Chapter Two Hundred One
Sephie
Everyone came to the penthouse for lunch, including Adrik. I wasn’t expecting him to have a break in his day. He clearly enjoyed my excitement to see him, holding me in front of him long enough to calm down so the guys wouldn’t also see how much he enjoyed my excitement.
He looked down at me, concern plainly in his eyes, “what’s this about you going to the police, salnishko? Are you sure you want to do that?”
I chewed on my bottom lip, but nodded. “Ivan thinks it would be helpful to get the information the police have on that guy. It might help find him. Apparently, nobody else can remember what he looks like, but I can clearly remember his face.” | shuddered again, seeing his face flash in my memory. Adrik pulled me closer, feeling it.
“I’ll call the commissioner this afternoon and find out what he knows about this police unit that’s trying to find the doctor. We can have them come here. I don’t like the idea of you going to a police station,” he said, kissing my forehead.
I heard Viktor’s deep voice behind us. “That’s a better idea. You’re going to need to be there with her, Boss. We had to rush out of the hospital before her shaking got too bad.”
Adrik clicked his tongue. “Why didn’t you come to me when you got back?” I looked up at him. He looked almost angry,
“I was okay. Viktor helped keep it from getting worse when we were at the hospital. I screwed up your day yesterday. I didn’t want to do it two days in a row,” I said, apologetically.
His eyes softened. “My schedule doesn’t take priority over you, solnishko.”
Ivan said, “told you.” I didn’t even look in his direction, I just snapped my fingers and pointed in his direction. I could hear him laughing.
He looked over my head to Viktor. “You really helped?”
Viktor shrugged his shoulders, a somewhat worried look on his face. “I don’t think it was the same as you, but it kept it from getting worse, which is what we were worried about.”
Adrik took a deep breath and visibly relaxed. Viktor looked at him, puzzled. “You’re not mad?”
Adrik laughed. He looked down at me as he answered Viktor. “No, the opposite, really. It makes me worry less to know that she has someone else who can help if needed.” I smiled up at him, watching as he tried to hide his heart skipping a beat.
We were in Adrik’s office at the end of the day, waiting for someone from the police department to show up so I could give them a description of what the doctor looked like. Adrik had called the commissioner after lunch. He knew about the doctor and said they’d been trying to catch the guy for a decade. He said the same thing as Dr. Williams; no one could remember what he looked like. Adrik told him that I could remember and the commissioner said he would send someone out that night. He also told Adrik that they could have all the information the police had on the guy.
“He told me that we had free rein to find this guy. He said his people have been looking for him for a decade and they’d only run into dead ends. He was still operating in the city, as they met new victims regularly. Apparently, he’s gotten worse as the years have progressed. He’s moved on to even darker things,” Adrik said as we were waiting
Misha asked.
“He’s into organ harvesting row. The hospitals are reporting people showing up with missing organs, with no memory of how it happened,” Adrik said.
“For real? I thought that was just an urban legend,” I said.
“According to the police commissioner, it’s real. He hasn’t released that info to the public yet, but he said it’s been happening more frequently lately,” he said.
“Just when I thought things couldn’t possibly get any worse,” I said, mostly to myself.
Viktor’s phone rang. He got up, walking out of the office. He returned a moment later with one uniformed police officer, one plain clothes officer, and a third with a sketch pad in his hands. Adrik stood, walking toward them. He extended his hand to all three. “Thank you for coming on such short notice,” he said. He motioned for them to sit.
“We should be thanking you, sir. We’ve been chasing this guy for years and never found anyone that can remember what he looks like. We still haven’t been able to figure out what drugs he uses to wipe memories. They’re out of the victims’ systems quickly, which makes it impossible for us to test them,” the plain clothes officer said, taking a seat across from the couch I was
When Adrik got up to greet them, I moved closer to Andrei, who was on the other side of me on the couch. I was scared. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders while I curled up next to him, wanting to hide. He held me against him tightly. “You’ll be okay, spider monkey. We’ll protect you,” he whispered to me.
The plain clothes officer looked at me. “You must be Sephie,” he said. I nodded. Adrik sat back down on the couch, but sat closer to me so I wouldn’t have to move from Andrei. The officer glanced at Andrei and at Adrik, then back to me. “I’m Jason,” he said. He looked at the uniformed officer. “That’s Ryan. And that’s Will,” he said pointing to the guy with the sketch pad. “We’re really grateful to have found you, you know. You seem to be the only one that can remember what this guy looks like. Can you tell us what happened?”
I looked up at Andrei, who gave my shoulders one last squeeze before I moved so I was sitting between him and Adrik. I had my hands pulled inside my sleeves so the officers couldn’t see my bruised knuckles. I didn’t need them asking questions about anything else today. Adrik stretched his arm across my lap as I started to recount the story of my uncle and what had happened the night he took me to this doctor.
I gave the sketch artist, Will, as complete a description as I could of what the doctor looked like. He would ask me questions as I described the guy, trying to get a better idea of what he looked like. He was working on his sketch pad the entire time we were talking. Finally, he said, “okay, tell me if this looks like him. We can change anything that might be off.” He turned his sketch pad and I saw the face of the doctor that had taken my uterus. I stared at it for a moment, then felt like I was going to vomit. 1 jumped off the couch, racing to the bathroom, which was across the floor from Adrik’s office, not wanting to use his private bathroom to spare everyone from having to listen to me vomit.
I wasn’t going to make it. Thankfully, everyone had gone home for the day and I spotted a trash can. I grabbed it and emptied what was left of the burrito I had for lunch that day Into the can. I felt Adrik’s warm hands on my back. I was still bent over, not sure if I was going to vomit again or not. I groaned. I hated vomiting and I hated it worse when it happened in front of people. He didn’t say anything, he just gently rubbed my back until I stood up. When I did, he ushered me toward the bathroom. When he came into the bathroom with me, I couldn’t help myself. I looked at him, saying, “under any other circumstances, this would be kinda hot.”
He smirked at me. “I’ll remember that,” he said as I turned on the water in the sink. I washed my hands then splashed water over my face. He handed me a paper towel when I was done. I glanced at myself in the mirror. I could plainly see the Bar on my face. I knew everyone else would be able to as well, I caught sight of my hands as I was drying my face, I quickly pulled my sleeves back over my hands to hide them. Adrik noticed. I just looked at him and said, “I should’ve worn gloves and told the was a germophobe or something
“It will be fine, solnishko. Don’t worry,” he said as he pulled me to him.
When we walked out of the bathroom, all five of the guys were lined up outside the office, waiting to make sure I was fine. I couldn’t help but smile to myself. “They worry almost as much as you do,” I said.
He clicked his tongue. “More, I think. Which is saying a lot.”
