LUKA #2
Mirov says, “She has a concussion. The scan does not show a major bleed. There’s swelling, and we should keep her under observation because head injuries like to make fools of confident doctors, but right now, this is better than it looked.”
“How long until she wakes?” I ask.
Mirov says, “Could be soon. Could be hours. She was hit hard.”
My jaw tightens.
Mirov looks at my shoulder. “And you tore something.”
“I don’t care,” I say.
“I know you don’t care,” Mirov says. “That’s why I’m telling you instead of asking.”
“I’m not leaving her,” I say.
Mirov says, “I assumed that, which is why I’ll fix your shoulder beside her bed while you glare at me.”
I almost tell him to go to hell.
Then I look through the glass and see them moving Nina into a room.
I follow.
They settle her into the hospital bed, replace her ruined dress with a gown, cover her with a blanket, and clean the blood from her hair as much as they can without disturbing the injury.
She looks too young under the white lights.
Too still. Her face is softer in sleep, stripped of all the expressions she uses to keep the world at arm’s length.
I take the chair beside her bed.
Mirov does exactly what he threatened to do. He cuts open the shoulder seam of my shirt, mutters that I’m a stubborn animal, cleans the wound, tapes the dressing again, and tells me I will need stitches reopened if I keep behaving like an idiot.
“Later,” I say.
Mirov says, “You always say later.”
“And yet you keep coming,” I say.
Mirov says, “Because your mother pays on time and frightens me more than you do.”
Nina’s fingers move slightly under the blanket, and for one wild second I think she’s waking, but she only settles again.
Pavel calls again.
I answer because ignoring the world will not protect her from it. “What?”
Pavel says, “The man from the apartment is not in our local files.”
“Then widen the search,” I grit out.
Pavel says, “Already started.”
“Find Misha,” I say.
Pavel says, “No confirmed location yet.”
“Then get one,” I say.
Pavel pauses. “Understood.”
I end the call before he can say anything else.
I place my phone face down on the table and take Nina’s hand carefully. Her fingers are warm, though weaker than they should be, and I hold them with both of mine as if my hands can keep her anchored to the bed.
Time moves slowly.
Nurses come and go. Mirov checks her pupils again. I answer questions when necessary and ignore questions when they are about me.
At some point, dawn begins to pale the window.
Nina makes a small sound.
I’m on my feet before she moves again.
Her brows draw together. Her head shifts on the pillow, and she winces before her eyes even open.
“Nina,” I say.
Her lashes flutter. For a moment, her eyes don’t focus.
Then they find my face.
“Luka?” she whispers.
“I’m here,” I say.
Her voice is rough. “What happened?”
“You’re in the hospital,” I say. “You’re safe.”
Her eyes move around the room slowly, confusion giving way to pain. “My apartment.”
“Yes,” I say.
“The door was open,” she says.
“I know.”
“The living room,” she says, then stops and closes her eyes tightly. “Someone hit me.”
“Yes,” I say.
Her breathing changes.
I reach for the cup on the side table and bring the straw to her mouth. “Small sip.”
She drinks a little, then turns her face away. “My head hurts,” she mumbles.
“Mirov says you have a concussion,” I say. “The scan was clear for anything worse, but you need observation.”
She blinks at me. “Mirov is here?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Of course he is,” she says.
It sounds like her, faintly, and the relief nearly takes my knees out.
I sit back down because standing suddenly feels dangerous.
She looks at me properly for the first time, taking in my cut shirt, the new dressing under my jacket, the blood at my cuff.
“You’re hurt,” she says.
“It’s nothing,” I say.
She frowns. “Don’t do that.”
I say, “My shoulder reopened. Mirov fixed it. It’s not important.”
“It’s a little important,” she says.
“Not compared to your head,” I say.
She closes her eyes again, then opens them after a few seconds. “Did you find who did it?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Is he alive?” she asks.
“Yes,” I say.
Her eyes search mine. “Barely?”
“Alive enough to answer questions,” I say.
She absorbs that with a faint shiver.
I hate that I caused the shiver even though she asked.
“I should have called you,” she says.
“No,” I say.
“Yes,” she says. “The door was open. I knew something was wrong. I still went in.”
“You were worried about Misha,” I say.
“That doesn’t make it smart,” she says.
“No,” I say. “It makes it human.”
Her face softens a little at that.
I don’t know where the sentence came from. Maybe from sitting beside her for hours, thinking about every time I demanded logic from a woman whose whole life had been pulled apart in two days. Maybe from realizing that fear does not make rational choices, and love for a brother makes worse ones.
“Was he there?” she asks.
“No,” I say.
“Do you know where he is?” she asks.
“Not yet,” I say.
Her eyes move back to mine. “Not yet.”
“I will find him,” I say.
She swallows, and tears gather in her eyes before she can stop them. She turns her face away.
I reach up and brush one tear from her temple before it can reach her hair.
Her voice comes out small. “I hate hospitals.”
“I know,” I say.
“You don’t know that,” she breathes out, but there’s no strength in the correction.
“I know now,” I say.
Her mouth trembles, then steadies. “You stayed?”
“Yes,” I say.
“The whole time?”
“Yes,” I say.
“You didn’t go yell at everyone?”
“I yelled by phone,” I say.
She lets out the smallest breath of a laugh, then winces. “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts.”
“I will be less charming then.”
“That should be easy,” she says.
For the first time since I found her on the floor, I feel something in my chest loosen.
Only a little. Just enough to breathe.
She watches me, and her face changes again, turning serious in the softest way.
“You look scared,” she says.
I almost tell her she’s wrong. The lie would be easy. Instead, I look at her hand in mine and say, “I was.”
She goes quiet.
I continue, “When you didn’t answer, I knew. I don’t know how, but I knew.”
Her fingers shift weakly in mine. “I’m sorry.”
I shake my head. “No need for that.”
“I scared you,” she says.
“You were attacked,” I reason. “You don’t apologize to me for being hurt.”
She blinks, and more tears slip out.
This time I don’t brush them away immediately. I give her a second to be upset without managing it for her.
Then I add, “I should have walked you upstairs.”
“Luka,” she says.
“I know what you will say,” I say. “You asked me not to. I respected it. That does not make me feel better.”
“You did what I asked,” she says.
“Yes,” I say.
“That matters,” she says.
I look at her.
She’s lying in a hospital bed with a concussion, still trying to make me understand the boundary I nearly hated myself for respecting.
Something breaks open inside me then, quietly and without drama.
The words come up before I can stop them.
I love you.
They’re so close that my mouth almost forms them.
I love you, and I should have stayed. I love you, and I’m terrified of what that means for you. I love you, and if I say it now, while you’re pale and injured and afraid for your brother, I will be putting my need on top of your pain.
So I don’t say it.
I lean over instead and kiss her forehead.
Her eyes close.
I stay there for a moment, breathing her in, feeling the heat of her skin under my mouth, letting the words burn where only I can feel them.
When I pull back, she opens her eyes again.
She looks like she heard something anyway.
“Luka,” she says.
My phone vibrates on the side table.
I ignore it.
It vibrates again.
She glances toward it. “Answer.”
“No,” I say.
“It might be important,” she says.
“You are important,” I say. The words come out too plainly.
Her eyes soften in a way that nearly undoes the restraint I have left.
The phone vibrates a third time.
I look at the screen.
Pavel.
Something in my stomach hardens.
Nina sees the change. “Go,” she says.
“I’ll be right outside,” I say.
She says, “I’m not going anywhere.” The joke is weak, but it’s hers.
I squeeze her hand once and let go.
In the hallway, I answer the call. “What?”
Pavel says, “Alina has vanished.”
I close my eyes.
For one second, I feel nothing but a clean, cold fury. “Explain.”
Pavel says, “She was still under watch after the clinic appointment. Marina was inside the building. Denis’s replacement was at the rear exit. Marina was called to the front desk by a nurse, and when she returned, Alina was gone.”
“How long was Marina away?” I ask.
“Less than two minutes,” Pavel says.
“And the cameras?” I ask.
“Down for four minutes in that corridor,” Pavel says.
I look through the glass in the hospital room door.
Nina lies in bed with one hand curled on top of the blanket, exhausted and hurt and alive.
Misha is missing.
A man was waiting inside her apartment.
Alina is gone.
And the people around me keep looking away at exactly the wrong time.
Pavel says, “Boss?”
I open my eyes. “Find her,” I say. “And Pavel?”
“Yes?” Pavel asks.
“No one on her detail moves without being questioned,” I say. “I want to know how the fuck she vanished into thin air.”