Page 5 of Claimed By the Pakhan

The woman halts down the corridor, her eyes filling with fear when she turns around. Gossip here must spread like wildfire. “What is it?”

“I need to know what’s going on with her.”

“Fia has some head trauma from when the car hit her. The amnesia should ease overtime as her stress levels drop.” She hesitates. “You being here isn’t helping. I suggest you leave before security bans you from entering this hospital completely.”

“Nobody can ban me from seeing my wife.”

“She might be your wife, but Fia doesn’t seem to think so. She needs time to process. Come back tomorrow when you’re more levelheaded.”

These people should see me at my worst andthentell me about being level fucking headed.

I grind my jaw and navigate my way out of the ward, flashing Fia’s doctor a look as I leave. I swear to God, any funny business and I’ll make sure he’s out of a job.

Fia is mine to touch. I decided it would be that way when we first met three years ago, when she was caught snooping around my dockyard. I made it so nobody else could have access to her. I know men, particularly their intentions when it comes to women like Fia. The honey blonde hair and fair complexion makes her every man’s fucking fantasy.

The cold air dries my sweat as I leave the hospital. The sun arches in the sky, sinking closer to the horizon. The cold snap in the air doesn’t quite reach my bones.

Nothing does unless it involves Fia and the twins.

Bylat,judging from the look on her face, she has no interest in me being involved, which wasn’t the case four days ago when she was choking on my cock, thanking me for giving her the world.

I pop open my car door, throwing myself into the driver’s seat. I clutch the steering wheel, digging my fingers into the leather as the grief does laps around my body, leaving no stone unturned. I ache in unfamiliar places, and my remedy to this sickness is lying in a hospital bed, telling me to get out.

I set off down the road, watching the hospital recede in the side mirror along with my future.

Fia is stubborn by nature, always testing her limits, never worrying about the consequences of her actions. Facts come first. She stumbled upon a suspicious dockyard record through work and made it her business to investigate, even though she didn’t have clearance. In her world, right and wrong are definitive, never up to interpretation…

Which is why she’ll never forgive me when she remembers how we met, and how we later came to be married…

3

FIA

“The bloodwork came back clear,”says the doctor the following morning while I’m browsing through the breakfast options, desperately searching for something to interest my appetite.

“That means I can go?” I abandon the menu, looking forward to eating junk food on the couch to make myself feel better.

“I’d like to do one more ultrasound before you leave.” The doctor keeps looking at me. “Did you remember where you were living before the crash?”

I grimace. “The waters are still murky.”

“The home address in your records was last updated eleven years ago. It says here,” says the doctor, consulting the folder, “that you’re currently living in Broadmoor.”

“Not anymore,” I scoff, wishing the amnesia wiped different memories.

“Since you can’t remember your new address and this is the latest on the system, you’ll have to go back there.” The doctor prepares the ultrasound, wheeling a portable computer this way.

I sink into the hospital bed feeling even more defeated than yesterday, removing my gown so the doctor has access to my stomach.

The car must have hit me hard, but it’s a slight knock compared to how hard reality is hitting me now. I stare at my bump, desperately pushing through the fog in my mind so I can remember just a glimpse of the past. But more clouds emerge, my head hurting the more I force myself to remember.

“The memories will come back,” assures the doctor as he sticks a gadget on my stomach, moving it around. “Forcing yourself to think will cause unnecessary stress on you and the babies, and the three of you have been through quite enough.”

A knock at the door steers my attention from the ultrasound screen. I look at the door, my breath catching when I see Emil. Those black eyes are unmissable, darker than the night.

He’s standing with a male nurse, so the doctor is obliged to at least see what the worker wants. “One second,” he sighs, removing the device from my belly and heading to the door. “I’m in the middle of an ultrasound,” he mutters to the nurse.

“The father should be present,” says the nurse. “You know the rules.”