Page 65 of Doctored Vows

Needing to do something before I maul my husband in front of my elderly grandparents, I shift my eyes in the direction I hear my grandfather’s respirator, then gasp like my lungs are as airless as his when I see his aging eyes smiling a grin his oxygen mask covers.

“Grampies.” I sprint to the man who has loved me as much as my father has.

“Missy Moo,” he breathes out slowly when a handful of tears I can’t hold back soak his gown. “The only sunshine in the world is you.”

“Before you go.”

My tears dried hours ago, replaced with laughter only ever released when your heart is so full it is about to spill over. There’s a chance of them returning when Dr. Muhamed steps out from the portable workstation at the side of my grandfather’s bed. Maksim didn’t solely contract him to safely move my grandfather. He is his new full-time caregiver.

“I thought you’d like to see these before calling it a night.” He hands me my grandfather’s latest stats and markers. “You would swear he is in the early stages of his diagnosis.”

“I wish he was.” I take in the stats that show a drastic increase in lung capacity. “His VTs and IRVs are exceptional. Are you sure these are correct?”

“Yes,” he answers, his voice choked with laughter. “I ran them twice just in case.”

I try to think with my head instead of my heart. “It’s not the surge, is it?”

Terminal lucidity, or death surge as some medical staff call it, is when terminally ill patients have abrupt and unexpected increases in alertness and energy. It often fills their family with false hope. I don’t want that to be the case, but it is a phenomenon I’m anticipating undertaking in the next six months.

“Perhaps if he were on his death bed, but he still has a long way to go, Dr. Hoffman. If this is terminal lucidity, I will hand in my license to practice medicine.” When he realizes he is filling me with the false hope a grandchild of a terminally ill patient should never receive, he adds, “But I will continue testing and keep you abreast.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that.”

He farewells me with a smile before dipping his chin to Maksim standing behind me. I can’t see him. He is directly behind me. However, I detected his presence a second after Dr. Muhamed had requested to speak with me.

I take a moment to consider how much more energetic my grandfather was today before I spin to face Maksim. “Would it be okay if I sat with him for a little longer?”

I almost say “alone,” but Maksim’s head bob announces he is aware of my wishes before he confirms them by saying, “I will come get you in around an hour.”

He presses his lips to my forehead, breathes in my scent for barely a second, and then heads for the elevator. He announced earlier that he had purchased the two three-bedroom apartments below the penthouse. When I joked that he’d never require six bedrooms, he gave me a heated look that made me wish we were alone before he said he was transforming one into a home office so he can be close to me no matter my rostered shifts.

I’m not going to lie. I melted into a puddle when he said that.

Everything he’s done for my family has me shouting his name before he enters the elevator. “Maksim.” He stores his cell before spinning to face me. “Thank you.”

Again, my praise isn’t enough, but when they’re all you have, they are all you can give.

His sultry watch tells me I will pay my restitution with far more than words, but since I’m not worried, I mouth goodnight before tiptoeing toward the bed my grandfather is resting on.

I don’t know how much time passed before I fell asleep on the bulky leather chair beside my grandfather’s bed. It was long enough for Dr. Muhamed to conduct another set of stats on my grandfather’s oxygen levels and hum in approval, but the heaviness of my limbs and the thump of my temples make it seem as if I didn’t crawl into bed until after the sun woke up.

That can’t be the case, because even with my vision partially blocked by the spicy-scented man pulling me into his chest, I can see the large window that spans one wall of my grandfather’s room. It is pitch black outside.

“I can walk,” I murmur to Maksim as he steers me away from my grandfather and the night duty nurse who arrived to relieve Dr. Muhamed shortly after Maksim left.

A hint of the cigarette he must have consumed while we were apart filters in my nose when he replies, “You can, but I’d rather carry you.”

I lean in closer, using his pecs to hide my smile. He smells divine. He’s a little sweaty, but that can be expected since he’s carrying me down a flight of stairs instead of using the elevator.

“I didn’t know these apartments had stairs.”

“They’re all interconnected by servants’ hallways.” His love of architecture is exposed when he tells me how this building was once owned by a Russian aristocrat who built it for his first wife. “The top level was hers to do whatever she pleased with.” My groan vibrates through his chest when he says, “The other sixteen were for his mistresses. He snuck between each floor using the servants stairwell.”

“Then why not call it the mistresses’ stairwell?”

The laughter I hear in his chest isn’t released, but I see it twinkling in his eyes when he lowers them to me and says, “Because, to him, they were the same thing.”

“Ah…” I reply, my one word long. “The aristocrat part of your statement threw me off the scent. If you had said he was Bratva, I would have clicked on quicker.”

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