Levi lets his hands fall limp at his sides, a pained expression crossing his distraught features.
Landon flashes me with his psychotic glare, then jams a finger against my chest. “Why the fuck didn’t you stop him? You were there. Why couldn’t you fucking stop him, you useless waste of bloody space!”
“Landon!” Levi pulls him away from me. “Nikolai is the reason he’s still breathing. Your brother could’ve done it where no one was looking and it would’ve been too late by the time anyone found him—”
“You’re right, I couldn’t. I didn’t see it coming.” My voice chokes. “But I don’t give a fuck about you or your opinions, Landon. The only one who can be mad at me is him. Not you or anyone else.”
He snarls at me, but his father manages to push him back.
No matter how much I hate the prick, he’s right. If I hadn’t let him snatch that piece of glass, if I hadn’t broken that glass, if I hadn’t hit Play on that fucking video, none of this would’ve happened.
But it did.
And here I am standing at Death’s door, begging him not to take away my Bran.
He believes himself to be all messed up, but he’s the only one who’s managed to keep me rooted in the present, the one who manages to stop my thoughts from racing in different directions with unnatural patterns.
As long as he comes back, I’ll murder his demons one by one until he’s ready to look in the mirror again.
Until he forgives himself for something that was not his fault.
A middle-aged doctor with Southeast Asian features steps outside and removes his cap, his face drawn and his movements sluggish.
My heart nearly drops to the floor. Please tell me that’s only because he’s exhausted—
“Doctor…” Levi’s voice sounds strained. “How’s…my son?”
“We managed to repair the nerves and the veins. He nicked his carotid artery, but, thankfully, the first aid response was fast enough and he got here in time. He was also lucky that no damage was inflicted on his vocal cords.” He smiles a little. “He’s stable now, but we’ll keep an eye on him in the ICU tonight.”
“Oh, thank you. Thank you…” Astrid pants through her tears and I realize she and Glyn have come to stand beside us.
He says something about the psychiatric department getting in touch, but I’m not listening.
My heart thunders back to life, rising from the ashes in one sweeping motion. I have to close my eyes as a long whoosh of breath escapes me.
He’s alive.
I asked—begged—him not to leave me and he listened.
He didn’t leave me.
Fucking fuck.
Fuck!
I let the searing emotions blast through me, whirling into the organ that beats for him. Everyone around me breathes for the first time, with shaky exhales while prayers of thanks are murmured, but I know even they realize this is not the end.
It’s the fucking beginning.
And I’m going to take the first step.
Every part of me urges me to stay and see him, hold his hand, and tell him I’ll never leave, not even if he pushes me away.
But before I can do that, I need to slaughter his first demon.
I walk away from the scene without a word and dial the number I called after we got here.
He picks up after two rings. “Is he okay?”
I release a fractured exhale as I nod. “Yeah, Dad. He’s okay for now.”
“Thank fuck.”
I exhale shakily into the phone, trying not to crack the fucking thing with how much I’m tightening my grip on it.
Soon after Bran went into surgery, I called my dad, breaking apart, hyperventilating. He told me to breathe and I asked how the fuck I was supposed to do that when the love of my fucking life was fighting death on a surgeon’s table.
That’s when I told him everything in a word vomit. Everything about Bran and me. Everything about how that fucking pedophile is taking him away from me and that I need her gone. Erased. Fucking eradicated.
Dad said simply, “Then we’ll get it done.”
He jumped on his private plane while I was talking to him and said he’d make arrangements with his godfather to find the vermin.
“Just landed, son. It’ll take me approximately an hour to get to North West London.”
“Give me an address, Dad. I need the fucking address.”
“Listen to me, Nikolai. I know you’re agitated. I can hear it in your voice, and it’s okay to feel like that, but you will not make a reckless fucking mistake that will get you arrested. I told you if we’re doing this, we’re doing it my way.”