4. Lev
It hurts like a motherfucker.
I’m riding a wave of pain when I wake up. The pounding in my skull feels like I’m being pistol-whipped. My eyelids are heavy and hard to open, and when I do, all I can see is hazy white light. I move, and every muscle in my body protests.
I groan, wondering what the fuck happened.
Then I remember the explosion.
Igor, Victor, and I were walking to the car. I was talking on the phone to Brooke…
Brooke.
I sit up and wince at the pain.
My head feels broken.
But I push past the pain.
I need to get to Brooke.
To protect her.
That’s when I remember the baby, and I feel a rush of anger sweep through me. Anger at Vlad. Anger at Vadim. Anger at me for not seeing this coming.
The fury I feel pouring into my veins overrides the pain in my head, and I rip off the cords stuck to my chest and belly that tether me to the heart monitor, and pull out the needle in my arm attached to the IV.
I have to find Brooke.
And Igor.
I know there is no chance Victor made it. The last I saw of him, he was opening the car door.
I stumble out of the bed. I’m still dressed in my button-up shirt and suit pants, but they’re a mess from being thrown backward into the flower garden. My shoes are missing, and my gun is gone. Looking around, I find my shoes on a chair beside the bed, but I must be on some crazy heavy drugs because I can barely stand up straight.
“Hey, you shouldn’t be out of bed,” a nurse says as she walks into the ER cubicle. “You have a concussion. Not to mention a couple of bruised ribs.”
Like I can’t feel the pain radiating out of my body like I’m on fire.
“I have to find Brooke.” My mouth feels like it’s full of cotton wool. “I have to find my fiancée.”
“That will have to wait,” the nurse says. She tries to guide me back toward the bed, but I brush past her, only to walk into the police officer posted outside of the cubicle.
And he’s a big motherfucker.
“You ain’t going anywhere,” he says.
“Where is my gun?”
“You’ll get it back when you’re released,” the nurse says, walking toward me with a syringe in her hand.
I try to dodge out of her way, but my feet are too heavy.
I also try to push past the police officer, but he doesn’t move, and I’m too drugged to fight him. I try but my arms are useless, and it only pisses him off.
So I use my voice. Issue some threats. Growl out obscenities.
Until I feel the sharp sting of the needle, and I am sent into oblivion once again.
When I open my eyes again, I’m in a hospital room, and Brooke’s sweet face is the first thing I see. Immediately, a soothing warmth settles over me from head to toe.
“Hey,” she says gently, curling her fingers around mine.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
She smiles softly. “Aren’t I supposed to be asking you that?”
“I’m alive. That’s a good sign.” I reach for her. I’m desperate to hold her. But the moment I lift my arms, an agonizing pain rockets through my torso. Bruised ribs. Fucking great.
Brooke puts her arm out to stop me. “Lev—”
“I’m okay.” I pull her into my arms, and the soft cloud of her scent is an instant comfort. I press a kiss into her hair and hold her there for a moment before letting her go. “And the baby?”
“Our baby is fine.”
Our baby.
Even through the murkiness of medication, those words send something pure and right into my heart.
The clock on the wall behind Brooke reads five-seventeen, but I’m so disoriented I don’t know if it’s day or night. “Is it morning or night?”
“It’s morning. The blast happened last night. They sedated you. Feliks was here. He said to call him when you wake up, and he’ll be back. He said to let you know he’s holding down the fort, but you’d better stop sleeping on the job and get your ass out of bed.”
Fucking Feliks.
I press my fingers to my eyes and rub. I’m so bone-tired it doesn’t feel like I’ve slept. “Where is Igor?”
Immediately, Brooke’s face falls, and she hesitates, so I know I’m not going to like the answer.
“He’s alive, but it doesn’t look good, Lev. He’s on life support.”
The news hits me hard, and I feel it right down to my marrow.
“The doctors said it’s a miracle he’s still alive. That anyone half his size…” She catches a sob in her throat, and her eyes brim with tears.
I sit up, ignoring the protest from my bruised ribs, and swing my legs over the side of the bed.
Thankfully, I’m not as heavily medicated as I was in the ER, and my legs actually support me when I climb off the bed.
“Should you be doing this?” Brooke asks, even though she knows it’s pointless. She knows by now there’s no point in trying to stop me when I get an idea in my head.
“If they stop drugging me, I’ll be fine. Which room is he in?”
“He’s in the burn unit.”
Her words punch me in the gut.
Burn unit.
Fuck.
It’s hard to keep the edge from my voice. “Show me.”
She hesitates and then nods.
It’s slow going as I follow her through the hospital corridors on unstable feet. But after several exhausting and agonizing minutes, we arrive outside Igor’s hospital room. We can see Igor through a viewing window. He’s unconscious on the bed, covered head to toe in bandages with a breathing tube in his mouth.
When I see him, I have to steady myself against the wall. I’ve known Igor since he started working as my father’s chauffeur twenty years ago. I was a bratty teenager, and he was somewhere in his twenties. He’s not just a Zarkov employee. He’s fucking family.
My jaw tightens, and I grit my teeth so hard my jawbone aches.
I’m going to find those responsible for this, and I’m going to break every single one of their bones slowly.
My hands fist at my side.
Brooke notices and slides a comforting hand up and down my back. It’s the only thing that stops me from pounding the wall with my fist.
When a doctor approaches Igor’s room, I stop him. “What’s the update?”
“Are you family?”
“Yes,” I lie easily. “Is he going to live?”
“It’s too early to tell. He’s suffered numerous injuries that are fatal on their own. Abdominal hemorrhage and perforation. Injuries to his lungs and gastrointestinal tract. Then there’s the broken pelvis and lacerations from flying debris. He also has burns to thirty percent of his body.”
The beast inside me roars to life, and it takes everything I can to tame it. Outwardly, I’m a statue. But internally, the beast is struggling to break free from my restraint. He wants out, and he wants revenge. Badly.
I hate the fear I hear in my voice. “Will he survive?”
“Perhaps. But he’s not out of the woods yet. Actually, he’s far from it. If he makes it through the day, it will be a miracle.”
“And if he does?”
“Then we take one day at a time. His injuries are so severe, he’s going to be in rehabilitation for a long while.”
I turn to look at Igor lying on the bed and feel the rage burn like fire in my gut.
“I want him to receive the best care. Do you hear me? The best specialists. The best everything. I don’t care if I have to send planes all over the world to pick up those specialists and bring them back here. I will.”
“I understand your concern. But he’s in good hands. Some of the best specialists in the world are in this hospital. You can trust us to look after him.” He nods toward the nurses’ station. “We’ve been trying to find out who he was. His wallet and identification were burned up in the blast. Since you’re family, you’ll need to fill out the necessary paperwork. Insurance. Sign a care plan. After that, you need to go home and get some rest. You look like you could use it.”
I nod absentmindedly as I watch my friend fight for his life on the other side of the window.
But I beg to differ. I’m not going home to rest.
First things first.
I’m going to get my gun back.
And then I’m going to shell out some payback.