“Okay, Mr. Tough Guy,” the nurse says, motioning toward the chair. “Let’s see how bad this is.”
Nurse Jenny, as she likes to be called, tells me all about all seven grandkids while she cleans and bandages my forearm. I know she’s doing it to calm me and keep me from worrying too much, and I’m immensely grateful for it. She has a gentle touch—efficient while causing as little pain as possible. I imagine every single one of those grandkids adores her.
“So, you going to actually make her your wife, kiddo?”
I smile at being called a kiddo. “As soon as she’s well enough to walk down the damn aisle,” I say, making her laugh.
“Good for you, honey. Life’s too short. Don’t waste a damn second of it.”
I smile and thank her for everything she’s done. She pats me on the shoulder and while she finishes up, I send a quick text to Dima, letting him know that everything is okay and asking if he can bring me a change of clothes. I put my phone away right as Moira is wheeled back in. I’m standing and by her side before they’ve even got her hooked back up to all the monitoring equipment. Once everything is done, the nurses leave, and I sit with her, caressing the back of her hand with my thumb and wincing every time she coughs, wishing like hell I could take all this from her.
“Good news,” the doctor says when he walks back in. “No concussion, Moira. You and the baby are doing just fine.”
And just like that my world goes spinning out of control again.
Chapter13
Moira
“Wait. What?” I croak out, shoving the oxygen mask aside, sure that I’ve misheard what the doctor just said.
“You and the baby are fine,” the doctor says, looking from me to Nikolai, who’s standing there staring at me like he’s just been given the biggest shock of his life.
“I take it you didn’t know you were pregnant,” the doctor says in a much gentler tone.
“Um, no,” I manage to whisper, bringing a hand to my stomach while still reeling from the news. I do some very quick mental math and then want to kick myself for not noticing how late my period is. They’ve always been a bit wonky from training so hard, and I’ve just been so caught up in Nikolai that I hadn’t realized how much time had passed.
“Well, you’re not very far along at all, just a couple of weeks. We’re going to keep you here for a couple of days to monitor everything and make sure you’re okay and that the bump on your head goes down like it should,” he starts explaining, but I’m only half listening.
My brain finally catches up to what he’s just said. “Wait, no. I can’t stay here that long.”
Nikolai squeezes my hand and gives me a look that says there’s no way in hell my butt is leaving this hospital until the doctor says so.
“I don’t have insurance,” I finally admit, feeling my face heat up.
His eyes soften at my words. He leans down and gently pulls the oxygen mask back on my face like it should be. “I’m taking care of you, baby. You don’t have to worry about any of this.”
I start to shake my head, but he says, “I love you, and you’re carrying our child. Did you really think I wouldn’t take care of you?”
“I’ll be back to check on you later,” the doctor says, ducking out of the room, but neither one of us even spares him a glance.
Nikolai slides his hand under mine, resting it on the bare skin of my stomach. His dark eyes are a mix of so many emotions that I can’t figure out what he’s thinking, and it suddenly becomes all too much for me—the fire, the absolute terror at waking up in a hospital, and then finding out I’m pregnant and my club has just been destroyed. I’m sobbing before I even realize I’ve started crying.
Strong arms immediately wrap around me, holding me close. Being careful of my IV, he picks me up and sits down in the hospital bed so he can cradle me in his lap while I sob into his chest. He must feel really sorry for me because he doesn’t argue when I pull the oxygen mask off. When I notice the bandages sticking out from his shirt, I cry even harder, remembering how he risked his life to save mine. I would be dead if he hadn’t shown up at that exact moment and decided to run into a burning building like an absolute lunatic, except I wouldn’t have been the only one who died. Our unborn child would’ve died right along with me. It’s very possible Nikolai would’ve never even known that he could’ve been a dad.
He cups my head, kissing me and whispering to me in Russian. I don’t know what in the hell he’s saying, but it’s damn nice. It soothes me in a way that’s hard to describe, almost like if I could understand him, then the spell would be broken. This is just like beautiful white noise that has my sobs turning into sniffles and then finally to the shaky, hiccupping breathing that always happens when you’ve cried beyond your body’s ability to cope with it.
Leaning over, he grabs a tissue from the table by the bed and hands it to me. I clean myself up and realize that I must look like an absolute mess. They put me in an unflattering hospital gown before they took me for testing, and I can see how dirty my skin is from the fire, and that’s not even counting the puffy eyes and tear-streaked face I’m sporting at the moment.
I swear he can read my mind, because he chooses that exact moment to smile and say, “Sometimes I look at you, and you’re so beautiful that I can barely stand it, like a gorgeous piece of art that you get completely lost in, but you know you’ll never really ever be able to fully understand. You’re overwhelming, Moira, and you constantly take my breath away.”
I look at him like he’s lost his mind and then laugh, but it quickly turns into a coughing fit that has him looking all worried again.
“Super hot, right?” I ask when I’ve finally caught my breath.
“Yes, everything about you is,” he says, and I have to hand it to him because he says it with a straight face, and, God, do I love him for it.
“When I thought I’d lost you today,” he says, and then shakes his head as if the very idea of it is more than he can stand. “I’ve never felt anything even close to that kind of pain.” His dark eyes are still red from the smoke he endured for me, and there’s dark smudges on his face and neck, but he looks more beautiful to me in this moment than he ever has. “A life without you is not one worth living,” he says, running his finger along my jaw before cupping my face and smiling. “This isn’t at all how I planned on asking you, but will you marry me, Moira? I want to spend every second of the rest of my life with you.”