35. Lev
LEV
Isat on the edge of the bed, watching Mila rest.
A full circle of visiting people like this bothered me.
Before I’d met her, I’d made a habit of visiting Uncle Dmitri. Now, I was spending every second of the last day and night here with Mila while she slept.
Uncle Dmitri was never going to wake up. The cancer he’d hidden from us all had spread until he suffered that stroke. He was gone, in every true sense of the word, and we were beholden to keeping him physically alive per his wishes in his will.
Mile would wake up. She already had for short periods of time. The surgeons who closed up the through-and-through bullet holes had ensured that she’d survive. While she had lost a lot of blood, she had tolerated the emergency surgeries well enough.
I wasn’t sure what her truest wishes were, but I wanted to have faith that when she woke up next after this long nap with the sedation wearing off completely, she would express her will to live.
With me.
With my love that I would remind her of every single second of her life.
Alexei walked into the room, knocking on the door as he entered without waiting for my reply. My bedroom wasn’t a hospital room, but she’d been brought here as soon as she had been given the all-clear for transport from the hospital.
“Looks like it pays off to donate those hefty funds to St. Anne’s, huh?” he quipped as he strode in and took a seat.
So much had happened since that mission of taking out Yusef. He’d been ready to help, sending a chopper to the location to have Mila airlifted to the hospital that we contributed a lot of money to.
I glanced at him, holding Mila’s hand and stroking my thumb over her knuckles. “And I’ll personally be paying them a little bonus soon.”
He nodded, expressionless but somber somehow. “Worth it.”
I raised my brows at him. “What is?” Mila?
“It’s worth it to have that hospital in our pocket and more or less ready to act at our beck and call.” He leaned back and folded his hands behind his head. “It’s a shame that Uncle Dmitri didn’t go to St. Anne’s back when he first had his suspicions that something was wrong with him.”
I smirked, upset that it was turning out like that. “I bet Uncle Dmitri deliberately didn’t go to St. Anne’s because they might have told us about the cancer and we would’ve insisted that he not be so stubborn about not treating it.”
Since we’d learned of his tumors, we understood now that by the time he’d had it checked out, it was too late to treat it well.
“Anyway.” My brother sat forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “I didn’t come here to talk about him.” He pointed his steepled fingers at her. “An update about her work.”
“Yeah?”
“I bet you’ll disagree that it was a good thing that she wanted to linger and hunt for any files in that office for as long as she did.”
I narrowed my eyes. “It’s not a good thing that I let her linger long enough that she got shot before we could fully escape.” I’d never, ever forgive myself for not protecting her better. One man—or one gun—against seven were terrible odds no man could beat.
He nodded. “But, it was a good thing she grabbed what she did.”
“Is there anything useful on those drives?” I hadn’t bothered to ask yet. It was too soon. She was my priority and I would be right by her side while she recovered.
“Oh, fuck, yes,” he replied with a scoff. “A lot to work with.” He stood, patting my shoulder. “It’ll take a while to pick through it all, but she’s mighty resourceful, getting the files like that and risking it all to obtain them.”
“Hey.” Nikolai appeared at the door and entered. “There you are,” he said of Alexei standing near the bed. “Are you still riding with me and Adrik for that meeting with Rico Johnson on the Strip?”
My brother sighed. “I guess.”
Nikolai came into the room. “How’s she doing?”
“Resting.” I lifted her hand and kissed the back of it. “As she should be.”
He gave me a lopsided smile. “Look at you…”
I furrowed my brow. “What?”
“You and Mila.” He crossed his arms and laughed lightly. “I never could have imagined all of you being in such a rush to settle with a woman like this.”
Alexei rolled his eyes. “Not all of us are.”
I wouldn’t fight with him on that point. He was the least likely to settle with a woman, let alone even find one. I was sure that even the most aloof loners could warm up to the idea of love, but my brother wouldn’t be rushing toward it.
They left to head to that meeting with Las Vegas’s up-and-coming—and annoying—politician who was courting our favor.
He wanted to get in our good graces, but Adrik was slow to warm up to him.
He wasn’t enthusiastic about having to play a part in politics at all, but he understood that he had to as part of his being the next Pakhan.
Uncle Dmitri had never liked that branch of responsibilities, either.
I watched Mila rest for a while more, memorizing all the features of her gorgeous face.
The smooth curves of her cheeks that I wanted to see rising in smiles again.
The delicate arches of her brows that I bet would raise when I pushed her buttons.
The plump pink lips that stayed so still now, but if I played my cards right, they would curl up with a sexy grin as I pounded into her.
“Oh.”
I turned at Adrik’s voice as he entered the room.
“I thought I’d find Alexei and Nikolai around here.”
“They stopped in for a second but were heading out for this meeting with Rico Johnson.”
He nodded, strolling in as he smoothed his hand over his cuff. “Good. They can get there before me and maybe they can make excuses for why I’m late to show.” He rolled his eyes. “Or why I don’t show up at all.”
I smirked. “Funny.” We both knew that he’d never shirk his duties, no matter how loathsome they could be.
“And how are things in here?” He approached the bed and tipped his chin in Mila’s direction.
“Stable. In progress.” I sighed as I looked at her before facing him. “She’s recovering well.”
“And you?” He raised his brows.
“Me?” I hadn’t been hit.
“Yes. You.” When he could likely tell that I wasn’t following, he shook his head. “Don’t be dense. How are you handling almost losing her?”
I stood, needing to stretch my legs for a moment. He got the point and stepped out of the room with me where I could pace and hopefully my voice wouldn’t carry and be so loud that I’d keep her up or bother her.
“I’m handling it with the plan that I will claim her as soon as she’s awake.”
He walked with me, watching me seriously as I headed for the open door.
“As my partner. My wife. My woman. My everything.” She already was. My heart would be forever connected to her, and if she needed time to accept that, we had the rest of our lives for her to catch up to me.
“Is that so?” he asked, almost teasingly.
“It is. It will be.” I crossed my arms and glanced over my shoulder at her. “There will be no more questions or excuses. I’ll sever all the ambiguity about her place with me, about her place here in this family.”
He nodded sagely, patting my back as a gesture of good luck.
“As soon as she is stable enough to walk down an aisle, I am marrying her.”
Letting out a heavy exhale, he stuck his hands in his pockets. “I guess it wouldn’t be too pre-emptive of me to pass the word along to Elena and Carina. I’m sure they can get started with some basics of a hasty wedding plan.”
“And an officiant,” I reminded him. “This will be a legitimate union.”
“Of course,” he agreed.
“The only binding contract she should ever be in is one of matrimony. With me.”
He smiled. “Not that you need it, but if you were looking for my blessing or permission… you have it.”
I risked a smile too. I didn’t need his approval to marry Mila and bring her deeper into the fold of what it meant to be part of our family.
But I appreciated how open he was to accepting her.
He and Maksim had accepted her back when she had instinctively moved to protect Elena and Carina.
When she first showed more of who she was as a person, the heart she tried to hide behind all those layers.
“We will all be glad to welcome her—officially—to the family as your wife,” he said.
Perhaps his congratulatory wording was premature, but I also knew I could take his word for it that he meant every bit of that statement.
Alexei no longer warned me to be careful with this mysterious slave I’d brought home.
Viktor didn’t comment about her being invited to discussions that used to be exclusive to us.
No one in the Bratva would ever question her worth and right to belong with us, to be my better half.
“You know, I’ve been thinking about it quite a bit lately, with Gregori showing up and this network of his…”
His expression darkened.
“Gregori’s return reinforces my belief that family isn’t ever only defined by blood. You choose your family, too.” I almost smiled. “Like how I chose to see Uncle Dmitri as the true father figure in my life. How I saw him as more of my father than Gregori ever could have.”
He scoffed. “Hell, Lev. My father is bound to us all. You’re still his blood relative as his nephew.”
“Yes. But I’ve never wanted to even consider a blood relation to Gregori.”
“No one would ever assume that. We’ve all disowned him.”
I nodded, glad that my loyalty would never be questioned. Even though Gregori was my blood relative, I was firmly opposed to letting him live for what he had done.
“We choose our family, too,” I said again.
“And I will reconfirm it now and forever that I’ll swear to serve Uncle Dmitri, and you, cousin.
I will always protect Uncle Dmitri’s line.
” I meant him. Adrik, Maksim, Viktor, and Nikolai.
My cousins would have the throne before Alexei ever would.
I was last in line, so it never crossed my mind to even want to be Pakhan.
With all these thoughts about marrying Mila, though, it was on my mind.
I could marry and start a family and never have to be bogged down with that inheritance and generational expectation hanging over me.
“You do choose your family,” Adrik agreed, no doubt smiling because he was thinking about how he’d chosen to marry Elena despite their rocky and unconventional start.
“And I choose Mila,” I declared.
Not to own.
But to love.
She was the one for me. Her submission and trust were the greatest gifts I ever could have imagined, and with the beauty of violence and peace ebbing and flowing, I understood that I could never control either of them.
I didn’t want to. Because I intended to earn Mila’s love each and every day, hoping it would be freely given to me from the bottom of her heart—true and real love.