Julian was still sitting outside Amara's room, JJ asleep against his shoulder, when a nurse came to tell him Justina was waking up.
Julian, Josh, and JJ went in together the moment the nurse said Justina was awake, and the first thing out of her mouth wasn't an apology, wasn't even a question about herself.
"Dad, where's Mum? I want to see her."
"You'll see her later," Julian said gently, settling into the chair beside her bed and taking her hand. "Tell me how you're feeling first, princess."
"I'm sorry, Daddy." The tears came instantly, as though they'd simply been waiting behind her eyes for the first opening. "It's all my fault. Everything is all my fault."
Josh stood quietly near the foot of the bed and said nothing at all not because he had nothing to say, but because for the first time since he'd found that clean, unstained dress on the floor of her room, some small, tired part of him was simply grateful she was alive to cry about any of it.
