Page 111 of Bratva Baby

I read it once, then again.

“She came asking,” Lazlo says from the doorway behind her, voice rough. “Late, but she came.”

Sofiya turns, and for once she has no answer ready.

Lazlo gets a new identity, a protected flat, and a role reviewing archived freight records from a place nobody gets to enter without two permissions and my personal desire to ruin their week. He complains about the chair. Sofiya sends him a better one. He complains about that too.

A few months later, the war has become something else.

Grigor and the boss meet twice, both times under too much security and too little trust. They agree on route boundaries, broker accountability, and a shared rule that anyone trying to revive the old feud for private profit gets cut out before he gets romantic about blood.

Sofiya reads the agreement and crosses out three sections.

Grigor calls me ten minutes later. “Your woman edits like her father.”

“She’ll enjoy hearing that.”

“She’ll pretend not to.”

“She will.”

A pause follows, and when Grigor speaks again, his voice has less iron in it. “Tell her I received the photo.”

I look across the room at Sofiya, who is standing barefoot by her desk, one hand on her back and the other holding a pen. The latest scan photo is framed beside her monitor because she accused me of being sentimental, then put it there herself when she thought I wasn’t watching.

“She knows,” I say.

“She should visit when she’s ready.”

“That may take time.”

“I have time,” Grigor says and hangs up before either of us has to pretend the conversation was comfortable.

Sofiya doesn’t ask what he said. She already heard enough from my face, and she’s kind enough not to make me explain my face to myself.

That kindness lasts four seconds. “You look constipated,” she says.

“I was having a family moment.”

“That’s what I said.”

I cross the room and take the pen from her before she can throw it at me. “You are getting very bold for someone who can’t get off the sofa without making that little sound.”

Her eyes go flat. “Mention the sound again.”

I place the pen behind me. “I wouldn’t dare.”

“You absolutely would.”

“Yes, but later, when you’re less armed.”

She looks down at her stomach, then back at me. “I am always armed now.”

I bend and kiss her because arguing with her has become the best part of my day, which is disgusting and true. She softens against me, then grabs my shirt and pulls me closer like she still hasn’t forgiven me for existing in a way she enjoys.

The baby kicks between us.

I stop.