Page 80 of The Bratva's Bounty
"Can't believe I'm saying this, but please don't die." It was one of the twins again. "You know I can't go to an actual therapist. Otherwise, I'm going to end up in maximum lockdown at a mental prison." Arseny; it was Arseny because he was the only one who ever referred to me as his therapist. Also, he was the only one of the twins to actually converse a lot with me.
"Alexei, anything?" Nikolai inquired.
I assumed the sigh I heard was from Alexei. "Can't say for sure until we get him back home and I properly examine him." Always the oh-so-careful doctor—this asshole. "But I still feel a pulse. It's really thready, but it's there."
It wasn't long until my lungs screamed with happiness as a natural warmth blanketed my body.
Fresh fucking air, thank God.
Forcing my chest to expand—bad fucking idea—I took in as much oxygen as possible. My whole body convulsed with my violent coughs as I hacked, what felt like, my life out; I couldn't stop no matter how hard I tried to tighten my torn muscles to suppress my coughing.
At least the stark pain shot my eyes wide open.
Spitting out the pooled blood in my mouth, I weakly looked at my brothers with the best smile I could muster up in my state. "… I fu..cking…love…you…all…" I could die on the way home for all I knew, so it was better to get it out now, just in case.
"Hey, hey, hey." Alexei's hands grabbed my falling face, holding it up. "Do not close your eyes! I don't care what you do or say but do not fall asleep. You understand me?"
Iwanted to roll my eyes at him for ordering me around, but I was afraid that if I did, then I'd pull my eyelids down. "Fu…ck…y…ou…" I garbled out, causing some more blood that had pooled again in my mouth to spill over.
The four of them practically ran to the nearest vehicle and threw me into the back with the twins. "Kolya, you better drive like your wife's in fucking labor," Stepan joked in a serious voice as he slid into the passenger seat.
"No, I was planning on going twenty under the speed limit," Nikolai snarked at Stepan with a sneer. "Just shut up and hold on tight."
"Oh, this is going to be a ride from Hell," Arseny commented as he held my body down with Alexei.
"Or a ride to Hell," Alexei muttered.
Oh boy, this might be my last car ride if things went as I thought.
Fuck me.
My fucking head.
God, someone shut that beeping up.
Groaning, I strained out a few coughs as I tried to turn my broken body, only to be stopped by a set of hands. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, no, do not do that." God, never thought I'd be so happy to hear Angel scold me. "You need to stay on your back. Otherwise, you're going to pop your stitches and compromise your breathing."
Taking a slow and painful breath, I forced out a weak chuckle. "Well sh…it… That…" Fucking hell, I couldn't even finish a short quip back at Angel.
A soft whirring sound buzzed in my ear, and my upper body was lifted up into a half-sitting position. Thank fucking God because that made breathing so much easier and better.
Lulling my head to the side, I looked at Angel with grateful eyes. "Thank you." I barely managed to get the two words out above a whisper.
Smiling happily at me, Angel leaned in and hugged me very carefully. "I'm so glad you're alive." Her voice shook with relief as she clung to me for a bit.
Her happy smilestraightened out sternly after she pulled away. "Try not to move too much yet. I still have to secure your dressings and give you an abdominal binder and a rib belt." And there was nurse Angel—great. "If you bust a stitch and we have to put you together again, I will feed you Nicole's chicken noodle soup."
Grimacing a smile, I strained out a chuckle. "I think I'd rather spend an hour in the torture chamber with you than have a lick of my Nicole's food." At least I wouldn't end up with food poisoning with Angel.
"Hey! That's just rude!" And there she was. "Move!" Nicole practically ran up to Angel and playfully nudged her away to throw herself all over me.
"Hey," Angel scolded Nicole, smacking her on the back. "Careful, he's injured! You're going to make him worse!"
"Nikolai, your wife is putting too much stress on the babies by yelling at me!" Nicole shouted toward the door before looking at Angel and flipping her off.
Everyone filtered into the cramped room within seconds of Nicole shouting. I swear, it was as if they were all waiting by the door or something. "Get off of Lev, Nicole." Alexei chided with a sigh as he elbowed himself through everyone to my bedside. "Angel is right. His condition isn't fully stable yet, so you could do some damage to him." He proceeded to carefully pry Nicole away from me.
Letting my head fall back against my pillow, I slowly turned it around to look at everyone in the room with appreciative eyes. "You all have no idea how fucking happy I am to see you all." I wasn't an emotional person by any means, but fuck, I couldn't hold my tears back.