Page 35 of Broken Vows (Marital Privileges #4)

Emerson

M y hand shakes when I’m handed a glass of water. At some point during Andrik’s long confession about his contribution to his brother’s heartbreak, I sat down—whether by choice or force, I’m not sure. My mind is spiraling so much that I’m struggling to remember which way is up.

For years, I believed Mikhail had left me at the altar. I had no clue he was standing next to the priest, awaiting my arrival, because his grandfather bombarded me before I could walk through the church doors.

Now the way he looks at me makes sense.

He truly believes I broke his heart.

My mind races back to that moment, the confrontation with Mikhail’s grandfather, before I stammer out again in disbelief, “Mikhail was inside the church?”

Andrik nods, his unvoiced reply hitting me like a punch to the stomach.

Even hearing it multiple times hasn’t lessened its impact.

Mikhail didn’t leave me at the altar.

He was there, waiting for me.

Zoya moves closer when I involuntarily sway before she encourages me to take a sip of water. When I do, she smiles softly before squatting down in front of me, her swollen belly resting between her slim thighs.

The slightest groan sees Andrik at her side in an instant. “ милая , you’re meant to be resting.”

“Shh.” Zoya waves off her husband’s worry as if it is unfounded before returning her focus to me. “What Andrik orchestrated was wrong. Your shock is valid. But at the time, he believed he was saving your life and the life of your unborn child.”

A wave of confusion washes over me. “What are you talking about?” I ask, my voice barely a whisper. “What child?”

Andrik rejoins the conversation, willing to face the brunt of my anger if it will shield his wife from it.

“I saw the pregnancy test, Emerson, and the ultrasound results. I thought they were yours.” He looks down, his expression pained.

“My advisor did, too. We remained unaware until our grandfather passed, and the lineage he had amassed over the years was sought for his estate.” I’m sucker punched for the umpteenth time when he murmurs, “When you never came forward as claimant, I prompted his attorney to what I believed was another subsequent recipient of his fortune.” He coughs, seemingly embarrassed.

“It was then that we learned the pregnancy test and ultrasound images I had seen were not yours. They were?—”

“My mother’s,” I interrupt, flabbergasted.

For the first time, his stern expression softens before he nods. “I was wrong, but I thought I was protecting you.”

The room spins around me, and I feel like I can’t breathe. “How? It doesn’t make any sense. Even if I was pregnant, how could breaking us up protect me?”

Mikhail’s confession about his mother being alive and how she was used as an incubator by a government institution meant to keep her safe answers my questions on his behalf.

“They took his mother because she had conceived a daughter.” I lock my eyes with Zoya. “Because she had conceived you.”

Zoya grimaces before nodding.

I take a deep breath, trying to process everything. The betrayal, the lies, the misguided attempt at protection. Then I think about how Mikhail would have felt standing at the end of the aisle, waiting for me, and for him to believe I never showed up.

A solemn tear rolls down my cheek as I murmur to myself, “I should have gone inside. I should have fought harder for us. I should have trusted him enough to know he would never hurt me like that.”

“No, honey,” Zoya denies, waddling closer like a duck. “You are not to blame. Mikhail is not to blame.” Andrik drags in a needed breath when she murmurs, “Andrik isn’t to blame, either. He did, at the time, what he thought was right, and when he learned otherwise, he endeavored to fix his mistake.”

I bounce my wet eyes between hers, lost.

She smiles as if she finds my daftness cute before she relieves it.

“This”—her hand floats around Mikhail’s office as if she is highlighting the entirety of the Zelenolsk Manor—“was not Andrik Sr.’s doing.

” Her eyes shift to her husband, hot and heavy.

“Just a man who is slowly learning he is a mere mortal, like the rest of us.”

“So the five-hundred-million-dollar inheritance isn’t true?” I don’t care about the money. Truly, I don’t. I’m just lost as to what is happening and how I am involved in the cruel ruse Andrik is playing on his brother. Hasn’t Mikhail been through enough?

“The inheritance is valid,” Andrik announces. “It is just coming from me instead of Andrik Sr.”

His generosity is astonishing, but it doesn’t alter the facts. “Paying Mikhail off won’t fix this.”

“I know,” Andrik agrees, his head slightly bobbing.

“That isn’t what this is about. Mikhail is wealthy in his own right.

He wouldn’t have cared if he didn’t receive a cent from our grandfather’s estate.

” Zoya’s cheeks flush when a glint passes through his eyes as he rakes them over her face a second before he shifts his focus back to me.

“But you… he would do anything to help you. Especially if it would force you to become a part of his life again.”

Confusion echoes in my tone. “Then why not just encourage him to do that? Why force him to take part in an elaborately designed skit?” I answer my own questions. “Because you made him believe I had left him, so this is the only way you could make him face his heartbreak headfirst?”

When he nods, I want to hate him. I want to place the blame for a decade of hurt solely on his shoulders. But I also understand why he did what he did.

Ten years of heartache has nothing on a lifetime, and that is what Mikhail and I would have faced if the federation that once ruled this country had made the same mistake Andrik did.

There would have been no second chances then.

“During the first year of your separation, Mikhail tried many times to see you, but they always found a way to detour his thoughts.” The disdain in Andrik’s voice announces who he is referencing.

My name never left his grandfather’s “unworthy” list.

Shock rains down on me when my arrow veers toward the bullseye before it misses its target.

“The federation had used Mikhail to control me for years, but I had no clue they had gone that far.” My fists clench along with Andrik’s when he mutters, “They almost killed him when they forced him off the road on your birthday the first year you were apart, and although he didn’t fear dying, he believed in fate.

” I can’t breathe through my shock, and he worsens it.

“I don’t know if the numerous DUIs Mikhail collected over the years were poor judgment on Mikhail’s part or the federation’s doing, but I will find out. I promise you that.”

His word should mean nothing to me, but his love and respect for Mikhail are undeniable, so I absentmindedly nod instead of responding how I really want to—with violence.

After a deliberation nowhere near long enough to lift my confusion, I lock eyes with Andrik and say, “I understand why you did what you did, but it doesn’t make it right.”

“I know,” he repeats, his expression sorrowed, even though it is still somewhat firm.

It becomes unreadable when I add, “I don’t see Mikhail moving past this as easily as I have. I don’t know if he will be as forgiving. You are the only person he trusts, and you broke that. He may not forgive you.”

“I know,” Andrik parrots, his heartache undeniable despite his hard expression. “But that is a sacrifice I am willing to make to fix my mistakes.”

Mikhail and Andrik endured years of abuse together. They assisted each other through it, and it made their bond unbreakable. I don’t want this to tear them apart. Enough heartbreak has already occurred. I would give anything for it to end here, and I think I know a way to achieve that.

“I don’t think we should tell him yet.” Zoya and Andrik gasp in sync. As my eyes bounce between theirs, I say, “He deserves to know the truth, and I will tell him, but I don’t think now is the right time.”

They see what everyone does when you look at Mikhail—a cocky, confident man.

That isn’t what I’ve seen reflecting in his beautifully tormented eyes over the past few days.

I see the boy hiding behind the cloak his grandfather and father forced him to wear when he was a toddler.

The facade all men wear to stop them from getting hurt again.

Mikhail was told for years that he was unlovable, and his belief that I had left him at the altar would have validated their lies.

With Zoya and Andrik still needing convincing, but unwilling to share parts of Mikhail he has only ever shared with me, I say, “You’re his family, his one constant.

I don’t want to take that away from him.

” I lock eyes with Zoya. “He only just got you back. I don’t want anything to take you away from him either.

” I drink in their bond not even the massive pain in my chest can discount. “This could affect that.”

“I understand,” Zoya says. “That’s why Andrik made the decision he did. But I don’t think keeping this from Mikhail is the right thing to do. He thinks you broke his heart, Emerson. He thinks you left him.”

“He does,” I agree, fighting not to cry as Zoya’s hormones forced her to do during her caution.

“But even believing that, he still helped me. He still went through with this…” I mimic her earlier wave, my hand freezing halfway when I recall how he helped me last night.

“He still held back my hair despite his dislike of vomit.”

When Mikhail was a child, he mistook a bowl of vomit for a bowl of porridge. His mother couldn’t make it to the bathroom in enough time, and since Mikhail was in a hurry to rush back to Andrik’s side, he scooped and swallowed too fast to be cautioned by the kitchen staff.

As memories of Mikhail wiping a smidge of vomit from my bottom lip last night filter through my head, I shift the tension by saying with a laugh, “I also have ways I can encourage his forgiveness in a manner neither of you can.”

“That is true.” Zoya giggles, wiping at her wet cheeks, the humor in my tone lifting some of the tension hanging heavily in the air.

Our plan seems as firm as concrete until Andrik says, “And if he finds out before you tell him?”

I take some time to deliberate. It is nowhere near as long as it deserves, but I’ve lost too much time to dilly-dally now. “We will cross that bridge when we come to it. Until then…”

I leap to my feet like my legs aren’t as wobbly as Jell-O before shooing them out of Mikhail’s office, doubling their shocked expressions.