Authors: Jade White

The Lion's Love Child (14 page)

“He's hurt. I think it's bad,” he cried. “He got wounded saving me.”

Shannon, whose face had turned to ash upon seeing Jason’s limp body, ran to him. She dropped

to her knees beside him and lay her head on his chest to listen for a heartbeat. Though it was faint and spotty, she heard it.

She took his head in her hands and pleaded, “Jason, Jason, don't leave me!”

“He's out like a light,” Dylan said, trying to calm her.

She paid him no attention, focusing only on her love, lying unconscious in front of her. “Jason, please, please come back to me. I am in love with you. You can't leave me. Please. You promised you would come back to me. It can't end like this,” she sobbed as she pressed her lips to his head and prayed for him to come back to her.

His eyes fluttered open and he groaned a bit before saying, “Shh...I'm OK. Don't worry yourself.” He weakly lifted his hand and placed it on her cheek.

“Oh, I thought I lost you,” she cried, placing her own hand on top of his to hold it close to her.

“Never,” he whispered. “Did you say that you are in love with me?” he added, in dazed amazement.

“Yes, very much so,” she said with a laugh of relief. She laid her head on his chest, relishing in the sound of each beat of his heart.

“Thank god,” he said, trying to wrap his arms around her, though he was too weak.

“Hush. You need your rest,” she said, sitting up and cradling his head in her lap.

“That's a very good idea,” he murmured as he stared up at her. It was as if he thought that if he blinked, she would disappear.

“Mine usually are,” she teased, trying to lighten the mood.

“I love you too, you know,” he said before finally giving in and closing his eyes.

“I thought maybe you did,” she said, tears running down her cheeks as she ran her hand through his hair and stared at the gaping wound on his side. Dylan had managed to stop the bleeding but she knew that he would need a lot of care before he was healed.

“Is this over?” Shannon asked, looking up at Dylan.

“Yes, they are banished from the pride lands. Our customs are much like our lion brethren in that regard. Order is restored.” There was no triumph in his expression though. His eyes were full of worry for his cousin.

“Don't ever scare me like that again,” Grace said, throwing her arms around him without loosening her grip on the baby.

“I will spend the rest of our lives making it up to you and the boy,” he said, pulling them both tight to him.

“Before you start,” Shannon said, “help me get him to my hut. I want to make him comfortable as he heals.” She wiped the tears from her cheeks and stood to face the tough road ahead of them.

“You really do love him, don't you?” Dylan said as he moved to lift his fallen cousin.

“More than I thought I was capable of,” Shannon said, wincing as he lifted Jason from the ground in sympathetic pain.

Dylan helped her to get Jason settled in her bed before she dispatched him and Grace with the baby to get Aria. Jason was in desperate need of medical attention and the midwife was the only person with any extensive medical knowledge that they knew of. She and Grace had enough skills to splint a break or stop bleeding, but not enough to pull Jason back from the edge of what he was facing.

The entire time that they were gone, she with his head in her lap, stroking his hair and telling him how deeply she loved him. She knew of no other way to help him hold on to life until Aria arrived than to give him something to live for. He did not regain full consciousness in their absence, but he seemed to be responding to her words and he was breathing steadily by the time Grace and Dylan returned with Aria.

The woman came willingly, though she looked disapprovingly at Dylan the entire time that she worked to create a salve for Jason’s wound. She seemed to have realized that he was the lion she suspected of having impregnated Grace. Shannon was fairly sure that she thought he was responsible for it and she was too tired to even attempt to explain the entire complicated situation to the woman.

She stood over her shoulder and watched her every move, trying to learn how best to care for Jason when she left. Aria spoke softly of healing to Jason as she cleaned the wound. It was clearly very painful, as he moaned and writhed throughout the entire process. It was so tiring for him that when she finished, he lay motionless.

Shannon feared that he was dead, but Aria told her that he was just exhausted. She gently applied her salve and showed Shannon how to properly bandage the wound. She lay a hand on his head and observed that he had no fever. If they could keep an infection from settling in, she explained, he would pull through.

While she was there, she insisted on giving the boy a checkup. Dylan was reluctant to leave her alone with Luke, but she waved him away, behind his mate, to see to

their son’s health.

Shannon, finally alone with Jason again, laid down beside him and gently mopped the sweat from his brow as he slept deeply. There, in those moments, she pledged her life to him, even if he was not awake to hear her.

That day and through the night, she tended to him. Grace and Dylan both offered to watch him for her while she got some sleep, but she could not stand the thought of anyone but her being the first face he saw when he woke. It was she who changed the dressing on his wounds and she who held him close, willing him to regain consciousness.

As the sun rose the following day, his eyes fluttered open and the first sight he saw was her exhausted face staring down at him.
“Hey, you're up,” she said, trying to sound casual despite the tears welling in her eyes.

“How long have I been out?” he asked as he tried to sit up, failing in his exhaustion to manage an upright position.

“Nearly 24 hours. You slept through two dressing changes on that wound. I was about to start to worry.”

“Where are Dylan and Grace? Are they OK? Where is Luke?” he asked, clearly confused about what had happened since the battle. She wondered if he even remembered her declaration of love. Though she would gladly have told him thousands of times, it hurt that he would not be able to share the memory of the first time with her.

“They are all fine,” she said, amazed that he was awake and safe with her. “They were here to see you earlier but I sent them out. You needed your rest.”

“Did you really tell me you love me or did I hallucinate that?” he asked, looking up at her with hesitation. He seemed so afraid that it was a hallucination that he did not truly want to know the answer. She was so very relieved that he remembered that she threw her arms around him as he lay before her.

“Yes,” she cried, tears streaming down her face, “I love you. Now and forever.”

“That is a very good thing,” he said weakly. She pressed her lips to his and thanked the stars that he was improving. It had been all she could do during the last day to keep herself from facing the fact that she might lose him. They sat there in a sweet silence for quite a while, her stroking his hair and him looking up at her with eyes full of love.

“I'm sorry,” he said eventually, looking at her with a deep sadness in his eyes.

“For what?” she asked, not sure what in the world he could be apologizing for.

“You're probably carrying my child. That's the way it is with our mates. I know you never wanted a family,” he apologized mournfully, resting his hand on her stomach possessively.

“I never thought that I did,” she explained, “but the thought of having your baby brings me such joy. I want us to be a family; you, me, and anyone else who might come along.” She placed her hand over his, relishing in the feeling of knowing that they could already have created a life.

“God, I love you,” he said, pulling her other hand to his lips and kissing it gently.

“That is a very good thing,” she said as she bent to kiss him.

“I've wanted nothing but a family of my own for a very long time. This isn't at all how I pictured

it,” he muttered, seeming amused.

“Are you very disappointed?” she asked, suddenly concerned that he still had reservations about loving her. She sat up straight then and he moaned at the loss of closeness between them.

“Disappointed? I couldn't be happier,” he said, shocked that she could doubt it. “Come close,” he ordered, reaching up toward her.

“No, you're hurt. You need to rest,” she smiled down at him, relieved that he loved her as she loved him.

“How can I rest without you in reach of my arms?” he pouted.

She lay down beside him then and he wrapped his arms around her with a sigh of relief.

“OK, now go back to sleep. You need your strength,” she ordered.

“Deal,” he said, his heart full of peace.

THE END

Authors Message:

Thanks so much for reading all the way to the end!

If you have a quick moment, I would love if you could leave a rating of the story on the Amazon store at the below link.

YES I WILL RATE YOU JADEY, YOU DESERVE IT!

Thanks in advance and if you want to see all my other releases then you can
check out my Amazon Author page here
!

Why not collect them all? ;)

Jade xoxoxox

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