Page 65 of My Dark Horse Prince

“Hey, it’s me. I just wanted to say that I’m going in for surgery in the morning. I have pre-ops in a bit.”

“Oh.” She’s silent for a long moment. “Why aren’t you doing it here?”

“Kris is here. She’s my support system,” I say.

“You have one here.” She let me move in with her when Kris sold her barn, but I’m not sure I’d call couch-surfing at her place a ‘support system.’

I don’t bother arguing. “I saw a surgeon here, and he’s an American one. I think he’s pretty good. He says he thinks he can fix it. The guys in Latvia just told me they were hoping I might not need a wheelchair.”

“Fix it?” Adriana asks. “What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure yet,” I say. “It’ll obviously still need screws and plates, but he thinks in time, I might be sound enough to really use my leg, without much pain.” It would be a miracle if it was true.

“Could you ride again?”

It almost pains me to say the words. “That’s the hope.”

Adriana swears, and even though her dirty mouth gets us both in trouble a lot, it kind of warms my heart. She’s more than someone who roots for me. She loves me with her whole little warrior’s heart.

“Thanks.”

“And hey, listen. I know you only owed me five hundred. I just wanted to say thanks.”

“Huh?”

“It was so nice of you to have Kristiana send two thousand instead.”

“To have. . .”

“I paid rent first, I swear I did, but I have a race tomorrow, and I can feel it. This is the one.”

Oh, no. “Kris sent you two thousand euros?” I groan. “I didn’t tell her to do that. Did you really think you should get four times what you loaned me?”

“When I win tomorrow, I’ll pay her back and I’ll give you the five hundred, okay?”

For the love. “Please be smart,” I say. And then I hang up, because with Adriana, it’s a waste of energy to argue. She always does what she wants, no matter what anyone else says.

The pre-op appointments are pretty boring, and they take forever. We pick up Italian food on the way home, and since I have to wake up at four-thirty the next morning to get ready and be at the hospital by five, I head for bed almost as soon as we get home.

Before I can duck into my room, Grigoriy catches my wrist. “I just wanted to say that it’s going to be fine.” His voice is low, his expression intent. “Don’t get scared now that tomorrow’s almost here.”

“It’s hard not to worry, but I appreciate your vote of confidence.”

“Why do you think I’m insisting that I go?”

I shrug. “You’re a good friend?”

He laughs, low and long. “Sure. A friend you walk around the grounds naked with.”

Hey. “What did you tell those guys?” It did feel like he wasn’t out there for quite six minutes.

He shrugs. “I might have told them Hengshu was made up, and that you got nervous when they all showed up.”

I slap his shoulder.

Grigoriy just smiles. “I’m insisting on going tomorrow, and we’re paying extra to be in the gallery. I told you already, but my healing power’s able to repair anything that has just happened. So if he does something horrible or screws something up, I’ll bust through the window if I need to, and once I’m touching you, I’ll have access to my magic. I can heal you from any blunders he makes.”

Is that really true? I must believe it, because when I go to sleep, I’m actually able to stay that way all night without tossing and turning for once.

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