“Felix, remind me, where would the cable exit my body?”
“Just above the navel.”
Gregor’s brows rose in surprise. Yeah, she thought that would be a shocker. Baby’s got a plug.
“And it ties into a battery pack, right?” She looked straight at Gregor as she said that. “One I wear around my waist 24/7?”
“Yes, this diagram shows how it works.” Happy as a boy with a toy, Felix pulled a brochure out of his attaché. Maddy waved it away, but Gregor took it and studied it, his face grave. “You see, there is the battery pack on one side of the belt, which powers the impeller, and this box on the other side is the system controller. It regulates the pump speed.”
“And I would have to avoid all strenuous activities, I assume.” Maddy met Gregor’s eyes again. “So how’s that for sexy, Faustin? A puffy, couch-bound wife with a crusty plug in her belly and a belt full of batteries that never comes off. Still hot on the marriage idea?”
Gregor sat down on the edge of the bed. Suddenly he looked as tired as her. “Maddy, turning you is marrying you. Turning is a binding process, it links us all the way down to the cellular level. And of course I want to turn you, because I want you to live.”
“I’ll be outside if you have any questions,” Felix said as he slipped away.
“Linked to the cellular level?” Maddy said. “That’s nuts! If that’s true, what happens to you if I die in this process?”
Gregor lowered his head, didn’t answer. It came together for her, all too clearly. This was as dangerous for him as it was for her.
“Oh no, Faustin. What happens to you if you’re tied to an invalid for the rest of your life? Or what if I die in surgery? No way. I’m not going to let you.”
Lifting his head, he met her eyes. His expression was resolved, his eyes, breathtaking blue. “That’s not how I see it.”
Maddy dug in her heels. Save and Protect. It worked both ways. She could save him. “Offer declined. I want you to leave now.”
“Maddy—”
“Go!”
Gregor glanced over at her heart monitor, which was beeping fast and no doubt looked like the Pyrenees. “I’m going to let you think about this,” he said in a placate-the-crazy-person tone. “I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“Don’t.” She softened her voice. “Gregor, I appreciate what you are trying to do. No one has ever done anything so nice for me. But the dice have already been thrown, you know? I’m okay with this.”
Gregor scowled. “You’d better not die before I come back tomorrow.”
Alex met him at the nurse’s station. He and Felix had been busy fascinating the nurses. “How’d it go?”
Gregor slammed through the exit without answering. As he did, he heard Alex saying goodbye to all his new friends, then he and Felix were falling in behind him as he walked down the hall.
“That good, huh?”
Felix said, “I should not have told her the odds.”
“No, it’s fair for her to know. We all have to know what we’re getting into.”
“Well, I should vanish before one of my old colleagues sees me.”
“Yes, go, Felix. Thank you. The plan for tomorrow is still in effect as far as I’m concerned.”
Felix bowed. “We’ll be ready.”
After he left, Alex said, “So?”
“She won’t do it. She’s trying to protect me, to keep me from being hurt if she dies in the process.”
“Great. That means she likes you. But doesn’t she know that you’re screwed either way?”
“I didn’t explain to her that I’m already bound to her.”
“Why not?”
“Think, Alex. I don’t want to guilt trip her into this. She has to want it herself. She has to want an artificial heart. She has to want to be like us. She has to want to be bound to me.”
They stopped at the elevators. Gregor felt a lot like driving his head through the wall, because even as he said these things, he knew it was hopeless that she would want any of it. “If she went through it just because she felt sorry for me, I don’t think she’d have the will to survive.”
“So you’re helping all this along by fighting with her?”
The elevator doors opened. “It’s what we do best.”
“Have you told her you love her?”
“I asked her to marry me.”
Alex sighed. “Yeah…good…but did you tell her you loved her?”
“Well, no, but she knows.” The elevator doors opened, Gregor glowered at the people waiting outside, none stepped forward, and the doors closed again. “Of course she knows. Why else would I be doing all this?”
“You know, you and Mikhail make fun of me for watching Oprah, but Misha is a monk, and you’re a Neanderthal.” Alex folded his arms and leaned against the railing. “You make me proud to be a metrosexual.”
“What?” He couldn’t understand a thing Alex was saying. “What the fuck are you talking about? Just tell me what I’m supposed to do!”
“Grisha, you’ve got to make with the nice.”
Chapter 10
The next night, just after sundown, Maddy had an unexpected visitor. All day she’d dreaded seeing Gregor again, fighting with him again. Her own family had moved into resignation mode. It was hard to watch, but they were troopers. They’d been at her deathbed more than once. When they left, she just wanted to sleep and sleep, but a strange woman slipped through her curtains, hardly stirring them. She had the build and posture of a dancer. Her dark hair was pulled back into a chignon and streaked with a single blaze of white. She wore a simple black dress and a little crocheted cardigan sweater that looked like they dated from the 1930s.
“Madelena López de Victoria,” she said in a thick Russian accent, her hands folded in front of her as if she were at a recital. “My name is Natalia Grigorevna Faustin.”
Oh no. The Mom. Gregor guessed she wouldn’t kick his mom out.
What else was there to say but, “Thank you for the cross”? She gestured to her IV stand, where the cross dangled like a Christmas ornament. Mrs. Faustin smiled. Maddy could see Gregor in her coloring, her broad cheekbones, and especially her wide mouth.
“You are most welcome. I do not wish to tire you, my daughter, but I wanted to tell you of the dream.”
“The dream?”
“The dream I had of you and my Gregor Ivanovich.”
“Oh, okay.”
“I cannot describe the dream in many details, you see. It was much about knowing.” She lifted her hands, waggling her fingers dramatically. “But I saw your name, written in fire, one single letter at a time. It burned my brain, so when I woke, I could find paper and write it down. Madelena Victoria de López. Such a pretty name.”
Maddy gave her a little smile, thinking okay dokey, lady.
“And I saw my Gregor’s name too, the names they were…tied?” She laced her fingers together in illustration. “And then I knew it was a true dream. Or is it a truth dream?” She frowned. “I’m sorry, I don’t know the English for this, but I knew you were for Gregor, his only one. My first son to marry! I gave him your name and told him to find you, my darling Madelena.”
“You told him to find me? When?”
“Almost three months ago now.” She perched on the edge of the bed and put her hand over Maddy’s. It was very cool. “If he had listened, if he were not such a stubborn bear, we would not be where we are now, would we?”
“Mrs. Faustin, I’m sorry, it might be the drugs, but I’m really not following you.”
“All that is important for you to know is that I would not have dreamed of you if you are going to die. You and Gregor are meant to be. You must have faith.” She reached out, took the cross in her fist, and gave it a shake. “Faith, huh?”
Then Mrs. Faustin leaned over and kissed her brow. “Sleep now, Madelena. Have no more worries.”
When Maddy woke again, she felt more rested than she had in days. She was not surprised to find Gregor sitting next to her bed, waiting for round two. She played possum for a few minutes, thinking about what Mrs. Faustin had told her, then she said, “Your mom was here.”