Page 251 of Mile High Ruin

“You didn’t.”

I pull back enough to look at him. His eyes are red, his face bruised, and he looks more exhausted than I’ve ever seen him, but he’s here, solid and warm and watching me like he has not moved from this spot since I went under.

“You’re hurt,” I say.

“It’s nothing.”

“That is never true when men say it.”

“It’s close enough.”

I touch the bruise near his cheek. He catches my hand and presses his mouth against my palm.

The kiss we share after that is careful because I’m weak, because my body is sore, because there are too many wires and tubes between us, but it’s not distant. His mouth stays against mine long enough for me to believe that I’m awake, that he’s here, that our son is alive, and that whatever comes next won’t be something I have to survive alone.

When he pulls away, another thought returns.

“Petrov.”

Vadim’s expression changes, but it doesn’t harden the way I expect. “What about him?”

“Is he dead?”

“No.”

I stare at him. “He isn’t?”

“He’s stable.”

“You didn’t leave him behind?”

“No.”

“Why?”

Vadim looks at our joined hands for a moment before answering. “I’m done with vengeance.”

I don’t know what to say to that. Vadim, who once looked like revenge was the one language he trusted completely, sounds tired of it in a way that feels real.

“Iosef used everybody’s grief,” he says. “Petrov and I have enough blood between us already. I won’t make another corpse part of our son’s first day.”

Our son.

The words keep striking me in different places.

I see the baby twelve hours later. Vadim wheels me to the NICU because the nurse insists I shouldn’t walk that far yet, and I only stop complaining when I realize Vadim’s hands are too tense on the wheelchair handles.

The nurse explains everything before we go in. The incubator. The breathing support. The monitors. The wires. The fact that he will look small, because he is small, and that doesn’t mean he’s not fighting.

I nod like I understand.

Then I see him.

He is tiny. Smaller than anything I prepared myself for. He’s wearing a little cap, his skin flushed and delicate, his chest moving beneath wires and tape and things I don’t understand. One hand rests near his face, fingers curled, and the sight of those fingers breaks me all over again.

Vadim stands behind my chair.

“He’s too small,” I whisper.