Twisted Throne (Bratva Born #2)

18. Dimitri

Dimitri

I reach the sitting room, and Mamma is on the floor beside Jacob who is a pale, waxy color, and he’s moaning, making strange sounds.

“He fell,” Mamma sobs, “and he’s not making sense.”

I drop Adriana’s hand and fall to the floor by the only father I’ve ever known. He can’t die. He simply can’t die. Fuck. Not yet. There are things I want to say to him. I’m not ready.

His face is drooping on one side, and I know what that means. He’s possibly had a stroke.

The paramedics burst into the room moments later and begin to do their thing. They ask Mamma and me to move out of the way for them. They take Jacob’s vitals, talk to him, ask him to respond to their instructions and ask him to squeeze their hand. He can do it with his right side but not his left.

“Okay, you’re going to come for a ride with us, Jacob, alright?” the female paramedic says.

My stepdad makes a gurgled sound in response. I want to sob for the first time since I was a kid, but I swallow it down. He needs me to be strong.

“Can I come in the ambulance with you?” Mamma asks.

“Of course,” the lady says.

“We’ll follow behind,” I say to my mother. “I’ll bring Nataliya.”

She nods and holds Jacob’s hand as he’s rolled out of the house on a gurney.

The minute they’re gone, Nataliya falls to the floor and starts to sob. Alexis kneels beside her and tips her chin up. “Hey, Nataliya, you need to hold it together. We must go to the hospital, and we all have to be strong for Jacob. He’s going to be okay.”

I hadn’t even told Alexis that I wanted him there, but he understood the assignment without having to be told. “Call Yuri too,” I tell him, “ask him to come with us.”

Alexis nods and takes out a monogramed handkerchief from his pants pocket and gives it to Nataliya. Then he calls Yuri.

I ring Virgil and explain what’s happened as Alexis helps Nataliya get her shit together so we can go. I fill him in fast, and he tells me he wishes my father all the best.

Virgil is in charge right now with my father out of the picture, but things are more complicated because I know Jacob wants me to take over if anything happens to him. I trust Virgil to act in Jacob’s place temporarily but longer term? I’m not sure how safe that would make our family. Would he want to remove any possible challengers to his throne?

That would mean me, of course, but he might even see Nataliya as a threat. It would mean she’d be in danger too. No one ever knows how a person will react when it comes to money and power.

If Jacob names me as his successor in the event of his death, that also causes issues for us and makes everyone less safe. I’m not afraid of Virgil and can deal with him, but I’d rather not have a civil war on my hands at a time of what would be serious grief.

He’s not going to die . He’s a strong man. A tough cookie who is far too damn stubborn to die. Not like this.

“Ready?” I ask Nataliya when she comes back into the room with Alexis.

“Yes,” she says with a sniff.

“Okay, let’s go.”

Yuri barrels through the door, hair askew and panting a little. “I’m so sorry, D,” he says. “I have five guys outside, ready to go with us, for security.”

“Good,” I say. “We’re ready.”

As we cross to the cars, I call Riley on the burner. “Where are you?” I ask.

“On the compound,” he says with a yawn. “Been watching TV and napping.”

“Thank fuck you’re on base. Can you head over to my house?” I ask.

“Sure.”

“Adriana’s little stepbrother is there, and I want you to oversee security. I have to go off base for a while, and I have Alexis and Yuri with me. Jacob has fallen ill.”

“Shit, boss,” Riley says. “Let me know how he gets on.”

“Of course.”

I toss the keys for the Mercedes to Yuri. “Drive us,” I order.

“Sure thing,” he says.

I sit in the back with Adriana, holding her hand, taking comfort from her being here. When we reach the gate, I roll the window down. “Keep extra vigilant,” I order. “No one gets in here unless they are close family or staff.”

“Yes, sir,” he says.

As we hit the road, Adriana squeezes my hand. “He’s going to be okay; I’m sure of it,” she says.

I’m not, and all I can do is pray to a god I had thought deserted me a long time ago. So I do. I hold Adriana tight and pray.

When we reach the hospital, after Yuri parks the car, we all file somber and quiet into the white walled, stark entrance hall. The scent hits me straight away and takes me right back to the days after being blown up. The memories rush in hard and fast, slicing deep.

The scent of explosive fills my nostrils. The boom rips through my body again, sucking the air and life from my ears. My brothers in arms dead and dying around me. The pain, then the nothingness, until the slow awakening to the antiseptic scent of hospital rooms and doctors telling me I would never have full hearing again.

The lady behind the desk informs us that Jacob has been taken to a ward where they are deciding treatment. “You won’t all be allowed into his room, but there is a waiting area up there. Take the elevators up to floor H.”

“Thanks.” I rush to the elevators, still holding Adriana’s hand. Having her here with me is keeping the outright panic at bay. Every now and then she squeezes my hand reassuringly.

We ride up the elevator in silence and step out onto a quiet corridor with low lighting and comfortable chairs. There’s a nurses’ station and I approach it. “We’re here with a man brought in just now with a suspected stroke, Jacob.”

“Dimitri.” Mamma rushes out of a room to my right before the nurse can answer. “You made it. Nataliya, come.” Mamma beckons to her. “Come see your father. He’s okay at the moment. He’s doing a little better, and they’re looking at administering a drug which can help with recovery.”

Nataliya runs to my mother and past her into the room. I walk over to Mamma. “So they think it’s definitely a stroke?”

“Yes, that’s what it looks like, They’re doing a few more tests, and if they all indicate the same thing, they’ll give this medicine. It needs to be administered within the first hour or two for it to be the most effective.”

She nibbles at her lower lip. “They say his survival chances are excellent but his long-term prognosis might include a certain level of disability, and it’s going to take him some time to get back on his feet.”

I know what that’s like. To have to fight to make your body do things you always took for granted.

After Nataliya has spent some time with him, I go in and sit with him for a short while, but then the doctors want to administer the drugs and they want him in an operating room when they do. We’re all ushered out of the room for an anxious wait until he’s wheeled back, and they say it seems to have worked well. Time will now tell.

They tell us all to go home and get some rest, and we can come back in the morning.

“I’m staying,” Mamma says.

“I can stay with you,” I offer.

“No, Dimitri,” she says. “Go home and make sure things are run the way Jacob would want.”

I nod and kiss her cheek. “Nataliya, come back with us,” I say.

She sniffs, and her eyes fill with tears. “I want to stay with Daddy,” she whispers, sounding like the kid she hasn’t been for some time.

“Come on,” Adriana says, taking her hand. “Come back with us, and we’ll make some hot chocolate and watch Disney movies if you can’t sleep. You need to be as rested as possible for your dad, and he’d want to know you were at home and safe.”

Nataliya offers Adriana a trembling smile and nods. Adriana wraps her arm around my sis and leads her down the corridor.

“You’ve got a good one there,” Alexis observes. “I’d put a ring on it if it were me.”

I smile darkly. “Oh, I intend to.”