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Bee straightens up. I can sense the worry wafting off her, too. She’s been doing a good job suppressing it so far, but I smell it coming off her pores. “I’m sure everything?—”
“I’m done with lies, Bee. Even if you think they’ll protect my feelings. I want the truth, no matter how hard it might be.”
She swallows. “Dmitri was meeting Vittorio tonight. I’m thinking something didn’t go according to plan.”
“Dmitri was meeting Vittorio tonight?” I lean up and my eyes bulge out of their sockets. My son whines at my breast, so I grimace and settle back down, though my heart is now racing.
“Vittorio claimed to want to negotiate a new truce.”
“And Dmitri actually bought that? He actually went?” I exclaim incredulously. “Is that where Aleks is? And Pavel and the rest of the men?”
“Most likely. I haven’t heard from any of them in a few hours now.” She checks her phone again and looks anxiously towards the door. “If their silence stretches on much longer… Well, fuck. If it goes much longer, we’ll have to put the evacuation plan in motion.”
“You’re not serious.”
Bee nods. “Dmitri told me he already briefed you about the contingency plans he made just in case things went south. Well, the same goes. I’ll be your sherpa.”
This is supposed to be a happy day. But all the joys of childbirth are quickly being replaced by the fear of the unknown.
“I don’t want a sherpa!” I cry. “I want my husband.”
“I know, babe. And trust me: if I could bring him?—”
She breaks off at the sound of heavy running footsteps. The baby senses my nerves because he breaks off my breast and starts crying. A second later, the door bursts open…
And Dmitri is standing there, looking like he’s literally been fighting the giant snake from my dream.
“Jesus Christ, Dmitri!” Bee cries. “What happened to you?”
“Later, Bee,” he snarls, pushing past her to get to my bedside. “Wren, baby, I’m so fucking sorry I wasn’t here.” He looks truly repentant as he moves a little closer. I try to soothe the baby as he launches into a higher pitched wail, but I can’t take my eyes off Dmitri.
He’s bleeding from a thousand different cuts. Soot clings to every inch of him and the first signs of some heinous bruising are already beginning to show on his throat and face.
“My God,” he whispers as he looks down at our son in my arms. “He’s perfect.”
“What happened?”
He meets my eyes. “It’s a long story. But the important thing is I’m here now.”
“The important thing is I need the truth!” I yell. “Because I’ve had enough lies to last a fucking lifetime.”
He tosses Bee a glance over his shoulder and sighs. “You’re right. And I’ll tell you everything. But first, can I see my son?”
I don’t have the heart to deny him. So I twist the baby to the side and peel off some of the blanket so Dmitri can see his face.
He just breathes, his expression smoothed free of fear and anger in a way I’ve never seen before. I could love a man who looked like that all the time. I can trust the angry Dmitri to keep us safe. I can trust the arrogant Dmitri to keep us fed and clothed and sheltered.
But a Dmitri who looks like that…
I could love him.
“His name is Mischa. I named him myself and I’m not changing his name now,” I tell him firmly.
Dmitri smiles and nods like he’s lost in a dream. “I wouldn’t change it even if I could.”
His appearance is going a long way in softening up my anger. “I’d hand him over to you, but…”
He looks down at himself and laughs incredulously. “I’ll hold him later, when I’m fit to.”
