"He drove four hours," Viktor says quietly. "Got the location from one of Luca's men who was already on site. Left immediately when he heard."
I think about Luca sitting in a car for four hours in the middle of the night. For the daughter he disowned months ago and clearly hasn't stopped thinking about for a single day of it.
Some things are more stubborn than pride. Turns out love is one of them.
"When I'm out of this bed," I say.
"Two days minimum—"
"When I'm out of this bed, we sit down. All of us." I look at Viktor. "We end this together."
"The Volkovs won't make it easy."
"No." I lean back against the pillows, feeling the weight of everything settling across my shoulders — the wound, the exhaustion, Leo's betrayal, the war that's been coming since before I got out of prison. All of it at once. All of it mine to carry. "Nothing worth finishing ever is."
Viktor stands. Moves toward the door, then stops.
"For what it's worth," he says, not turning around. "She didn't move from that waiting room once. Four hours. She sat there and counted those ceiling tiles and talked to the baby and to you." His voice is carefully neutral. "Thought you should know what you've got."
He leaves before I can respond.
I lie there in the quiet room and look at the ceiling.
Somewhere outside this door, Aurora is standing in front of her father for the first time since he told her she was a disgrace, and Luca is standing in front of the daughter he hasn't been able to stop loving no matter how hard he tried, and whatever happens in that hallway will determine something I can't control.
That's the hardest part. The things I can't control.
My hand moves to my side, to the bandaging there, and I press my palm flat the way I've been pressing it to Aurora's stomach. Feeling what's real. What's still here.
I'm going to end this,I think. It arrives the way my most certain thoughts always do — quietly, without drama, absolute.Leo. The Volkovs. Every piece of this. I'm going to dismantle all of it and I am going to bring her something that looks like peace and she is going to raise this child without looking over her shoulder.
That's the only outcome that exists.
The door opens.
32
AURORA
The hallway is empty except for him.
He's standing at the far end near the window, arms crossed, still in his coat like he came straight here and never thought to take it off. He looks older. That's the first thing I notice, and it punches through me in a way I wasn't prepared for — the deeper lines around his mouth, the grey at his temples that wasn't there before. He was always so large in my memory, so immovable, and he still is, with broad shoulders and the particular stillness of a man trained never to show weakness.
But he looks older.
When did that happen? Was it always there, and I just never let myself see it?
I stop walking.
Twenty feet between us and I just — stop. My legs make the decision without consulting me, and suddenly I'm standing in the middle of this empty corridor with my heart doing something violent in my chest and my hands gone cold and all the things I've rehearsed saying to him in the dark over the last several weeks evaporating completely.
He sees me.
He yanks to his feet from where he'd been leaning against the wall, one fast movement, and takes a step forward, and then he stops too.
We just look at each other.
Papa.
