Chapter 22
LEO
I’d been waiting for Sergei to slip into bed next to me, so I heard exactly when his truck pulled into my driveway.
Something was different about tonight, though.
He usually parked in the driveway, but tonight the garage door opened and closed.
Sergei also took way too long to enter my bedroom.
Usually, he would be upstairs in under five minutes.
I clutched the sheet into a fist and fought against the urge to investigate what was happening downstairs. If I did, he would know that every night he’d slipped into my bed, I’d known but pretended to be asleep.
So I waited.
The footsteps that eventually crossed the threshold weren’t quiet like I was used to. They made a beeline straight for the bed, and the lamp on the night table came on with a click. I squinted against the sudden brightness and groaned.
“Leo.” Sergei sat next to me and touched my shoulder. “Leo, are you awake?”
I turned over and blinked up at him, pretending I’d just woken up. “Sergei? What are you doing here?”
And the Oscar goes to me.
“I’ll explain everything later.” His hands were on my shoulders, urging me upright. “Can you come with me, please? I need your help.”
“Where are we going?”
“The garage.” When I didn’t move fast enough for him, he picked me up and set me on my feet on the floor. I was so stunned I blinked up at him owlishly.
“I don’t understand.”
“You’ll see. Come on.”
He took my hand, and I barely managed to stuff my feet into my house slippers before he was leading me out of the bedroom.
I trailed after him, dragging my feet down the stairs.
By the time we reached the door to the garage, a bit of common sense returned and I dug my heels in, refusing to go a step further.
“What’s going on, Sergei?” I stared at the closed door. “Am I walking into an ambush?”
“The fuck, Leo!” He scowled at me fiercely. “If I wanted to take you out, I wouldn’t need anyone else for that. And you know I’d never hurt you.”
“You would if it was to protect Morozov.”
His hand tightened on mine. “I said I would never hurt you. What part of that is tripping you up?”
I swallowed as a thrill ran down my spine. “Then tell me what’s behind the door.”
“Someone’s hurt and needs medical attention.”
Damn. That was the one thing I couldn’t ignore as a doctor. For the first time since he woke me up, I took a good look at him and saw the bloodstains on his shirt. How the hell had I missed that?
“Wait, are you hurt?”
He looked down at himself, then back at me, his features softening into a smile. “You’re worried about me?”
I straightened my spine. “I just don’t want you to die here. Anywhere else but here.”
“Ouch, that stings.” The moody look was back on his face, lips pursed and brows etched in a scowl. “Don’t worry, if you wish for it hard enough, unlike tonight, I’m sure one of these assholes will eventually succeed, then I’ll be out of your life forever just like you want.”
My mouth went dry. Someone had tried to kill him tonight? Before I could say anything, he pushed the door open. I hurried after him inside the cold garage, rubbing my arms. He’d managed to wedge his truck next to Brad’s car thanks to me finally dropping off Brad’s things at the charity shop.
“Come here.”
He retracted the tonneau cover from the truck bed and dropped the tailgate.
I took a step back, barely containing the scream that bubbled up inside my throat.
A man soaked in his own blood was trussed up like a pig at a barbecue.
Only years of training kept me from reacting and showing the fear and shock coursing through my veins.
“Is he dead?” I asked.
“Maybe. He was still alive when I threw him in there.”
I winced at how matter-of-fact he sounded but didn’t waste any more time on him.
I hopped up into the back of the truck and hurried over to the unconscious man.
Up close, the damage was worse. Someone had tried to slash his throat but hadn’t finished the job.
Blood soaked through his shirt and pooled beneath him, his skin pale to the point of gray, his chest barely rising.
“Shit…”
I dropped to my knees beside him, leaning in closer and turning my head slightly to feel for breath against my cheek, watching for any movement in his chest. He was breathing too shallowly. I needed to inspect his neck, but there was so much blood.
“Sergei, I need—”
“Here.”
Surprised, I reached for the box of nitrile surgical gloves Sergei held out to me. Why the hell did he have gloves like these with him? I’d been so focused on the patient that I hadn’t heard him rummaging inside his truck.
“Fresh towels,” I said, snapping on a pair of gloves without looking back at Sergei. “I need to stop the flow of blood.”
I went straight for the unconscious man’s neck, Sergei’s footsteps echoing in the garage.
The patient’s pulse was faint and thready.
Barely there, but thankfully present. I supported his neck with one hand while applying firm pressure to the wound with the other.
Warm blood gushed into my palm, and I clenched my jaw and pressed harder, trying to stem the flow.
Sergei returned quickly, joining me in the bed of the truck and handing me the towels.
I folded one and pressed it firmly against the wound, replacing my hand with something that could actually absorb the blood instead of letting it slip uselessly through my fingers.
The second towel I wedged beneath his neck to elevate him slightly, careful not to tilt too far.
Too much movement and I could make things worse.
Not enough, and he’d drown in his own blood.
“Hold on to that,” I said, shifting his hand into place when Sergei hovered too close. For once, he didn’t argue. His fingers tightened over the towel, his grip firm, steady, even as his jaw clenched.
I lifted one eyelid, and then the other, watching the unconscious man’s pupils react under the low light.
Slow.
“Fuck,” I muttered under my breath.
I tore open the front of his shirt, scanning for any additional injuries. He had various scrapes and cuts, ugly bruises forming, but no exit wounds or profusely bleeding sites. It meant everything was concentrated in the neck wound.
And it was bad.
I glanced back at Sergei, my voice sharper now. “He’s lost a dangerous amount of blood. He needs to go to the hospital,” I said, standing up to stare at Sergei.
“If you can’t save him, then leave him to die. Less trouble that way.”
My breath stuttered in my lungs. He was so heartless.
I wasn’t looking at the man who kept my fridge filled with food and checked that I got to work and back home okay. The Sergei crouching next to me was every bit the villain I’d known him to be. The one who had been in hiding all this time so he could manipulate me into thinking he wasn’t so bad.
He was as bad as the others.
Maybe worse.
“You brought him to me so I could watch him die?” I snapped. “Sergei, you are really heartless.”
“What good is me having a heart since you don’t want it?
” He let go of the towel, and before I could maintain the pressure myself, he took hold of my face.
“Leo, don’t you think you’re a little bit too cruel to me?
I grew a heart for you, and you rejected it.
I threw it aside, and now you want me to have one again.
” His thumb moved along my cheek, stroking my skin.
“You just wished me dead a minute earlier. A dead man doesn’t have a heart, Leo.
So do you want me to live so I can give you this heart of mine or not? ”
My mouth went dry as if filled with cotton balls, and I tried to find enough moisture to swallow. “That’s not what I meant. Will you take him to a hospital or not?”
“I asked you a question.” I tried to shuffle back, but he just moved forward, blocking my escape. He leaned forward until a mere inch separated our faces. “Do you want me to have a heart knowing it’ll be just for you?”
A shaky breath left me. “If we don’t take him to a hospital now, he will die.”
“Then let him die.” His hand switched to grip my jaw, and he leaned forward, pressing his lips to mine.
“I…can’t.” I pressed my palms against his chest and tried to push him away, but he didn’t budge, just kept pressing kisses to my lips. As far as kisses went, they were tame but eager, as if he was trying to convince me.
“Don’t be like this, Sergei. I—I can’t have this place remind me of another death.”
He stilled, easing back to observe me. “It’s a simple question.”
“But it’s not.” Tears misted my eyes as I pleaded with him to understand. “I’m afraid to want your heart. You’re not a good man, Sergei, and that scares me. If you want me to accept your heart, why don’t you show me that you actually have one? Take him to a hospital.”
“No.”
Disappointment landed heavily and with finality in my gut. So much for thinking I had some influence over him. It was the reminder I needed that whenever he gave in to me, it was because he wanted to. I was hopeless against him.
“But you can treat him.”
I huffed a breath of frustration. “I don’t have the equipment necessary to deal with something like this, and he’s lost so much blood. He’s going to need a transfusion. I don’t know what blood type he is, and I don’t have any blood supply.”
“I’ll take you somewhere you’ll have all of that.”
“But—”
“No hospitals, Leo. Do you want to save him or not?”
He knew damn well I wouldn’t be able to walk away.
Sergei refused to remove the ropes even though the man was unconscious. When I mentioned riding in the back to provide medical care in case it was needed, the way he looked at me alone had me climbing into the passenger seat next to him without arguing.