Somewhere beyond the alley, an engine turns over. The sound is distant but distinct, a low rumble that rolls through the cold air.
I feel it more than hear it. A vibration through the concrete, and through his body beneath my hands. His eyes drift past me, awareness tightening in his features, his breath pulling shorter. His entire body tenses, his muscles locking.
“Listen to me,” he urges, fingers brushing my sleeve, leaving another dark smear. “You need to go.”
My heart stumbles, skipping a beat before resuming its frantic pace. “I'm not leaving you.”
Another engine answers the first, closer now. Tires crunch over gravel, the sound too purposeful to ignore. He swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing. His eyes return to mine with urgency burning through the pain, overriding it.
“Please,” he repeats, and the word is raw, scraped from somewhere deeper than his wound.
The word hangs between us, thin and urgent. And for the first time since I knelt beside him, my focus fractures, fear cutting in cold as headlights sweep across the far end of the alley. My pulse surges, loud enough that I'm sure he feels it through my hands, even through the pressure I'm maintaining on his wound.
His fingers curl against my sleeve again, weaker this time, his grip slipping instead of locking. “You have to leave,” he urges, his breath dragging, each word an effort. His accent thickens, the edges roughened by pain and desperation. “Now.”
“I'm not finished,” I counter, my voice shaking despite my effort to keep it even. My hands tremble against the scarf, the wool heavy with blood. “You'll bleed out if I?—”
Another engine draws closer, low and heavy, the vibration traveling through the ground beneath my knees. A third follows, then a fourth. Doors slam somewhere beyond the light. Voices rise, clipped and unfamiliar, the cadence unmistakably Russian. My stomach twists, cold dread pooling there. I've heard the language before, in passing, but never like this. Never laced with command and danger.
I press harder against his wound, trying to ignore the tremor working its way up my arms, and the way my breath comes faster now, shallow and panicked. Blood has soaked through the scarf entirely, soaking the wool until it sags between my hands.He groans, his head tipping back, and his teeth gritting hard enough that I hear them scrape. The cords in his neck stand out, and his jaw locks.
“Look at me,” I demand, leaning closer, my knee sliding on the damp concrete. The cold seeps through my scrubs, biting at my skin. “Stay with me. Breathe.”
His eyes find mine again, the pupils blown wide, dark and intense even as his lashes flutter. His chest lifts in an unsteady inhale, then another. He follows my cadence like a tether, like I'm the only thing keeping him alive.
“In,” I coach quietly, my voice low and close. “Out.”
The alley changes all at once. Footsteps hit the concrete, fast and closing in, shadows peeling away from the headlights and stretching toward us. I see them clearly now, dark shapes moving into position, spreading out until the space tightens and there’s nowhere left to go.
He exhales, a sound torn loose from his chest, rough and pained. “They're here.”
“Who?” I whisper, the word trembling on my lips.
His mouth opens, then closes again. Whatever he was going to say was lost. Instead, his eyes fix on my face, intent and unsettling in their clarity.
“Listen to me,” he continues, urgency threading through the pain that's dragging him under. “If they see you here?—”
A shout cuts him off, loud and unfamiliar, then another. The words come fast and clipped, bouncing off the brick as footsteps close in. Movement appears at the edge of my vision as figuresstep out of the light, spreading across the mouth of the alley and cutting off the direct path back the way I came.
My chest tightens, my ribs squeezing around my lungs. Blocked.
His fingers curl into the fabric of my coat, panic breaking through his eyes now, raw and unfiltered. Whatever control he’d been holding fractures.
“Go,” he demands again, his voice tearing through blood and strain. “Now.”
I shake my head, stubbornness flaring even as fear crawls up my spine, lighting every nerve. “I’m not?—”
A figure steps into the light, tall and broad, dressed in black from head to toe. His face is hard, all angles and shadow, his eyes sweeping the alley with quick, assessing focus. Another follows, then another, their attention locking immediately on the man bleeding out.
One of them issues a short, urgent command. Two move toward him at once.
No one looks at me yet, and in that narrow space of time, I make the decision. I shove my scarf deeper into his wound, pressing down with everything I have. He cries out, his body tensing, back arching away from the wall, the sound ripped from deep in his chest. It slices through me.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, leaning close so only he can hear, my voice wavering despite my effort to keep it even. “I’m so sorry.”
His hand tightens around my wrist one last time, the grip already weakening, fingers slick with blood and sweat, and his eyes hold mine, dark and intent despite the pain, carryingrecognition, gratitude, and fear all at once. Not for himself, for me. Then he lets go.
I rise quickly, my heart hammering, and back away, keeping low, my eyes locked on him until the shadows swallow me. I turn and run.
