Page 72 of The Pakhan’s Hidden Heir

I feel so much better just hearing her voice without her even knowing what happened.

“I’m sorry,” I get out. “I know I shouldn’t call, I know, I know, I just⁠—”

“Don’t. Don’t you dare apologize to me.”

“Felix got hurt, and we had to go to this clinic. And I know I’m supposed to be keeping my head down and everything but I just needed a friend and⁠—”

“Sweetheart. Breathe.” Lada cuts me off wisely because I’d blubber on for an hour. I’ve never had to deal with him getting hurt like this before.

It’s not like I’ve made friends here or can easily call any family. The only family I have is dead or far removed.

Lada is the closest thing and I need her.

“I don’t have anyone to talk to,” I sob. “I’m just overwhelmed and sad. It’s lonely being here without anyone.”

“Raina,” she croons softly, and I hear her smiling. I should’ve listened to her when she warned me to stay away from Bastian, but then I wouldn’t have Felix. He’s my whole world now.

“Listen to me,” she says. “Are you listening? Every mother alive has sat in that chair with an injured child, terrified out of her mind. You’re not supposed to know everything, okay?”

The gentle rebuke makes me stop and think how right she is. But being totally alone, it’s easy to feel like I’m failing. “You’re right,” I agree, and I move toward the living room now, sucking in a breath to calm myself.

“Look, you did the right thing. You got him help. Is he okay?” she asks, as I float through the kitchen into the living room where he sits with his sucker the doctor gave him, staring at the TV.

“He’s got a nasty sprain. I have pain meds for him.” Something feels wrong though. I just still have this foreboding sense that I shouldn’t have gone to that clinic. If I tell Lada about it, she’ll think I’m silly.

“Then give him pain meds and feed him ice cream and enjoy the extra cuddles. God it’s so good to hear your voice.”

Movement beyond the curtains catches my eye, a man walking past the letter box.

At first I think it’s Darnell here to flirt with me again, but he doesn’t typically dress in black. The letter carriers wear blue.

“Lada,” I mutter as the gut-sick feeling I have swells into anxiety.

“What?”

Her voice is cut off by a knock at the door, and through the frosted glass I can see a dark shadow looming.

It’s a man, and he’s tall.

I don’t have to see him clearly to know he’s wearing all black, and my stomach drops to the floor as a vivid flash of a dream I had now six years ago comes to mind.

“I’ll call you back,” I whisper, staring at that door. Whoever this is, I have a feeling they followed me here from the clinic, and I have a feeling I’m in trouble.

29

BASTIAN

The phone wakes me out of a dead sleep. I grope for it, still half-drunk from last night’s whiskey binge and nursing a throbbing headache. The fact that someone is calling me in the middle of the night means some sort of trouble, which is what I pay Akim to take care of for me.

“What?” I growl into the receiver, not bothering to open my eyes. It’s four a.m. The world should be sleeping not fucking with my rest.

“Mr. Dravenko, are you awake enough to get some good news?” Grigor’s voice meets my ear but I’m not in the mood for any news. It’s four a.m. Can’t this wait ‘til morning?

I push up onto an elbow and grumble, “Do I get a choice?”

“We found her,” he says, then pauses to wait for my response.

My eyes shoot open and my heart flips as I try to let those words sink in. Five years I’ve had the best men money can hire out looking for that woman, and every one of them came back with nothing. I quit letting myself hope we’d find her a long time ago.