Page 201 of Mile High Ruin

Perfect.

Months apart, one dramatic reunion, and I vomit at his feet.

I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and stay bent forward for another few seconds while the worst of it passes.

Vadim doesn’t say anything.

I straighten slowly and look over my shoulder. He’s watching me, but not with disgust.

Not even close.

Concern has replaced whatever coldness was in his face before, his brows drawn together while his gaze moves over me with the same unnerving attention he used to give every bruise, every headache, every moment I tried to tell him I was fine when I wasn’t.

“Don’t,” I say.

His expression tightens. “Don’t what?”

“Look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you’re worried.”

“I am worried.”

A laugh escapes me, brittle and exhausted. “That is unbelievably convenient.”

Anton is still a few yards away with one of the men on the ground, but he has turned slightly aside, giving us the illusion of privacy without actually leaving.

I look back at Vadim. “You can’t be here.”

His face becomes unreadable again. “Yet here I stand.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“I know.”

My hands are shaking. I shove them into the pockets of my coat. “You have to let me go.”

For the first time since he appeared, something changes in his expression that I can’t immediately read.

I continue before I lose the nerve. “My brother is getting worse. I spend almost every day at the hospital. I barely sleep, I barely eat, I don’t know what the doctors are going to tell me from one week to the next, and I can’t do this with you on top of everything else.”

He says nothing. That silence encourages me.

“My life is falling apart, Vadim.”

His jaw shifts. “I know.”

“Then leave me alone.” The words hurt more than I expect. I force myself to keep going. “I don’t have anything left to give you. I don’t have answers about your sister, I don’t have whatever you think I have about Petrov, and I can’t go back to being locked inside another house while Ethan is dying in a hospital.”

The last word nearly breaks my voice. I swallow hard.

Vadim looks at me for a long moment.

Then he steps aside. Just like that.

For one blissful second, I think he’s actually going to let me go. Anton doesn’t move to stop me.