Epilogue #3
So when the doctor says, “He can go home,” I simply stare at her.
“Home?” I ask.
She smiles. “Home.”
Vadim is beside me, holding the baby bag Nadia packed as if it contains state secrets. He listens to the discharge instructions without interrupting once, which might be the clearest proof that fatherhood has changed him.
The nurse goes over feeding schedules, warning signs, medication, temperature checks, follow-up visits, and when to call the doctor. Vadim nods at everything.
“You’re scaring her,” I murmur.
“I’m listening.”
“You listen like you’re about to interrogate the thermometer.”
The nurse hides a smile.
Vadim ignores both of us.
Leonid sleeps through the whole thing in the blue hat Anya picked for him.
He’s still small, still too light in my arms compared to the babies I see in advertisements and hospital posters, but his cheeks are fuller now, and when he yawns, his entire face wrinkles with such deep annoyance that I have to smile.
“He looks offended,” I say.
“He’s concentrating,” Vadim replies.
“He’s a baby.”
“He’s still concentrating.”
The nurse says, “That is very normal for new fathers.”
Vadim looks at her. She doesn’t look intimidated. I decide I like her.
Before we leave, Ethan sees Leonid one more time and tells him to grow quickly because his mother needs backup and his father looks like a lot of work. Vadim says that is an unfair assessment. Ethan says it’s an accurate one. I’m too tired and too happy to argue with either of them.
At the private exit, I slow down.
I don’t mean to.
The doors are right there, opening and closing as people move in and out, and outside, one of Vadim’s cars waits near the curb.
For weeks, all I wanted was to take my son out of the hospital, but now that the moment is here, I suddenly understand that inside these walls there are nurses and monitors and people who know what to do if something goes wrong.
Outside, he is ours.
Vadim notices the hesitation immediately. “What is it?” he asks.
I adjust Leonid’s blanket even though it’s already fine. “I’m scared.”
He doesn’t tell me not to be.
Good. I might slap him again if he tried.
“So am I,” he says.
I look up at him. “You are?”
“Yes.”
“What are you scared of?”
He looks at Leonid, then at me, and he takes enough time with the answer that I know he’s not giving me something rehearsed.
“That I will make the wrong choice again because I convince myself I know what is best for you.”
“You probably will make wrong choices sometimes,” I say.
“I know.”
“So will I.”
“I know that too.”
“And we can’t keep turning every wrong choice into a war.”
His mouth moves slightly. “I will try.”
“That sounded painful.”
“It was.”
I laugh, and my eyes burn because I’m exhausted, because my hormones are probably still trying to ruin my life, because after all these months I’m standing beside him with our son in my arms and no one is bleeding or lying or running.
“I love you,” I say.
Vadim goes still in that contained way of his, the one that sends shivers down my spine.
“I should have said it before,” I continue. “I wanted to more than once, but everything between us was such a mess, and then I was angry, and then I was scared, and then I thought saying it would only make me weaker.”
He watches me without interrupting.
“I loved you when I left,” I say. “That was the hardest part. I kept telling myself I hated you, but I didn’t.
I hated what happened, and I hated what I thought you had done, and I hated that I missed you anyway.
Then I found out I was pregnant, and I was terrified, but I was also glad, because I still had some part of you with me. ”
Vadim’s face changes, and for once he doesn’t hide it quickly enough.
“I love you,” he says. “I don’t think I did it well.”
“No,” I say. “You really didn’t.”
A quiet sound leaves him, almost a laugh. “I know.”
“But you kept fighting for me,” I say. “Even when you were angry, even when you thought terrible things about me, you kept looking. You stayed when I needed you. You saved Ethan. You made sure Leonid had every chance. You brought Mila home. I know you’re not suddenly harmless, Vadim, and I don’t need harmless.
I need honest. I need you to trust me enough to ask before you decide my life for me. ”
“I can do that.”
I raise an eyebrow.
He exhales. “I can learn to do that.”
“Better.”
He looks down for a moment, then reaches into his coat. For one ridiculous second, because it’s him, I think it might be a weapon. Instead, he takes out a ring box.
I stare at it. “Vadim.”
“I was going to wait.”
“This is you waiting?”
“For me, yes.”
I laugh because I can’t help it.
He opens the box. The ring inside is beautiful, but I look at him more than the diamond because the ring is not the important part.
“I know this is not simple,” he says. “I know I have done things that can’t be fixed just because I ask you to marry me. I’m not asking you to forget them. I’m asking you to let me spend the rest of my life proving that I can love you without trying to control every part of you.”
My throat tightens.
He takes my free hand carefully, mindful of Leonid sleeping between us. “I want you with me because you choose it. I want our son raised by both of us. I want your brother safe. I want my family to be yours only as much as you want them to be. And if you ever need a door open, I will open it.”
I blink hard. “You know I’ll remind you of that every time you become unbearable.”
“I expect nothing less.”
For a moment, I just look at him. This man has hurt me, saved me, made mistakes that almost broke us and stayed long enough to face them.
I have run from him, lied by omission, doubted him, loved him through all of it, and still somehow we are here with our son between us and a future that feels frightening because it is finally real.
“Yes,” I say.
His hand tightens around mine. “Yes?”
“Yes. I’ll marry you.”
He exhales, and it’s the smallest, most human sound I have ever heard from him.
He slides the ring onto my finger, his thumb resting over my knuckle for a second after it is done. Then he leans in and kisses me carefully, because Leonid is between us and because my body is still healing and because maybe Vadim has finally learned that careful does not mean weak.
Leonid makes a tiny complaining sound.
Vadim pulls back and looks down at him. “He objects.”
“He’s your son,” I say.
“Our son,” he corrects.
I look at him, then at the baby, then toward the doors. For the first time in a long time, leaving doesn’t feel like running.
It feels like going home.
The End.
Dear precious reader, thank you for reading Mile High Ruin!
P.S. If you enjoyed Mile High Ruin, then I think you’ll enjoy Cruel Demands! Swipe to the next page for a sneak peek…