He picks up on the first ring. “Yeah.”
“Staff parking lot at Moscow General. Dark sedan, east side of the street. Two of my old man’s guys are running surveillance on the Kozlov surgeon.”
“Do they know about you?”
“No. Standard family watch. But I need them gone before she notices them.”
“Gone how?”
“Use your imagination. Just make sure they have a reason to leave and a reason not to come back.”
“Done.”
I hang up and watch Polina cross the parking lot. She unlocks her car, tosses her bag onto the passenger seat, and sits behind the wheel for a beat before she sets her phone down and pulls out.
Not one glance at the sedan. Not a flicker of awareness that two men have been logging her every move. The surgeon who kept me alive with four flawless hours doesn’t notice the wolves at her door, and something in my chest goes tight and sore.
I’m about to follow at a distance, just to make sure she gets home, when my phone dings with an unknown number.
Stop sending flowers. I don’t date patients.
My pulse kicks up so fast that I feel it in my teeth. That card didn’t include my number. She couldn’t have gone to the florist on Tverskaya. She was on shift. But she could have called. And clearly, she did. Whatever she said, they talked. You can take the girl out of the Bratva, but the Kozlov blood doesn’t rinse out that easily.
I save the contact asDoctorand type back.
You’re not my doctor anymore. Have dinner with me.
Three dots appear. Disappear. Appear again. Then nothing.
I sit in the car and watch the screen for ten minutes before I accept that she’s not going to respond. That’s fine. I’m a patient man when the stakes are worth it, and Polina Kozlov is worth every second.
I drive home, take a shower, and check the screen. Nothing. Eat leftover takeout standing at the kitchen counter, check again, and still nothing.
I lay on my bed and stare at the ceiling, thinking about the sound she made when she came on my fingers in the hospital room. I get hard so fast that it hurts.
I close my eyes and see it like it’s happening again. Her thighs tightening around my waist. Her face buried in my neck to swallow the noise. The slick heat when I slid my fingers inside. Her body lifting when I curled them forward.
I wrap my fist around myself and stroke slowly, holding on to her expression right before she broke. Brown eyes going glassy. Lips parting. Flush spreading down her throat and under her scrub top.
What does she look like naked? Does the flush keep going? Is she loud when no one can hear, or does she always bite it back?
I’m getting close when the phone vibrates on the mattress beside me.
Where?
One word is all she gives me, and it’s the most satisfying one in the world.
I let go of my cock, wipe my fist on the sheets, and type back.
That Georgian place on Pyatnitskaya. Friday, 8 p.m. Far enough away that we won’t run into anyone we know.
Her reply comes in thirty seconds.
If this is a trap, I will end you on the operating table next time.
I grin at the ceiling.
Noted, Doctor. Wear something that isn’t scrubs.
