Page 24 of Bratva's Mercy
Still nothing.
His jaw tightened slightly, but otherwise he acted like I hadn’t spoken at all. My head pounded harder with every step.
“Don’t let me fall asleep,” I muttered.
Sergei’s stride faltered.
“What?”
I forced my eyes open again, though they kept drifting shut on their own.
“Don’t let me fall asleep,” I repeated, pressing my fingers against my temple. “I might have a concussion.”
Sergei’s grip tightened immediately. “Okay.”
My vision blurred again as he opened the passenger door of his truck and lowered me carefully into the seat.
“Leo.” His hand caught my chin, forcing my eyes up to meet his. Green. His eyes were a light green with yellow flecks. They were so pretty. “Stay with me.”
The command vibrated straight through my skull. I blinked slowly, fighting the heavy pull of sleep creeping into my brain.
“Okay,” I muttered weakly.
My gaze drifted toward his hands as he pulled back. They were covered in blood. Deep red streaks ran across his knuckles where the glass tore through his skin. For the first time, I realized he was naked from the waist up, abs for days on display.
I sucked in a deep breath and grimaced. He had punched through a car window to reach me. Why was he doing this? If he’d left me to die, it would have solved his problem of constantly needing to monitor me.
On the way to my house, Sergei punched in someone’s number, someone named Nik.
“Don’t tell me,” the Nik guy answered, his background noisy. “You’re not coming back to the club because you’re going to sneak into the doctor’s house and spend the night watching him sleep while thinking of?—”
Sergei growled something at him in Russian, effectively cutting him off, but it was too late. I’d heard enough. I knew he watched my house, but had he ever broken into my home and watched me sleep? His friend couldn’t be serious,right? His tone seemed light enough to suggest he was joking.
Oh fuck, my head hurts too much to think.
“Nik’s sending someone to handle your car,” Sergei said softly, but even so, his voice grated against my sensitive nerves.
“Hmm,” I grunted, and slumped against the passenger seat, fighting the heavy pull of sleep dragging at my eyelids. Every bump in the road sent a pulse of pain through my skull that radiated down into my neck.
“Leo, stay awake, milyy.” Sergei reached across the console and gave my knee a tight squeeze.
“Don’t call me that.”
“What? Milyy?”
I had no idea what that meant. “No, Leo. Only my friends call me that, and you’re not a friend.”
“What should I call you then?”
“Dr. Cavanagh is fine.”
He let out a snort, and I sat up straight, ready to argue with him.
“Fine,” he said after a few seconds. “Dr. Cavanagh, it is.”
But Dr. Cavanagh didn’t sound right on his lips either. It sounded too…playful?
The truck slowed as we turned into my neighborhood. Familiar houses drifted past the window in soft blurs of porch lights and trimmed hedges. I’d been so close to home.
