Page 83 of Bratva Daddy
"Mr. Petrov, I understand your concern—" Dr. Harrison started, but Viktor wasn't interested in platitudes.
"You understand nothing! My daughter was scheduled for treatment this morning, treatment that would have helped her recover from her delusions, and instead she's—what? Trying to kill herself with medications you people gave her?"
"We're investigating how she obtained—"
"Investigating?" Viktor's voice climbed toward hysteria, and I realized something beautiful: he was panicking. His perfectly controlled plan was falling apart. "She could have died! The press will have a field day with this. Deputy Mayor's daughter attempts suicide in psychiatric facility? Do you have any idea what this means for your hospital's reputation?"
Through slitted eyes, I watched them argue—Viktor threatening lawsuits and withdrawn funding, Dr. Harrison trying to maintain authority while his career flashed before his eyes, nurses whispering about protocol failures and who would take the blame.
Nobody was thinking about ECT anymore. Nobody was thinking about fixing my delusions or burning Alexei from my brain. They were thinking about damage control, about liability, about how to spin this disaster into something that wouldn't destroy careers.
I'd bought myself time. Now I just had to wait for the sirens.
I didn’t have long to wait.
The first siren was so faint I thought I'd imagined it—a ghost of sound threading through the medical wing's forced calm. My fingers tightened imperceptibly on the sheets, the only movement I allowed myself while playing unconscious. Seven-twenty-three according to the monitor's timestamp. Alexei had said to wait for sirens, and now, distant but undeniable, they were coming.
Then another joined it. And another. Not the singular wail of an ambulance but a chorus building like a storm system moving in from the harbor. The heart monitor beside my bed stayed steady—I'd learned to control my breathing despite the adrenaline flooding my system. Three days of performing medication compliance had taught me that much.
"What the hell?" Patricia's voice drifted from the nurses' station. "That's a lot of sirens."
"Probably a pile-up on the FDR," someone responded, but doubt colored their tone. These weren't accident sirens. They had the urgent, coordinated quality of something bigger.
The sirens multiplied, growing louder, converging from different directions like they were surrounding something. Or someone. Through my barely open eyes, I watched Patricia move to the window, her scrubs rustling with nervous energy.
"Jesus Christ," she breathed. "There's FBI vehicles everywhere. SWAT vans. What the—"
The television in the corner—always on, always muted, always playing NY1—suddenly commanded the room's attention as someone grabbed the remote. The volume came up mid-sentence: "—breaking news from Federal Plaza where Deputy Mayor Viktor Petrov has been arrested on corruption charges. We're getting reports of a massive drug bust at Pier 47, forty million dollars in cocaine seized—"
The medical wing erupted. Voices overlapping, footsteps running, everyone suddenly needing to see the screen where my father's face filled the frame—not the controlled expression he wore like armor but genuine shock as federal agents led him away in handcuffs.
"The Kozlov crime organization," the reporter continued, her voice sharp with the thrill of breaking news, "seventeen members arrested in what the FBI is calling the largest corruption scandal in New York history—"
Through the chaos, one person stayed focused on their job. A young nurse, maybe twenty-five, with tired eyes and steady hands, checking my IV with the kind of attention that said she actually cared whether her patients lived or died. She glanced at the television, then back at me, and I saw the moment she noticed my eyes weren't quite closed.
She leaned closer, pretending to adjust my oxygen levels. "Your father?" she whispered, so quiet I almost missed it under the chaos.
I didn't respond—couldn't risk it with others still in the room—but something in my expression must have confirmed it.
"That why you're really here?" Her fingers were gentle on my wrist, checking a pulse we both knew was racing. "Not actually crazy?"
The smallest movement of my head. Not quite a nod but enough.
On the television, they were showing footage of Pier 47—DEA agents in tactical gear, massive amounts of cocaine laid out like evidence in a courtroom drama, Kozlov soldiers face-down on wet concrete. Everything we'd planned, everything Alexei had promised, playing out in real-time while I lay trapped in a bed I didn't need in a hospital that had become my prison.
"Holy shit." Dr. Harrison's voice cut through the noise, and not with his usual professional composure. "Petrov's been funding this wing for three years. The board's going to—"
"Forget the board," someone else said. "If he's really connected to organized crime, everyone who took his money is about to get investigated."
The young nurse was still beside me, her hand resting lightly on my arm like she was taking my pulse but really offering comfort. Through the chaos, more sounds filtered in from the hallway—shouting now, not celebration but panic.
"Where is she?" Viktor's voice, not commanding anymore but desperate, almost unrecognizable. "My daughter—I need to see my daughter!"
"Mr. Petrov, you're under arrest. You have the right to remain—"
"I don't give a damn about rights! Clara's in danger! That monster, Volkov, he's probably already—"
"Sir, you need to calm down."
