June tried weakly to lift her head.<\/p>\n
The shadow moved closer through the snowstorm\u2014tall, broad-shouldered, wrapped in heavy furs dusted white by the blizzard. A rifle hung across his back while frost clung to his dark beard beneath the hood.<\/p>\n
For one terrifying moment, June thought her brother had found her.<\/p>\n
Then the stranger knelt beside her.<\/p>\n
His eyes dropped instantly to the blood staining the snow beneath her bare legs.<\/p>\n
The expression on his face changed fast.<\/p>\n
Not anger.<\/p>\n
Alarm.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re freezing to death,\u201d he muttered.<\/p>\n
June tried to crawl backward anyway, protecting her stomach with both arms.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease\u2026\u201d she whispered weakly. \u201cDon\u2019t take my baby.\u201d<\/p>\n
The man froze.<\/p>\n
Wind screamed across the ravine as he stared at her\u2014really stared at her\u2014and whatever hardness lived in him shifted slightly.<\/p>\n
Behind them, distant voices echoed faintly through the storm.<\/p>\n
The traders were still searching.<\/p>\n
The stranger looked toward the sound once.<\/p>\n
Then back at June.<\/p>\n
Without another word, he removed his heavy fur coat and wrapped it around her shaking body before carefully lifting her into his arms.<\/p>\n
June gasped softly from the sudden warmth.<\/p>\n
The man turned toward the white wilderness ahead.<\/p>\n
And somewhere behind them\u2014<\/p>\n
The hunters were getting closer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
June tried weakly to lift her head. The shadow moved closer through the snowstorm\u2014tall, broad-shouldered, wrapped in heavy furs dusted white by the blizzard. A rifle hung across his back while frost clung to his dark beard beneath the hood. For one terrifying moment, June thought her brother had found her. Then the stranger knelt […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":3693,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storytimes.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}