His face tightens when I wince, but he says nothing. He only adjusts me carefully against his chest.
I rest my head near his shoulder. His heart is beating hard.
“Your side,” I whisper.
“It’s nothing.”
“You were shot.”
“So were you.”
“That doesn’t make it nothing.”
His mouth brushes my hair. “Later.”
I close my eyes for one second.
Later.
The word feels like a gift.
A few hours ago, I didn’t know if either of us would have one.
Yaromir carries me down the stairs through the wreckage of his father’s house. Broken glass crunches beneath his shoes. Smoke hangs under the ceiling. Men stand aside as we pass, some with blood on their shirts, some staring openly at me as if they’re seeing a ghost.
At the bottom of the stairs, Kirill remains against the wall.
Yaromir pauses. For a moment, neither of them speaks.
Kirill looks older now. Not weak, exactly, but stripped of the distance that made him seem untouchable. Blood has a way of making men ordinary.
His gaze drops to me. “You should be in a hospital.”
“I was,” I say.
His eyebrow shifts slightly.
Yaromir’s arm tightens.
Kirill looks back at him. “Take her back.”
“I will.”
“And Yaromir.”
We all go still.
Kirill’s voice lowers. “Whatever comes next, it’s between you and me. Not her.”
Yaromir studies him. I feel the answer in his body before he says it.
“Then keep your son away from my wife.”
Kirill nods once.
It’s not enough, but it’s still something.
We leave through the broken front doors.
