Page 21 of Forced By the Obsessed Bratva (Yezhov Bratva #8)

The air outside hit me like ice.

I stumbled out into the darkness, heels dragging on the stone path, my heart pounding so loudly that it drowned out the sound of the crickets, the creak of the trees, and the distant hum of the estate lights.

Each breath was too rough, too fast, as if my lungs couldn’t decide whether to scream or shut off completely.

The silk robe I’d thrown on clung to my skin, and my hands wouldn’t stop shaking—not from the cold, but from the heat of what I’d done.

Matvey was still on the floor. The sound of his voice, slurred and betrayed, echoed in my head.

“This won’t end well, kotyonok .”

I blinked over and over again and stroked my legs more forcefully, racing down the side of the estate where the security cameras had blind spots. I’d mapped them out, committed them to memory, just in case I ever decided I needed to leave.

The road beyond the iron gates lay out too narrow and dark. I hated what I had to do to escape from that gate.

But I needed to hurry. I only had an hour or maybe a couple of hours to get as far away as I could before he’d wake up and start hunting me like an animal.

And when he did…God, I tried not to think of that.

I sprinted to the car I had stashed days earlier, half-buried under the shade of a nearly vine-covered fence beside the back door. It wasn’t much—an old black Volvo. But it would have to do.

It would get me far enough to breathe and think.

My fingers trembled as I fished the keys out of my pocket. It fell out of my hands. “Shit,” I spat, stooping to pick up the key, my heart pounding as headlights whizzed by a few blocks off.

I climbed into the car, closed the door behind me hard, and stuck the key into the ignition.

The engine sprang to life.

And only then did I let out the breath I’d been holding since I’d left him on the floor.

***

The pill bottle was still in my coat pocket. I hadn’t even known what it was at first. I thought it was just another line of backup painkillers tucked deep in the mansion’s guest bathroom cabinet.

But rich, guarded homes like the Yezhov estate always had medical cabinets stocked to the brim for migraines, allergies, gunshot wounds, and nervous wives.

I’d googled the marking on the pills after we got home from the party. It was Diphenhydramine Benadryl. An over-the-counter antihistamine. It was safe in small quantities, but toxic in large ones.

I’d crushed three pills with the rim of a spoon, mixed them into the drink I’d given to Matvey.

For a moment, I’d been afraid he would see through me. Honestly, I thought a part of him had been suspicious, but he underestimated me, and that was his downfall.

It hadn’t been simple. I’d fought myself the whole way through, my mind at war with my heart, my pulse trapped in a struggle between guilt and survival.

But I’d had to do it.

He left me no choice. He would not have let me go.

Not over the baby.

Not over what I knew of Yulia.

I clung to the wheel, attempting to focus as I inched out onto the road. I’d done what needed to be done, and there was no going back now.

I kept glancing repeatedly from the road open before me to the rearview mirror, again and again, as if someone would suddenly appear behind me.

Matvey would definitely start hunting me down the second he recovered from the effect of the drugs; that much I was sure of. How far away I could get before that happened was all that mattered.

I’d timed it right. Left the door locked. Kept my head down. Crushed just enough pills to sedate, not kill.

But logic didn’t matter when your heart was breaking and your stomach felt like it was being carved open from the inside.

Everything hurt.

The silence in the car was too loud.

Every turn, every mile between me and him, felt like both freedom and a knife in my ribs.

I had nothing but a phony ID I used to sneak into bars back when I was still too dumb to worry about consequences, a pile of cash I’d stolen from the safe under Matvey’s desk drawer, and a tiny black bag containing two sets of clothes.

That was what running looked like, and there was nothing glamorous about it.

I barely had enough time to come up with a better plan. The second I heard the truth about Yulia’s death, I knew I couldn’t spend another second under the same roof as him. I’d be too horrified to even sleep next to him.

The apartment I planned to hide away in sat on the edge of the city. It was a small guest apartment I’d go to whenever I needed to clear my head. Only Yulia knew about this place.

There were no cameras or anything Matvey could track me on. No one recognized me there aside from the landlord, who only knocked when he wanted to get his rent. It was the perfect place.

But the closer I got, the harder my stomach churned. My head wouldn’t stop spinning with so many thoughts.

Yulia.

Matvey.

The baby.

And then Matvey again. His voice was a constant echo in my mind, and that sad look he gave me haunted me like a ghost. Every mile away from him felt like tearing out a chunk of myself with my own hands.

I wanted to scream and sob until my chest collapsed in on itself, but I swallowed it all the way down.

One breath. And then another.

I had to survive first.

When I arrived at the apartment, the sky was a pale pink, the dawn stretching its fingers along the horizon as if searching for me.

I pulled around the corner, just in case.

The hallway was still. Dusty. Smelled of rust and decaying wood.

The key was stuck in the lock, and for a second I thought it wouldn’t turn. But then it clicked, and I went inside.

It was cold here. The air was still, thick with the scent of wet walls and age-old paint. But it was quiet and peaceful.

Dropping the bag onto the floor. I kicked off my shoes and walked around the edges of the apartment like an animal in a cage, fingers tracing over scratched-up furniture and chipped countertops, trying to will this into being.

That I was free.

That I was safe.

My hand drifted to my stomach instinctively in a small, protective curve.

The child I hadn’t planned. Hadn’t wanted.

But now—

A flood of dizziness hit me, and the air was knocked from my body. My head spun, and I gripped the edge of the table, air trapped in my throat.

A blast of pain shot hot behind my eyes, and I collapsed to my knees, almost crashing sideways into the chair next to me but managing to evade it at the last second.

I hit the floor with a dull thud, and I lay there stunned, my hands flying to my stomach in a blind rush of panic.

Please…no. No, no, no.

Not now.

Not after all of this.

Not after I’d come this far.

A sob clawed its way up my throat as I hugged myself tight, one hand clutched over my stomach, the other grasping the wooden table leg as if I could cling to it to stay put.

Sobs ran hot and raging down my face.

I hadn’t even wanted this child.

But losing it would tear my soul apart. I didn’t think I could survive that kind of pain. I didn’t want to have to go through that sort of pain.

When I chose to run away after the party and risked Matvey’s wrath, I was not thinking about revenge for Yulia or my own safety. All I could think of was the little life that was growing inside me.

And how I had to be strong enough to protect it no matter what.

***

The day slipped by like smoke. I hadn’t sat down for a second since I got here. I couldn’t.

I strode from room to room, like I was waiting for a knock that I hadn’t heard yet, like Matvey might be able to burst through the walls instead of the door.

I stuffed the clothes I’d folded into the drawers, then backed away, and removed them again. Placed them back. Folding and refolding until my hands ached. My head thudded from trying to silence the screaming inside it.

The apartment was quiet—too quiet. No overhead creaks, no TV buzz from the neighbor next door, no car alarm outside in the street.

Only the tick of the second hand on the broken clock above the stove, and the hiss of my own breathing, coming more slowly now.

I pressed my hand against my belly whenever I felt the slightest pull or wrenching, a phantom pain, a flutter, something I couldn’t even name. I didn’t know if it was fear or pregnancy hormones messing with my mind or something else.

Each time I touched myself there, I wanted to be reassured. And each time, I wasn’t.

By evening, the sky had taken on a bruised shade of violet, and keeping my eyes open had become a struggle.

The mattress in the corner was thin and old. Springs jabbed into my ribcage beneath the sheet, but it was better than the freezing floor.

I curled up small, facing away from the door, hoping that turning my back would make me invisible.

But sleep did not come easily.

My mind was spinning with everything I’d done. Everything I’d lost. And all that I was now carrying.

I left him.

I left the Bratva behind.

I should’ve felt free and victorious. I should’ve been happy I’d finally managed to slip past the life they forced me into, but I wasn’t.

I was afraid, but not of Matvey or the rest of the Yezhovs and what they would do to me if they found me.

No.

What I was afraid of was how much love I already had for my unborn child. It seemed like just yesterday when that pregnancy test strip showed me those pink lines that would forever change my life, yet I felt like I would burn the whole world down if that was what it would take to keep my baby safe.

And I was certain I would.