Page 75 of Obsession of the Bratva

I loved her. Still.

Despite everything. Despite the lies. Despite the anger. Despite the months that had nearly destroyed me. I loved her. And tonight proved something even worse. I couldn’t survive losing her again.

A knock interrupted the silence, and the aged doctor stepped inside. He looked much more relaxed now, which put me at ease as well.

“Mr. Romanov. Oh, you’re here. I have been wanting to speak to you for a while now.”

I stood up and realized his expression looked strange. He didn’t look worried but cautious. I couldn’t blame him since most people acted that way in front of me.

“What is it? Is something wrong? She is going to be okay, right?”

He glanced toward Vera and then back at me.

“She will be perfect soon. There is something else I needed you to know.”

My stomach tightened instantly. “What?”

“The injury isn’t serious if that is what you are worried about.”

“I know.”

Every instinct I possessed sharpened, and the doctor cleared his throat. Then spoke.

“While running routine tests, we discovered something.”

I stared at him, and he hesitated. Then, finally said the words.

“Miss Stavros is pregnant.”

The room went silent. Completely. Utterly. I heard the words. I even understood the words. Yet somehow, they refused to settle.

She was pregnant.

The doctor continued speaking, but I couldn’t hear him anymore. My gaze moved slowly toward Vera, but she remained asleep. Unaware. Unaware that the entire axis of my world had just shifted. Pregnant. I looked at her stomach and then immediately felt insane for doing so. There was nothing to see. Nothing different or visible, and yet everything had changed. Every single thing.

The doctor was still talking about the early weeks and careful monitoring. About follow-up examinations and doctor recommendations. But all of it felt like noise because one thought drowned out everything else.

A child. Mine. Ours.

The realization hit harder the second time. And harder still the third. A child with Vera. My hand tightened around the back of the chair. The wood creaked, and the doctor wisely stopped speaking. I wasn’t sure how long the silence lasted. Eventually I managed a single question.

“Are you certain?”

“Yes.” There was no hesitation in his voice.

I looked back at Vera, and for the first time in years, I found myself completely speechless. Just stunned. Because somewhere between kidnapping her from a church, surviving her lies, surviving my own obsession, surviving gunfire and explosions and months of misery, we had somehow created something else. Something neither of us had planned. Something neither of us even saw coming. Something that changed everything. I sat down slowly beside her bed, and the doctor quietly left.

The door closed behind him, but I barely noticed anything. My eyes remained fixed on Vera. She was pregnant. The word echoed through my head again and again. For the first time since this entire disaster began, I had absolutely no idea what would happen next.

And that realization terrified me more than any enemy ever had. But one thing I knew for certain was I had never been more thrilled.

Chapter 18 - Vera

“Vera? My love?” Nico’s voice came from a distance somewhere in the dark, but I could hear him. He was there. Somewhere. Around me. I wanted to reach out and touch his hand, but it felt as if I had no control over my body.

“Vera?” he called out again, and I felt as if I was returning to consciousness.

I woke up slowly, but pain arrived first, before anything else. It wasn’t sharp or overwhelming. Just present. A dull ache settled in my arm, reminding me of the bullet that had pierced through my skin before my memory fully returned. I remembered everything. The explosions. The attack. The safe room.