Chapter 17 #2
“I didn’t know you had a medical degree as well as a law degree. This is not the first time this has happened, and it will not be the last. I know what to do. Now leave me alone.”
“I may not be a doctor,” Sonya glares at me, her jaw set, her eyes alight, “but I know how to help. Have you forgotten what I do for a living? The women I help don’t always have the luxury of going to the emergency room either. Now, take off your damn shirt.”
Sonya and I glare at one another for more than a moment before I concede and start unbuttoning my shirt. I bite back a groan of pain as the fabric pulls away from the sticky wound, causing fresh blood to run down my side in a warm, wet trickle.
“You said you’ve stitched yourself up before?” She looks determined and focused as she motions for me to sit on the vanity stool.
“Usually Evgeny does it, but he’s not here.”
“Then I guess you’re stuck with me.”
She patches me up with surprising skill. Halfway through, I hear her mutter under her breath, “Thank God for YouTube.” She double checks there’s no shrapnel in the wound and cleans it out.
I have to grit my teeth against the wave of pain-induced nausea when she applies the dressing.
“You’re very lucky the bullet went all the way through.”
I attempt to move my arm after she finishes and almost pass out.
“Stop that,” she snaps. “I’m already impressed with how tough you are. You don’t have to keep trying.”
The nausea and waves of pain are too intense even if I wanted to try to impress her further. I keep my mouth shut as I dig through the medicine stash. When I find the bottle of pills I’m looking for, I pop two in my mouth and swallow without water.
Sonya watches me with a slight frown. “I’m afraid to ask if you got that legally or not.”
“Then don’t ask.”
I lean back against the vanity and close my eyes, willing the morphine to work fast against the waves of pain creating a new pounding behind my eyes.
I can still feel Sonya’s attention on me, and after a minute, she finally speaks. “You surprise me.”
“Why? Because I have access to morphine?” If that surprises her, she hasn’t been paying attention.
“No. You, yourself. You’re different than what I imagined a mob boss to be.”
“You watch too many movies,” I sigh. “It’s all fantasy.”
“Yeah, but—” She pauses as though she’s thinking, and when I finally open my eyes, she’s chewing on her bottom lip. “I’d like to know what it’s really like.”
“Why?”
She shrugs, but I’m too tired and low on blood to ask her more about it. It will have to rest for now.
“You’re the pakhan of the Volkov Bratva, a man who comes home with a bullet wound at two in the morning and has a lot of scary-looking guys keeping watch on his house.
But then there’s the other side of you, the man I met at an airport who kept me calm on a plane, who showed me Prague, and can dance like Fred Astaire. ”
“My mother taught me. She loved to dance, but my father didn’t have time.”
Sonya smiles at the revelation. She cups my face with a gentle touch, her thumb brushing against my cheek.
I pull away, uncomfortable. Uncomfortable with the complete attention of this woman in the prime of her life—her skin radiant and glowing with pregnancy, her glorious hair, shining eyes, a face I could gaze at forever and never grow tired of.
This woman is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in her ratty old t-shirt and sleep shorts, her hair mussed with sleep, a woman who fights for those who can’t fight for themselves.
Sonya doesn’t need me nor should she want me.
I’m nearly twice her age, a man who’s seen and done far too much, who has stained his soul blood red with all the killing and illegality.
A darkness surrounds me like a death shroud that will never be clean.
Sometimes I feel guilty, touching her with hands so dirty.
I don’t want to put out her light with my darkness. Darkness that will remain, no matter how legitimate I make the Volkov empire and its name.
But I don’t want to live without her, either. I’ve tried to make it be just about sex between us, but no matter how many walls I put up, no matter how detached I’ve tried to be, somehow, she’s slipped through.
I glance to her stomach, where our child sleeps.
Our child. A child I never thought I would have.
I reach up and push back the hair from her cheek, then smooth it behind her ear so I can stare at the face of the woman who makes my heart tremble whenever she’s near, something no one has ever been able to do before.
“I’m too old for you.” The words come out suddenly.
Sonya raises a brow as she crosses her arms. Her lips, those incredible, soft, perfectly pink lips, curl into a wry, one-sided smile. “You sure don’t act like it in bed.”
I scowl at her. “I’m serious, Sonya.”
“So am I.”
She places her hand on my face again, touching the silver starting to show at my temples before trailing her fingertips along the lines at the corners of my eyes and mouth before brushing them over my lips, causing an electric jolt to run straight through me.
“Age is just a number.” Sonya shrugs and gives me that crooked smile I can’t seem to get enough of.
I should let go of Sonya, release her from the danger and darkness a life with me entails. But I can’t seem to do it. She’s too far under my skin, and the morphine is suppressing my iron will.
When I cup the back of her neck and bring her lips to meet mine, it’s the sweetest kiss yet. “I need you,” I murmur against her mouth, feeling her smile on my lips.
“I know, but I don’t think you’re up to it,” she jokes with another sweet smile.
I should correct her, tell her it’s more than desire, more than just her body. I want her entirely—heart, mind, body and soul—from now until forever.
But I don’t.