bled out right there in the dirt?

Because the beast was driven away, those dark possibilities never came to pass.

So, was it technically saving her life? It was hard to say.

But in a situation like that, severe facial scarring would have destroyed her future.

Even scarring on her body would have been devastating for a young woman's self-esteem.

Physical scars could be just as crippling as facial ones.

Surviving a mauling only to be horribly disfigured would have ruined her life anyway. So yes, in a way, it absolutely counted as saving her life.

Yet, Winona didn't want to frame it as a life debt.

Because a debt of that magnitude felt too heavy a burden for a romance.

After a moment of thought, she simply chose not to answer.

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