Page 27 of Innocent Plus-Size Bride of the Bratva (Sharov Bratva #15)

I do not sleep. The hours bleed together, each one heavy with the knowledge of what I have done—and what I must do next.

I ignore the world beyond my study. I barely speak, save for a single quiet order to the only man I trust with secrets older than this house: dig up everything about Elijah Rivers’s final transfer. Find out where he is.

The information comes slowly, filtered through old codes, vanished aliases, and dead men’s names. My father’s world was one of shadows and silences; every truth is twisted, every file a riddle.

I have spent a lifetime unwinding the knots of this family. I follow the trail: charred pages, faded signatures, the ghosts of orders signed in back rooms, sealed with blood and fear. The deeper I go, the more I realize how little of this was ever really in my control.

It leads me to a compound far from the city, deep in a forest where the old rules still matter and the newest face is decades old.

The gate is rusted, the guards old and silent, but they know my name.

They remember my father’s promises, and they let me through with a nod.

Inside, the place smells of pine, diesel, and gun oil.

It’s less a prison than a fortress of forgotten loyalties.

In a dim, smoke-filled office, I find an old man—white-haired, sunken-cheeked, eyes sharp even after all these years. He wears the same black ring as my father’s inner circle. He stands as I enter, respect in his bearing, but a wary suspicion in the way he grips his cane.

“You’ve come for Rivers,” he says, not bothering with pleasantries. His Russian is old and soft, an accent from a time before my own.

“I need to see him,” I reply, my voice as calm as I can make it.

He regards me for a long, silent moment. “You’re late. Years late.”

“I know.” The words taste like ash. “Where is he?”

He gestures me down the hall, past locked rooms and shuttered windows. “He was never meant to die. Your father’s men, they saw his words as the spark that would burn us all. They locked him away so no war would start. We kept it quiet. You buried it deeper.”

He says it without judgment, only a kind of tired resignation.

I stop outside a plain door, steel reinforced, unremarkable except for the heaviness of its lock. The old man knocks once. The door swings open.

Elijah Rivers stands inside, alive. A little older than his file photo.

Thinner. Eyes sharper. He looks at me with a mix of suspicion and defiance.

No surprise, given all he’s endured. I study him for a long moment.

I can see the resemblance: the line of his jaw, the set of his shoulders, a stubbornness I’ve known too well in his sister.

“So you’re the infamous Sharov,” he says at last, voice hard but not cowed. “You finally come to finish what your father started?”

I don’t respond to his bait. I hate journalists—especially those who think they can dig up the Bratva’s secrets and walk away unscathed.

This isn’t about the Bratva, not anymore. This is about Talia. I remember the way she looked at me the night before: hurt, angry, still burning with the need for answers.

“I came because your sister deserves the truth,” I say. “So do you.”

He crosses his arms, sizing me up. “Truth? Or your version of it?”

I shrug. “You were never my enemy, Rivers, but you were a threat. Not to me. To all of this.” I gesture vaguely at the walls, the woods, the world of codes and loyalty that built my life.

His eyes narrow. “So you hid me away. Let her think I was dead.”

“It was never meant to be personal,” I say. It sounds weak, even to my own ears. “It was meant to keep the peace. Your writing—what you uncovered—could have started a war. I buried it to stop bloodshed.”

He looks away for a moment, jaw working, then back at me. “She suffered because of you.”

“She suffered because of all of us,” I answer, and that is the closest to an apology I can give.

He glances at the guard standing just outside the door, then back to me. “Are you going to take me back to the city? To her?”

“That’s her choice now,” I reply. “She deserves to know you’re alive. She deserves to make her own decisions.” I look at him hard, letting him see the warning there. “Know this, Rivers. If you put her in danger again—if you use her for another story, another crusade—I will not be as patient.”

He almost smiles. “You care for her.”

I don’t answer. There is no point.

We stand in silence for a moment, the old man watching us both. The world outside this room is changing. Old rules dying, new dangers rising. The past is heavy, but I know now there is no outrunning it. Only the choice of what to do next.

“Tell her I’m alive,” Elijah says quietly, finally. “Tell her I never gave up on her. Not once.”

I nod, something tight twisting in my chest. “I’ll bring you home myself, but she decides what comes next.”

For the first time, Elijah looks at me without suspicion. Only exhaustion, and a hope he’s trying hard not to show.

I turn to the old man, giving him a nod of respect. He’s done what was asked, kept the silence that held this world together. “Thank you,” I say. I don’t know if I mean it, but it feels necessary.

Outside, the wind stirs the pines. The world feels different now. Lighter, and yet more dangerous than ever.

I drive back through the forest, thinking of Talia—of everything I have to tell her, everything I must now let go. My loyalty to my father’s legacy, to the peace I tried to protect, feels cold and distant. The only thing that matters now is her. And the choice I must give her, whatever the cost.

It’s past midnight when I return to the house. I park in silence, kill the headlights, and let the car cool in the hush before the storm that I know is waiting for me inside.

The compound is quieter than usual—too many guards stationed outside, too few inside.

Even Miroslav’s shadow doesn’t appear as I pass through the kitchen and up the back staircase. I move like a ghost, tired and gritty-eyed, the smell of pine and smoke still clinging to my coat.

I half expect her to have locked herself in her room. I wouldn’t blame her. But I find Talia in the hallway, standing just outside the door to my study, arms folded tight over her chest, hair falling in a dark tangle around her face.

She’s not expecting me, but she doesn’t flinch or run. She just waits, watching, defiant even in the soft light spilling from a lamp down the hall.

I stop a few feet away, hands open at my sides. “I know you hate me,” I say, my voice low, stripped of the iron and ice I wear for everyone else. “You deserve the truth.”

She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t move. I see her knuckles whiten where she grips her elbow, her body held taut as a wire.

So I tell her. Everything. I tell her about Eli—about the threat he posed when his stories began unraveling secrets that would have started a war.

I tell her about the meeting with my father’s men, the choices that weren’t choices at all, the compromise I made to keep the Bratva from tearing itself apart.

How I buried her brother’s name not out of cruelty, but because the alternative was blood on the walls—hers, mine, Eli’s, everyone’s.

I tell her about the old compound, the silent guards, the locked rooms and coded orders and the heavy guilt I have carried since the day I signed off on his disappearance.

I tell her everything, and she listens, her face unreadable, eyes flat and dark, her jaw working as if she’s chewing on a piece of glass she refuses to spit out.

When I’m finished, there’s nothing left to say. The confession hangs between us, raw and unfinished. She turns to the window, her back straight, her hands pressed to the cold glass. The city beyond is empty, washed in moonlight.

“You did it to protect yourself,” she says eventually, voice so quiet I almost don’t hear it.

I walk closer, slow and careful, as if she might shatter. “I did it to protect what I built. To protect my people. Now… that includes you.”

Her breath hitches just a fraction, just enough for me to hear it. She doesn’t look at me, not directly, but I see her reflection in the glass. This time, it’s not the fire I’ve come to expect. It’s something cracked. Something fragile. Not just angry, but wounded. And that is so much worse.

For a moment, all I want to do is reach for her—pull her close, shield her from every consequence that followed my decisions. I know better. Some wounds need to breathe. Some truths can only be borne in silence.

She speaks again, her voice steady, almost cold. “You could have told me. You could have let me choose. Instead, you lied. You made me grieve for a brother who wasn’t dead. You made me fall in love with you—”

She cuts herself off, pressing her forehead to the window. Her shoulders shake, just once. I ache to touch her, but I stay where I am, letting her have the space I stole so many times before.

“I know,” I say softly, uselessly. “If I could take it back—”

She laughs, brittle. “You can’t.”

The silence that settles is different this time. There is no room for anger. Only exhaustion. Only the pain of all the lives I changed with one act of supposed mercy.

I clear my throat. “Eli is alive. You can see him, if you want. You can bring him here. You can do whatever you need to. I won’t stop you.”

She doesn’t move, doesn’t even breathe for a second. Then, quietly, “Would you let me go? If I asked?”

I hesitate, the answer sticking in my throat. Finally, I whisper, “If you asked, I would let you go. Even if it killed me.”

She closes her eyes. A tear runs down her cheek, glinting silver in the light. She wipes it away with the back of her hand, fiercely, as if daring me to mention it.

“I just wanted the truth,” she says, voice breaking. “I wanted to believe we were something real.”

I take a step closer, my own hands shaking now. “It was real. Everything I feel for you is real, Talia. Even if it’s built on all the wrong things.”

She turns, finally meeting my eyes. For a moment, we just stare at each other—the villain and the would-be avenger, each undone by the other’s impossible, inconvenient heart.

“I don’t know what to do,” she admits, broken and beautiful. “I don’t know how to hate you and still want you. I don’t know how to forgive you. Not yet.”

“I’ll wait,” I promise, meaning every word. “As long as it takes.”

Her lips tremble. She turns back to the window, hugging herself as if trying to hold all the pieces together. I watch her reflection, my own face pale and haunted beside hers in the glass. I want to reach for her, but I know this is the price of the truth.

So I stand behind her, silent, and wait for whatever future she will let us have, no matter how fragile, no matter how uncertain, no matter how much it costs.