Page 269 of Wicked Brutal

“You do not say his name near my baby.” Bella freezes. My fingers curl protectively over my stomach. “You don’t ask about my baby. You don’t talk about my baby. And you do not tell either of those men one word about my baby.”

“I won’t.”

“If Dad finds out—“

“I know.”

“No.” My voice rises. “You don’t know.”

“Yes.” Her voice cracks straight through mine. “I fucking do.”

Silence. And she hears it a second too late — hears exactly how much certainty was in it. Something flashes across her face that has nothing to do with Cat, or Becca, or even Penny. It’s fear. For me. Raw and unguarded and gone almost before I can name it, buried back under whatever she keeps it under. But I saw it. We all saw it.

She swallows. “Roman doesn’t know.”

“No.”

“Tremblay?”

“No.”

Her eyes close for half a second. “Good.”

That scares me more than anything she’s said. “Why?”

“Because they can’t, Alison.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

“I know.”

“Then give me one.”

Bella looks at me. No smile. No clever remark. Her eyes drop to the ring on my finger, then to the bruises on my arms — and when she speaks again, it’s quiet, and it costs her something. “Because whatever agreement exists between Roman and Tremblay depends on you being exactly what they agreed you would be.” My stomach twists. Her gaze drops briefly to my stomach. “This changes that. More than you understand.”

Becca’s fingers find mine. Cat goes colder beside me. Penny isn’t threatening Bella anymore — she’s listening.

Bella looks back at me. “Men like them don’t react well when something they think belongs to them changes without permission.”

The words land too intimately. Not like a warning she read somewhere. Like a thing she carries.

“You sound like you know.”

Bella goes still. And there it is — Victor’s wives, Celeste, everything she knows when nobody can explain why she knows it, all of it sitting right behind her eyes. I could push. I watch her brace for it, the way you brace for a blow you’ve already decided to take. And I don’t.

Bella waits. When I don’t ask, her eyebrows pull together, almost thrown by it. “You’re not going to ask how I know?”

“Would you tell me?”

Her lips part. “No.”

“Then I won’t.”

Something changes in her face. Small. Gone almost immediately. But it was there — surprise, and under it, something that looks unbearably like relief. Like not being made to say it is its own kind of mercy, and she isn’t used to being handed one.

“Ryan knows?” I nod. “The boys?”

“Yes.”