Page 38 of Bratva Baby

I lean closer. “That’s not a number.”

“Go to hell.”

I lift the ultrasound sheet between us. “You can tell me now, or you can wait until your family pulls it out of you and kills the child growing there. Pick which version you prefer.”

Her whole face shifts. Fury hits first. Then hurt, open enough to cut. Then the truth settles in behind it. She knows I’m right. She hates that I’m the one saying it.

Her voice comes out torn. “How dare you.”

“Sofiya,” I say, breath tight, “you can keep fighting the words. It doesn’t change what this is.”

“You think I don’t know what they’d do?” she shouts. “You think I haven’t thought about that every second since the doctor said it out loud?”

I let go of her wrist. She stands there rubbing the skin I caught, tears slipping free now, and she doesn’t try to hide them. She turns her face away and wipes at it once, angry at herself for letting me see. All at once, she looks younger and worn down, and something in me shifts with it.

“How far?” I ask again, quieter this time.

Her shoulders shake once. “Seven weeks,” she says.

“Is it mine?” My voice comes out flat and deadly serious.

She laughs, broken and harsh. “Who else do you think there’s been?”

“Say it.” I press her back against the wall, my face inches from hers.

Her eyes cut up to mine. Grey-blue, wet, furious, humiliated, and still sharp enough to cut. “Yes,” she says. “Yes, it’s yours.”

Everything inside me shifts at once. Claim. Protection. Blood. Threat. Future. Every dark instinct I have reaches for the same answer. Mine. I drag a hand over my face and turn away for a second because if I keep looking at her right then, I’ll either put my fist through the wall or pull her against my chest and never let her go again.

When I turn back, she’s still watching me. My eyes drop to her mouth, then lower to the line of her throat and the soft rise of her breasts under the shirt. She is maddeningly beautiful.

“Who else knows?” I ask, getting hold of myself again.

She shakes her head. “No one.”

“The doctor?”

“She knows I’m pregnant, not who I am.”

I nod, stack the papers neatly, and slide them into the folder to buy myself three seconds of control. When I look up again, she’s still standing by the table with both hands braced on the edge, tears dried, a lock of hair stuck to her forehead.

Something in my chest pulls hard. “You should’ve told me,” I say quietly.

She lets out a rough sound that lands between a laugh and a sob. “When? By post?”

I step in close enough that she has to tip her head back to keep looking at me. “The second you knew.”

“The second I knew, I was alone.”

Then I plant both hands on the table, boxing her in without touching her. If I touch her now, I won’t keep hold of myself.

“You listen to me now,” I say with no humor in my voice. “Leonidov men are hunting you. Maks wants whatever you took, and if he gets his hands on you before I do, he’ll pull the truth out one way or another. That child becomes leverage the second they confirm it. You know that. I know it. So this part is over.”

Her eyes shine with fresh tears she hates me for seeing. “I’m not your puppet.”

I hold her gaze and say it cleanly. “You’re coming with me, Sofiya, whether you agree or not.”

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