4
Lev
Polina left twenty minutes ago to go on break, and now I’ve got a six-foot-two slab of muscle closing my hospital room door and shutting the blinds with the posture of a man who’s about to say something I don’t want to hear.
“We need to talk,” Ruslan declares.
I pinch the bridge of my nose and reply, “No, we don’t.”
He ignores me as he drags the visitor’s seat away from the window, flips it around, and drops into it backward with his forearms resting on the back. Everything groans under Ruslan’s weight because the man was built for demolition, not conversation.
“You’ve been here nine days,” he begins.
“I’m aware.”
“And you haven’t contacted your old man or Frol. Haven’t checked in with anyone.” He ticks each point off on his thickfingers. “I’ve been fielding calls from them all week. They think you’re dead.”
“Let them think whatever they want.” I reach for the water on the bedside table and take a slow sip, buying myself a second. My shoulder aches when I extend my arm, but the pain is manageable, even without the morphine. “My father hasn’t called you directly, has he?”
He presses his lips into a thin line and shakes his head. “No.”
“Then he doesn’t care enough to worry. Frol’s probably covering for me, and the old man accepted it without question because that’s how it works. He doesn’t ask about the jobs I do, he just expects them done.”
Ruslan eyes me. “This isn’t about your family.”
“Then what’s it about?”
“The surgeon.”
I set the water down. Slowly.
“Her name is Dr. Kozlov,” I correct him.
“I know who she is. What her last name means is the part that should matter to you.” He leans forward, and the seat frame creaks beneath him. “Whatever this is, it needs to stop. You came here half-dead, and instead of focusing on getting back on your feet and reporting in, you’re lying in this bed making eyes at a Kozlov.”
I raise my index finger and warn, “Careful.”
“Iambeing careful. Someone has to be. You’ve clearly lost the ability to think past your dick.”
“You don’t know what you're talking about.”
“I don’t?” he scoffs. “I’ve driven you past this hospital at least a dozen times over the past six months. You had me pull her conference schedule in Kazan and told me it was for a security sweep. I sat in a parking garage for three hours while you watched her walk to her car, and when I asked what we were doing, you told me to mind my business. So don’t tell me I don’t know what I'm?—”
I’m out of bed before the last word leaves his mouth.
The IV stand screeches against the linoleum as I rip away from it. Two strides, and I’ve got him by the throat. I drive him backward into the wall hard enough to crack the frame of the safety poster, and his skull connects with plaster. His lower lip splits against his teeth on impact, and a thin red line runs down his chin. Behind me, the seat clatters to the floor, and something in the IV line pops loose.
He doesn’t fight back, though he could if he wanted to. The man outweighs me by thirty kilos with a decade of combat training that makes my violent history look like playground scrapping. But he just stands there with my fingers digging into his windpipe, glaring at me like a man who’s proving a point by letting me prove mine.
“Her name doesn’t leave your mouth again,” I state through gritted teeth. “Not in that tone, not in any other. Understood?”
He swallows against my hand. “Understood.”
I release him and step back. Adrenaline has turned the dull ache in my gut into something that feels like getting shot all over again. I press my hand against the wound and force myself to breathe through the pain.
Ruslan touches his chin, inspects the red on his fingertip, and wordlessly wipes it on his trousers. Then, he picks up the toppled chair, drops back into it, and looks at me like nothing happened.
“Feel better?” he asks.
