Page 50 of Bratva Baby

He smirks, wipes his thumb across my lower lip, and then sucks it clean. “Neither am I.”

This time, I don’t recall how many turns we take or when both of us fall asleep. Morning comes too fast, and by the time I’m fully awake, we’re already moving.

Anton gets me across the border with a speed that makes it clear he’d planned routes like this long before I ever became part of one. There are no crowded terminals, no waiting rooms, no ordinary delays. Cars change twice. Papers appear when needed. Men meet us, speak little, and move fast. By the time Moscow rises around us in gray glass and traffic, my anger has grown, but so has my curiosity.

We go directly to his penthouse, which is beautiful in the way such things often are. He has a private bar, a gymnasium, a park—everything I could ask for. But wherever I look, I see men in uniform. I stop just inside the entrance and look at him. “You dragged me into a cage.”

He takes off his coat and hands it to a woman who appears soundlessly from nowhere. “You’re still breathing, and so is our child.”

“That answer’s getting old.”

He shrugs, and suddenly, the humor I’d seen in him has cooled and he’s… colder. “It’s still correct.”

I refuse breakfast. I refuse the tea set out in front of me. I refuse the doctor he brings in within the hour, some polished woman in a cream blouse with calm hands and a medical case.

“You’re not touching me,” I tell her.

She looks at Anton. He looks at me.

“Sofiya.”

“No.”

His mouth flattens, but he nods once and dismisses her. That small victory keeps me upright for another ten minutes. Then he starts laying out rules as if he’s announcing meeting notes.

“You don’t leave alone. Your care is under my supervision. No one here speaks to you without clearance, and no information goes out unless I allow it.”

I laugh once. “You really hear yourself and keep going.”

His gaze stays on mine. “I haven’t gotten to the important part.”

“God help me.”

“In this house, and in Brotherhood eyes, you are no longer only a Leonidov woman.”

I go still.

He steps closer, not touching, but close enough that I can see he means every word. “You’re carrying Reznikov blood now. This is your home.”

16

SOFIYA

The first few days in Anton’s home turn out to be the hardest. Even though I know my baby and I are safer here than outside, I can’t thank him. The expensiveness I’m surrounded by is ridiculous to the point of being revolting. And there are men everywhere I go.

But being who I am, I do my best to learn everything within what limits I have. By the third day I’ve got timing, patterns, and one good chance.

Anton disappears into his office with Kolya and two older men I haven’t seen before. One guard shifts off the private elevator post. Another takes a call near the far hall and walks three steps farther.

I move through the service corridor, cut behind the library wall, slip past the blind patch near the kitchen corner, and reach the private lift before anyone says my name.

The panel lights when I touch it.

Hope is a stupid feeling. It arrives anyway and dies when the screen goes red. Locked.

Frustrated, I hit it again. Still red.

Anton’s warm voice reaches me lazily from behind before I can decide whether to swear or smash the panel with the nearest object. “Having fun?”