Page 113 of The Bratva's Secret Baby
I close my eyes for a second.
I use the last clean number I trust. Irina answers on the second ring.
“Tell me,” I say.
“She’s alive,” she says. “She’s with Mila. She said if you were hurt, you wouldn’t walk through a public entrance.”
“She’s right.”
“There’s a private wing at City Clinical Seven,” Irina says. “Registered under Nikolai Sokolov. Not your old name. Everything’s filed.”
“Who knows?”
“One admitting doctor. He’s ours.”
I end the call and change transport again before heading toward the hospital.
They don’t bring me through the front. A side entrance, a corridor with pale walls that smell like disinfectant and overboiled tea. When I turn the corner, Ana is there. Mila is asleep against her shoulder, cheek pressed into Ana’s coat, her hand fisted in the fabric. The tin sword rests on the chair beside them.
“She made me bring it,” Ana says quietly. “She said you’d need it. To fight bad men.”
She doesn’t smile. She reaches for my wrist and grips it hard enough that I feel it through bone.
They admit me under Nikolai Sokolov. Security consultant, married, family listed. The nurse reads what’s on the form and doesn’t ask for history. Paper is enough here.
I refuse pain medication until the door closes and Ana sits beside the bed. Mila is asleep in the chair under a thin blanket. The tin sword sticks out of the bag at her feet.
“You delivered it,” I say.
“Yes.”
“More than one place.”
“Yes.”
I nod. The movement pulls at my ribs.
A trolley rolls past in the hall. Someone laughs too loudly down the hall and then remembers where they are. I look at her without distance for the first time in years.
“Are you going to run again?” I ask.
She holds my gaze.
“No,” she says. “Running bought time, that’s all.”
She studies me the way she did the first night she chose me with her eyes open.
“Are you going to keep living like every good thing has to be paid for in blood?” she asks.
“No,” I say. “Not anymore.”
The nurse comes back. “Mr. Sokolov,” she says. “Someone from administration would like a word. Just outside.”
Ana’s hand tightens around mine.
I swing my legs off the bed. My shoulder protests, and I ignore it. Mila is asleep in the narrow chair by the wall, curled on her side, her hand near the sword. She doesn’t stir.
“Who?” I ask.
