Page 172 of Savage Hearts

If I could only recall the word Mal said when I first woke up in the cabin. I asked him where he’d taken me, and he said a Russian word that I think was the name of his town, but my memory refuses to produce it.

I could start in Moscow, look for the tall glass building Mal’s apartment was in, but I doubt I’d recognize it. I only saw it once, in the middle of the night. And Moscow’s huge, too. I didn’t drive, so I don’t know what the building is near. And I couldn’t ask anyone, because I don’t speak the language. And anyone who helps me get there would be risking his life.

I have nightmares every night. I can’t wake myself up from them. Or maybe I don’t want to wake up, because they’re so vivid and include Mal.

It’s always the same. His face receding through the van window as Spider sped me away from him. His anguished expression.

His beautiful, haunted eyes.

I cycle through almost all the five stages of grief, except I never make it to acceptance. I just start over at denial, spend a lot of time in anger, then bargaining, finally ending up in depression, where I wallow until I get pissed again.

I make myself sick with it. Literally sick. At least once a day, I throw up.

Spider disappears. Declan makes a vague reference to him needing time off, and I don’t ask for specifics.

Then nothing.

Another week passes. And another. June becomes July. Sloane asks if I want to go back to San Francisco, because they paid the rent on my apartment while I was gone, but I say no. That’s not home now.

Home is a cabin in the woods with a man who’d rather see me in the arms of his enemy than keep me with him if it meant I’d be safe.

God, how I hate him for that. Chivalry is bullshit.

Then Fate decides to throw me a curve ball.

And man, if I thought it had been screwing with me before, this time takes the cake.

“You look like shit.”

“Thanks for that,” I say drily. “Your support is always so helpful.”

“No, I mean it,” says Sloane, watching me from across the kitchen table. “You don’t look healthy, Smalls. Your color isn’t good. You’re always barfing. And I think you’ve lost weight since you got here.”

With my fork, I poke at the pancakes on the plate in front of me. The sickly-sweet smell of maple syrup makes my stomach roll over. “It’s probably a tumor.”

Showing great forbearance, she refrains from smacking me. “It’s not a tumor.”

“Then it’s Lyme disease. Bugs have always found me tasty.”

“Can you be serious for a second? I’m really worried about you.”

When I glance up, I find her watching me with concern in her eyes. Sighing, I say, “I’m fine. Pinkie swear. It’s just… you know.” I make a vague gesture to encompass the general fuckery of my life. “The situation.”

When she makes a scrunchy face, I say offhandedly, “I’m not pregnant, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“How do you know?”

“I’m on the birth control shot.”

It’s only when she narrows her eyes at me that my heart skips a beat.

Wait. How long ago did I have my last shot?

Swallowing back the acid taste of the bile rising in my throat, I start frantically calculating dates in my head.

I was with Mal for three months. It’s been three weeks since I got back.

How long before I went to Russia did I get the shot?