Page 36 of Forced By the Bratva

She was all that mattered to me. Scratch that! She was everything I had left and the only thing among all the other things in my life, including the awful condition I was forced to live with. Because of her, I agreed to this marriage, and I would do much more to ensure she wouldn’t leave me anytime soon. What would be left of me in the first place if she left?

I arrived at the hospital and pulled into the parking lot before I hurriedly got out of the car, almost forgetting to lock it. Luckily, the first person I bumped into when I got to the hospital's entrance was Dr. Patel, who oversaw my mother’s case.

“Doctor, is she okay?” I demanded hurriedly; I was speaking so fast that I forgot to breathe, and I practically had to restrain myself from grabbing him by the collar.

“Thankfully, yes,” Dr. Patel explained calmly, like someone with no worry. If not for the fact that I wasn’t in charge of my emotions now, I would have felt slightly ashamed for being as tensed and worked up as I was at the moment. “She just needs the blood transfusion, and then—”

“I’m ready,” I cut in, interrupting him. “We can go for the transfusion now.” I raised my sleeves to gesture to my arm, where I believed the blood would be removed.

“Of course,” Dr. Patel said. “This way.”

He led me into a hospital room where some nurses were already waiting with the equipment to draw the blood from me already in place.

I was made to lie on the bed as a nurse leaned over me to check my vitals while trying to ask some questions related to my health.

“Are these necessary?” I asked the nurse with a scowl. I wished that they would quit with all the questions and go ahead with the process immediately before something terrible happened to my mother.

“It is, ma’am. We need to know the state of your health before we can proceed with the process. It could lead to disastrous consequences if we start without verifying your condition first,” the nurse explained patiently.

After a long train of questions, the process eventually started, and after a while, we were done.

I waited in the lobby for what seemed like forever before the doctor finally came to me to give an update on my mother’s condition.

“Well?” I asked, immediately standing up from my chair and going to him.

“The transfusion was a success; thankfully, she is now stable. However, she is still under observation, so you can’t visit her yet.”

Dr. Patel’s words did much to calm my nerves; my stomach, churning like a tornado earlier, was finally calm, as if a soft breeze had blown over to remove all the tension.

“So, when will I be able to see her?”

“Soon,” came Dr. Patel’s soft reply, and he patted my shoulder lightly to reassure me.

I walked out of the hospital in slow strides, much calmer than I’d felt when I arrived. I reached into my bag while walking to the parking lot to retrieve my phone, which I’d carelessly tossed in my haste to get to the hospital.

My breath hitched when I looked at my screen to see about fifty missed calls from Feliks and several texts.

My heart, which had settled down a few minutes earlier, spiked and started to beat violently again as I stood in front of the hospital, going through the messages Felix had sent to me.

The anger he felt and the rage that had built up after hours of trying to reach me did not fail to show in his text messages. I’d been so worried and concerned about my mother’s condition that I couldn’t even think about him all this while.

I swallowed hard as I held my phone shaky, going through the messages. I knew that I was done for.

In my head, I began to rehearse the words I would say in my defense, hoping to find something convincing enough to forgive me and save me from the situation I found myself in. Just moments from reaching my car, I noticed a familiar figure leaning against the vehicle.

It wasn’t hard for me to recognize that masculine figure, the same man who’d brought me pain and who I had been wishing I would get the chance to hit hard across the face so that he’d pay for everything he’d put me through and how he broke my heart.

“Leo!” I muttered to myself through gritted teeth.

How had he known I was here? Did he follow me? What did he even want?

I took a deep breath and clenched my fists till my knuckles almost started to hurt as I approached him.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded as I stood in front of him.

“Jenna,” he said in an emotional voice; he was hoping he’d get me to soften because he spoke gently, but it made things worse. “Can you at least allow me to talk to you?”

He tried moving closer, but I stepped back to prevent him from reaching me.

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