Page 200 of Marrying the Savage

I nod.

I should ask what happened. I should be worried. I should be angry that Damir promised we would talk, promised the doctor would check me and nothing else, promised without promising that he would not disappear again, and then he left anyway.

Instead, all I feel at first is relief.

Because he’s gone. Because I don’t have to look at him while the doctor’s words are still ringing in my ears. Because I have a few minutes, maybe an hour, maybe less, before my life changes again in a way I can’t take back.

“Okay,” I say.

My voice sounds normal. Too normal.

Mikhail looks at me more closely. “Are you all right?”

I almost laugh.

Instead, I nod again.

“Yes,” I say, touching my belly. “I’ll be alright.”

30

DAMIR

The photo comes while Sofia is still in the clinic. I look down at my phone and see the man from the club walking through Sergei Antonov’s side gate.

His face is swollen. His shirt is stained with blood. His right arm hangs wrong at his side. He’s barely steady on his feet, but he has enough strength left to go back to the man who sent him. It’s as I expected.

My men did exactly what I ordered. They beat him, threw him into the street, then followed from a distance.

Dead men don’t lead you anywhere.

This one led us to Sergei.

I close my hand around the phone. Sofia is sitting on the examination bed, watching me. Her blouse is unbuttoned at the collar, and the marks on her throat are clearer under the clinic light. Red pressure. Broken skin near the side. A faint line where his arm pressed in.

She thinks I missed it. But I rarely miss anything when it comes to her.

I saw it in the club. I saw it in the car. I saw it last night when my mouth moved too close to her throat and her whole body went still for half a second before she hid it.

The man didn’t just grab her. He tried to cut off her air.

He tried to kill her.

“What is it?” Sofia asks. Her voice is calm, but her eyes are not.

I put the phone away. “I need to step out.”

Her face closes immediately. That reaction hits harder than I expect.

Because she expected this. I touched her, took her to bed, promised a doctor and a conversation, then walked away the moment violence called.

Again.

“I’ll be back,” I say.

She looks away. “Sure.”

I want to stay. For one second, I almost do.