Chapter 237 You're Dying Savannah All my life, I’d heard people say that someone was their entire life. I’d heard it said with smiles, with laughter, with a kind of certainty that always made me tilt my head and wonder. I used to think it was an exaggeration—something people said when they didn’t know how else to explain love. How could one person become your whole world? How could your entire existence revolve around a single heartbeat that wasn’t even your own? I never believed it. Not until Roman. Not until I fell in love so deeply, so recklessly, so obsessively that there was no part of me left untouched by him. Not until loving him rewired something fundamental inside my chest. He didn’t just enter my life—he became it. He became my entire life. My world. My sun. My moon. My stars. The gravity that held everything else together. And now? Now my entire world was bleeding out on the floor in front of me, clutching his chest, struggling to breathe like the air itself was betraying him. And it was my fault. I shot him. The realization ripped through me with a violence that stole the breath from my lungs. A sound tore out of my throat—raw, animal, unrecognizable—as my body moved on instinct alone. I dropped to my hands and knees and crawled toward him, the pain in my belly screaming in protest, but I didn’t care. I didn’t feel it. I didn’t feel anything except the sight of Roman collapsing under his own weight. “No. No. No. No,” I chanted, the words tumbling out of me like a prayer gone wrong. “No—please—God—no.” I don’t remember how long it took me to reach him. I don’t remember how my body even managed to move when every muscle felt like it was tearing itself apart. All I knew was that one moment he was standing—and the next, I was staring down at him as his blood soaked into the floor beneath us, warm and horrifyingly real. “Roman,” I sobbed, my voice breaking apart. “Roman, please—” My hands were shaking so badly I could barely function, but I pressed down on the wound on his chest anyway, desperate, useless. The blood soaked through my fingers instantly. Too much. There was too much of it. He groaned in pain, his body jerking beneath my touch. “I’m here,” I cried. “I’m here. I’ve got you.” I cradled his head onto my thigh, brushing my fingers through his hair as tears blurred my vision. His skin was starting to look pale—too pale—and his breathing was shallow and ragged, each inhale sounding like a battle he was losing. “I’m sorry,” I choked out. “I’m so sorry, Roman. I didn't mean to. I never meant to hurt you. I would never ever do anything to hurt you—” “Shhh,” he murmured weakly, his voice strained but gentle. “I know, my love. I know.” And then—God help me—he smiled. A faint, crooked thing that shattered what was left of my heart. “Thank God,” he breathed, “I already called an ambulance.” A hysterical sound escaped me. “This isn’t real,” I whispered. “This can’t be real.” Behind us, my mother was crying—sobbing loudly, brokenly—but the sound felt distant, like it was coming from another world. I didn’t know what Julius was doing. I didn’t care. Nothing existed beyond the man bleeding in my arms. “I’m sorry,” I said again, because I didn’t know what else to say. “Please, just hold on. Stay with me. Help is coming. Keep your eyes open, Roman—please—” A painful cramp shot through my belly and I hissed loudly in pain. He groaned, his hand trembling as it lifted to his chest, already slick with blood. “Fuck,” he hissed. “Sav… are you okay?” I let out a broken laugh that dissolved instantly into sobs. “Are you out of your mind?” I cried. “You’ve been shot and you’re asking if I’m okay? How do you feel, Roman?” He tried to inhale deeply and failed, his chest stuttering. “Feels like,” he muttered, forcing a breath, “like I got punched by the Hulk.” “This isn’t funny,” I sobbed. “This isn’t funny, Roman. Look at you—you’re bleeding—you’re—” I looked down at the blood pooling beneath him, soaking my clothes, my hands, my life.“You’re dying,” I whispered. His fingers curled around mine weakly. “Don’t talk like that,” he said, though his voice was fading. “I’ll be fine. An ambulance is already on the way. I called—” My mother’s scream cut him off. Sharp. Terrified. Loud. I looked up and if my heart hadn’t already been breaking, it would have shattered completely. Julius was standing now. He was not on the floor where he’d fallen—but he was upright, his face twisted with fury and desperation. And he was pointing the gun at me. Straight at me. “Julius,” I said hoarsely. “What are you doing?” He didn’t look at me. His grip tightened around the weapon, his knuckles white. “Do you know what you’ve done?” he snarled. “Do you know what you’ve caused? Why is it that you always bring me misfortune, Savannah?” Roman groaned beside me, a pained sound that made my hands tighten instinctively around him. “Do you know what the General will do when he finds out about this?” Julius continued, his voice shaking. “Do you know what he’ll do to me? To us? To us all?! You shot his son!” Roman coughed weakly. “I’m starting,” he muttered, “to think you have a thing for my father.” Julius ignored him. “The General will not spare my life,” he said, eyes burning. “And if I’m going down—” He lifted the gun higher. “Then I’m taking Savannah with me.” I closed my eyes, expecting to hear a gunshot. But the gunshot came from behind him. Julius froze. For a very tiny second, nothing happened—then his chest bloomed red. The gun slipped from his fingers and hit the floor with a hollow clatter as his body crumpled forward. I screamed. Loudly. I looked up, my vision spinning—and saw my mother standing behind him, her hands shaking violently as she fired again. And again.And again. And probably a million more times. She didn’t stop. Each shot echoed through the room, loud and deafening. Julius’s body jerked with every impact, blood splattering across the floor, the walls—everywhere. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. I just stared, horrified, as my mother kept shooting, her face twisted with terror and rage and something feral. Suddenly, she stopped. Then a hand gently but firmly took the gun from her. Jace. I hadn’t even seen him come down the stairs. “That’s enough, Flora.” He said quietly. My mother collapsed to the floor, sobbing uncontrollably, her hands covering her face. “He was going to kill her,” she cried. “He was going to kill my daughter. I had to stop him—I had to—” Jace pulled her into his arms. “I know,” he murmured. “I know. It’s okay.” I didn’t look at them again. My eyes were locked on Julius’s body. He wasn’t moving. He never would again. Now, he'd become another name added to the list of people we’d lost today. The distant wail of sirens cut through the chaos—and hope exploded inside my chest so violently it hurt. “The ambulance,” I gasped, looking down at Roman. “Roman, they’re here. Help is here. You're going to be fine.” But he didn’t respond. His head lolled slightly against my thigh. His chest—his chest wasn’t moving. “No,” I whispered. I pressed my ear to his mouth, to his chest, desperate. “Roman?” I said, my voice barely sound. Nothing. No breath. No rise. No heartbeat. My world stopped. My heart stuttered violently in my chest as the truth slammed into me with unbearable force. The man I was supposed to grow old with. The father of the baby I was carrying. The man who was my entire life…He wasn’t breathing anymore. And in that moment, I shattered completely.