Chapter 63
sixty-three
. . .
Consciousness returned to me in fragmented layers of sensation.
First the weight of my body as if it no longer belonged to me, followed by the sharp antiseptic scent clinging to my nostrils, then the faint rhythm of a monitor.
My chest ached when I tried to pull in a deep breath and something tugged at my arm, an anchor keeping me tethered to this humming blank space.
For a moment I didn’t open my eyes, afraid of what would be waiting on the other side of the dark. The distant ring of a gunshot echoed in my ear, trailed by the fiery bloom of heat through my body and then the rush of my own blood sprinting through my veins.
Remo’s face floated in and out of the darkness, his mouth murmuring words I couldn’t hear, and I felt my lips widen in response, wondering if he finally understood just how much I loved him.
Something touched my arm and my eyes flew open, the brightness making me blink a few times before outlines flattened, easing into sterile shapes I knew well. I was in a hospital.
My eyes on the white ceiling, I swallowed, trying to ease the dryness in my throat before I shifted my gaze and paused on a familiar face.
“Hey.” Dia sat in a chair beside the bed, her hand wrapped around mine in tight grip, her eyes swollen and lips inching into a fragile smile.
“You’ve been crying,” I rasped, amused. This tough cookie never showed any emotion; she was my rock.
She uttered a watery laugh. “Didn’t I warn you not to run into any bullets?” she scolded, her thumb brushing across my knuckles. “You’re thirty-two. We mastered ‘look both ways’ in kindergarten, didn’t think I had to upgrade it to ‘also check for armed men’ too.”
“What can I say?” I murmured, managing the faintest grin. “Even bullets find me irresistible.” She smiled. “How long was I out?” I asked.
“Doesn’t matter.” She leaned closer, pressing her forehead briefly against mine. “You scared me.”
I closed my eyes, inhaling her warmth. “I’m sorry.”
She sat back, slowly shaking her head. “Never apologize for almost dying.”
I swallowed, panic flickering at the edges of my ribs. The memory of the docks rushed back. The smoke, the noise, the way she’d moved. “I saw you,” I whispered, my voice trembling, more awe than fear. “Taking those men down. God, you were so good, so fast. Like you weren’t even afraid.”
Her grip on my hand tightened, just for a second, before she relaxed it. “Someone had to cover your six, Ishika. You’re the doctor. I’m the cleanup crew.
“But you saved him,” I said, the realization settling heavy in my chest. “You saved Remo.”
“We saved him,” she corrected softly. “You took the bullet. I just cleared the path.”
I looked at her and felt a surge of gratitude so sharp it hurt. I didn’t know how she did it, how she lived in this world of violence and kept herself whole enough to protect me. All I knew was that I was alive because of her.
“Where’s Remo?”
“Probably outside,” She glanced at the door. “Dealing with things, I’m sure.”
I nodded, sinking back into the pillow, the medication pulling me down again, dragging me toward sleep. But before I drifted, I squeezed her hand. “Don’t go.”
“Never,” she whispered.
And for the first time since the gunfire started, I believed we were safe.
“How are you feeling?” The familiar voice, minutes later or maybe hours, was calming, drawing me momentarily into a childhood I rarely visited.
Slowly, I turned my head. “Uncle Haru?” I whispered, heat burning behind my eyes as skepticism tangled with relief, and for a second I was certain the medication was playing tricks on me. “You’re not here.”
His lips tipped in that usual barely-there smile. “Still second-guessing yourself, chibi-sensei?” Little doctor.
Near the window, where my sister stood looking outside, she shifted her gaze to me. “He’ll never stay away, not when you need him.”
My throat tightened unexpectedly. “How did you even—”
“Later.” He poured a glass of water from the pitcher on the nightstand and brought it to my lips.
I drank greedily, the cool water moistening my dry throat. “Thank you,” I said when he moved the glass back and dabbed my lips with his fingers. “Remo?”
Uncle Haru sighed, setting the glass on the stand. “He’s alive. His brother insited he go shower and eat when he refused to leave your side.”
I closed my eyes from relief so overwhelming it made my chest sting worse than the wound.
Of course, Remo wouldn’t leave, not unless he decided he would.
I imagined him pacing the corridor, jaw tight, hands bloodied and eyes a menace all on their own.
My heart ached for him, wanting him here, desperate for his hands on my face, his low voice telling me I was safe even if he had to burn the city down to make it true.
Inhaling deeply, I opened my eyes and looked at my uncle. “You’re not supposed to be here,” I said, scanning the blue scrubs and white hospital coat, aware he no longer practiced medicine, especially not outside Japan.
His expression softened a fraction. “Neither should you.”
I shifted again, more carefully this time, and felt that same internal ache tug at me. My hand drifted down instinctively, pressing lightly against my abdomen as if to steady it.
His gaze followed the movement. “There is something you need to know.”
A quiet unease stirred in my stomach. “What?” I watched him, suddenly aware of my own heartbeat as though my body had divulged secrets, revelations I hadn’t had the courage to voice myself. The missed cycle, the tenderness, the quiet hope I chose not to bloom, unsure how I’d handle it.
“You’re pregnant.”
For a moment I pretended not to understand, the two words hovering somewhere just out of reach, unreal and disconnected from the dull pain in my body.
“Pregnant?” I repeated.
“Yes,” he confirmed. “The bullet missed critical organs, and the blood loss didn’t impede it. You were lucky.”
Lucky. I almost laughed at the absurdity of it.
Shot in a mafia war I didn’t understand, losing blood like it was free to give.
Yet here I was, alive, and inside me a second heartbeat had quietly begun its own story.
Cells dividing. A heart forming. Life moving forward while I’d walked through gunfire and blood, believing myself untouchable.
I pressed my palm more firmly against my abdomen. How could I bring something so fragile into this insane world? How could I protect it when I couldn’t protect myself?
A strange sound left me, half laugh, half exhale, and my eyes stung unexpectedly. “I didn’t…I mean I suspected.” I swallowed hard. “Are you certain, Uncle?”
“Would I lie to you, chibi-sensei?” The quiet assurance in his voice pulled on maternal instincts I didn’t know I possessed.
Gently, my fingers traced a slow pattern across the sheet hiding my abdomen. I was going to be a mother. “Wow.”
Images flashed uninvited through my mind.
Tiny fingers, tiny feet, a little nose and mouth.
Remo holding something impossibly small in hands built for violence.
His expression when he realized he was not only an underboss feared by men twice his size, but a father, the way his jaw would tighten, how he’d pretend not to feel and fail.
Fear followed immediately after the warmth. Remo lived in a world that swallowed innocence whole.
My sister stepped closer to the bed, her voice softer now, less clinical. “You said you didn’t know if you wanted this.”
“I didn’t,” I whispered, staring at the ceiling as though the answer might be written there. “Not like this.” Abruptly something else flickered beneath the trepidation.
Excitement. Terrifying, wild, bright, bursting at the seams to reveal itself. A part of me wanted to laugh. To cry. To find Remo and tell him just to see his composure fracture.
“He’ll lose his mind,” I breathed.
“Yes,” my uncle said before he added in a more somber tone, “his world is not designed for children, chibi-sensei.”
The warmth in my chest faltered. “He would protect it,” I replied almost defensively.
He sighed, placing a hand on my arm. “Men like him build empires through force that generates opposition. And a child tied to that name won’t remain invisible. It will become leverage. His enemies won’t assess like they did yesterday.”
My sister’s gaze sharpened. “They adjust when bloodlines appear.”
I looked at her, recognition dawning. “They’ll come for my baby, Dee.”
She slipped her hand into mine. “Let them try, I’ll bury them before they even sniff the air around you.”
“If they knew,” my uncle added.
Eyes wide, my gaze shifted to him, cognizant of what he was saying. “Remo doesn’t know,” I whispered, because that mattered more than anything in that moment. “If he finds out I’m pregnant and I disappear, he’ll tear the world apart.”
“And once he finds you?” Uncle Haru asked.
Remo would build walls thick enough to keep out armies. He’d assign guards, fortify homes, erase threats before they formed. And in doing so, he’d paint a target so large we’d never see the bullet coming.
“He’ll cage me,” I whispered, the words tasting like surrender. “He’ll burn cities looking for me. He won’t rest. He won’t forgive.”
The room seemed to narrow again, my numb mind accepting the inevitable and a strange, almost selfish relief washed through me. This baby was mine to give him. This miracle, this terrifying, beautiful secret was mine.
My uncle’s gaze did not waver. “Then he must prove he is worthy of both of you,” he said, voice so calm, it struck a nerve.
I looked at him sharply. “You’re testing him?”
He didn’t answer.
The realization settled heavily in my chest. This wasn’t only about safety, but also the truth. Would Remo choose control or choice? Possession or love?
Fear twisted with something dangerously close to hope, churning in my chest until I slowly rubbed the spot and exhaled on a long, drawn-out breath, the weight of indecision pulling me down.
“I won’t let my child grow up as leverage,” I said quietly. There it was, not strategy, or war.
Just a mother.
My sister’s expression softened for the first time. “Then don’t.”
I swung my legs carefully over the edge of the bed.
White-hot fire scorched my abdomen, the stitches pulling tight.
I gritted my teeth, refusing to lie there while the world decided for me.
Pain sharpened my resolve. “If I stay,” I said, meeting my uncle’s gaze fully now, “I stay because I choose him. Not because I’m hidden behind his men. ”
“And if you leave?”
“Then he has to find me, not cage me.”
The room fell quiet again, but this time it pulsed with something alive.
Excitement. Fear. Love. Defiance.
I rested my hand over my abdomen once more. “Let’s see what he does,” I murmured.
Slowly, the words settled into me, reminding me of roots pushing into soil, determined to grow, to breath.
I’d been strong in so many ways, had stood beside a man the world called ruthless and quietly loved him without apology.
But this felt different, like stepping into a vast, uncharted ocean.
I wasn’t afraid of bullets in the same way I was afraid of loving something this much.
Tears slid silently down my cheek as I stared out the window, trying to reconcile the woman who’d bled on asphalt with the woman who now carried life. I didn’t feel robotic or invincible. I felt small and enormous at the same time, as though my body had become both a battlefield and sanctuary.
“Ishika,” my sister murmured, brushing a strand of hair away from my face. “You’re going to be okay.”
I turned my head, looking at her then at my uncle standing guard at the foot of the bed, and let myself breathe carefully around the pain. “We are,” I whispered.
The word we meant something new now, something fragile and fierce and impossibly precious.