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Silence.
Then…
“WHAT?!”
I stare at her calmly so that she understands that I’m not kidding.
“How… how is that—wait! Does Kolya know that?”
“Of course.”
Geneva frowns. “I don’t understand.”
“That’s because you don’t know the whole story. Maybe I should have told you sooner, but I’m telling you now. And I need you to just sit there and listen, okay?”
For once, she nods wordlessly.
“Adrian had this whole past life I didn’t know about. The night he died was the same night I found out that I was pregnant. And right after that, I met Kolya at his funeral.”
“You met him at Adrian’s funeral?”
“They’re brothers, Gen.”
She just blinks at me. “Adrian was born Bogdan Uvarov, Kolya’s younger brother. He left the Bratva when he was younger and took a different name to get away from the world he knew. Except… he couldn’t really give it up the way he thought he could.” I take a staggering breath. “There was so much he kept from me. So much he lied about. And being the naive idiot that I was, I never asked too many questions.”
“Y-you’re going to marry Adrian’s… brother?” Geneva asks slowly.
“It was only ever meant to be a fake wedding,” I tell her. “A way to throw Ravil off.”
“Ravil?” she asks. “How does he fit into this?”
I nod. “Ravil is Kolya and Adrian’s cousin. He formed a competing Bratva with a breakaway faction of Kolya’s. And now, he feels threatened by the fact that Kolya will soon have an heir.”
Geneva frowns. “So it’s not Kolya’s baby you’re carrying…”
“But Ravil doesn’t know that.”
Slowly, she starts to get it. Her eyes go wide. “You were trying to trick him into believing that you were carrying Kolya’s baby so that he would have the upper hand.”
I nod. “Exactly.”
“But… I still don’t get it. What’s in it for you? Why are you going along with this?”
I take her hand and hold it tight. “I’m going along with it now because I love him, Genny,” I say, looking her in the eye because I want her to know how much I mean it. “I love him and he loves me.”
“And how do you know he’s not manipulating you like Adrian did?”
It’s a fair question, but it hurts regardless. I had been prepared to walk away from Kolya and the whole wedding. The only reason I hadn’t is because he convinced me that his feelings for me are real.
What if it had all been an act?
I consider that for all of five seconds before I fall back on the last week with Kolya and everything we’ve shared in that time. It isn’t just about what he said, it’s about what he did.
Pressing a fresh lemon soda into my hand every time I finished the last.
Massaging my knee every night before bed to ward off the phantom pain.
Pulling me close into his arms when I dreamed of crashing glass and screaming metal.
