Page 29 of Innocent Plus-Size Bride of the Bratva (Sharov Bratva #15)

When I wake, the room is painted with soft morning light, diffused through heavy curtains. I don’t move. I lie there, letting the minutes stretch, holding her close and watching the slow, steady rise and fall of her breath. Her hair is a dark tangle on my chest, her cheek warm against my skin.

The bruises on her thighs and throat are my marks, but for once, I don’t feel the usual surge of possessive pride. The part of me that always wants control, that needs to win, that would rather punish than plead—it’s quiet now, pushed to the far edges of my mind.

All that’s left is clarity. The ache in my chest is sharper than I want to admit.

I can’t keep her by force, not anymore. I know it as clearly as I know my own name. I can cage her, protect her, fuck her until she can’t breathe, but it won’t matter. The only way she’ll ever truly be mine is if she chooses to stay. Even if that choice destroys me.

I let her sleep, fingers tracing slow circles on her back, committing every inch of her to memory. She stirs against me once or twice, mouth brushing my collarbone, but doesn’t wake. I almost wish she never would.

I almost wish we could stay in this limbo, suspended in the afterglow of everything we survived and everything we ruined.

By noon, the spell breaks. She’s up, showered, dressed in jeans and a plain sweater, her face unreadable. She avoids my eyes. The old distance is back, the wariness, the armor she wears so well.

I feel her slipping through my fingers even as she sits across from me at the breakfast table, picking at toast she won’t eat.

There’s nothing left to say in the kitchen, so I lead her to the study, closing the door behind us with a finality that makes my heart race. I place a burner phone on the desk. Next to it, a folder, thin, but heavy with meaning. I meet her eyes, making sure she understands every word.

“Your brother is being moved tonight,” I say quietly. “I’ve arranged it. If you leave now, you’ll reach him before they do.” I don’t bother to explain who they are. She knows. I’ve made sure she knows.

Her eyes flick to mine, sharp and searching. I see the fear, the hope, the thousand questions she’ll never trust me enough to ask. I add, “The car’s waiting. I’ll keep my men off you.”

She picks up the phone like it burns her, turning it over in her palm, her pulse hammering in her throat. “If I choose to stay?”

I don’t sugarcoat it. There’s no point. “Then you belong to me, but not as a hostage. As my wife. No more pretending.” My voice is steady, but my heart is breaking with every word. “If you stay, Talia, there’s no more halfway. I will love you like I destroy everything else—ruthlessly.”

She laughs once, a sharp, broken sound, more pain than amusement. “That’s not love.”

I hold her gaze, letting her see the truth, raw and unvarnished. “It’s the only kind I’ve ever known.”

The silence stretches between us. She looks away, jaw clenched, blinking hard. I want to cross the room, to pull her into my arms and beg her to stay, but I don’t move. She needs to choose. I can’t steal this from her, not after everything I’ve already taken.

Her hands tremble as she sets the phone down, her breath coming quick and shallow. She paces to the window, fingers pressed to the glass, watching the drive where a black car waits, engine idling.

For a long moment, I think she’ll go. I almost hope she does. It’s better to lose her now, on her terms, than to watch her rot in the prison of my love.

She doesn’t move. She stands there, staring into the gray afternoon, caught between freedom and fate. I watch the way her shoulders rise and fall, the way her hands clench into fists.

“I don’t know how to forgive you,” she says quietly, her back to me.

I nod, voice rough. “I don’t know how to deserve it.”

She turns, eyes bright and wet, and something breaks in me. “If I stay,” she whispers, “you have to promise me you won’t lie again. About anything. Not even to protect me.”

I cross the room, slow and careful, my heart in my throat. I take her face in my hands, tilting her chin until she meets my eyes. “No more lies,” I swear. “No more secrets. Not between us.”

She closes her eyes, a tear sliding down her cheek. I wipe it away with my thumb, pressing my forehead to hers.

“If you go,” I murmur, “I’ll let you. I’ll do everything in my power to protect you and Eli. If you stay, you’re mine. In every way. I won’t let you go again.”

She shudders, caught between longing and fear. “What if I can’t choose?”

I brush my lips over hers, gentle for the first time in weeks. “Then I’ll wait. As long as it takes. You have to decide, Talia. I can’t live in this halfway anymore. Neither can you.”

She pulls back, searching my face. “Are you asking or ordering?”

I almost smile. “For you? I’m asking.”

She takes a long, shaking breath, her fingers curling into my shirt. For a moment, I think she’ll bolt. Instead, she lets herself fall into my arms, silent and trembling.

We stand there, wrapped around each other, on the edge of something that feels dangerously close to hope.

She stands with the burner phone clutched in her hand, knuckles white against the black plastic. Her gaze darts from the phone to the folder, then back to me.

Every line of her body is tense—anger and hope, fear and want, all twisting together beneath her skin. For a moment, I almost wish she’d scream, throw something, shatter the heavy silence hanging in the study.

She only stands there, eyes burning into mine.

“I don’t know what I hate more,” she says, her voice so low it barely makes it across the room, “that I came here to destroy you… or that I don’t want to leave.”

The silence that follows is thick, electric, unbearable. I hold perfectly still, every muscle locked down tight, barely daring to breathe. In that pause—longer than a heartbeat, longer than a confession—I realize she hasn’t chosen yet. Not completely.

Her heart has already started to shift. I see it in the way her jaw trembles, in the way her eyes keep flicking to mine, desperate and furious and almost pleading.

She doesn’t speak for a long time. Just holds the phone like it weighs more than it should, shoulders hunched against everything she’s been forced to carry.

I can see the battle in her eyes: war or surrender, flight or forgiveness.

I see the longing there too. The part of her that wants to believe, to be wanted, to stay.

I don’t move. I don’t speak. I just watch her, every part of me coiled in anticipation, every old rule warring with the new reality I can’t unmake.

Finally, she moves. It’s a small thing. Her hand opening, setting the phone down on the table with a dull click. The sound is a rupture, a crack in the silence, a decision made.

It’s not forgiveness.

“I’ll stay,” she says. Her voice is quiet, rough with everything she’s lost and everything she’s still fighting to keep. “On one condition.”

My breath catches, hope flaring even as I brace for whatever demand she’ll make. I meet her eyes, keeping my own expression unreadable, hiding everything that wants to claw its way out.

“My brother,” she says, steady now. “Safe. Alive. I want to see him. I want proof that he’ll be safe after he’s released, that he can live a normal life.”

The room feels even smaller. The risk in her words is enormous; letting a Bratva prisoner go is breaking a rule that has held for generations.

A part of me recoils at the thought. Every lesson my father drilled into me, every warning from old men in dark rooms: prisoners do not walk free.

Especially not the ones who once threatened the whole house.

Another part of me—stronger now, louder—doesn’t care. I have broken so many rules for her already. I brought her into my world, married her in a cathedral built for violence, gave her the truth I swore I’d never say.

What is one more line crossed, if it means I get to keep her? If it means she chooses me, freely, finally?

I nod, slow and careful. “You’ll see him. I’ll take you there myself. And when you’re ready, you can decide if you want to come home.”

The word home hangs between us. I see the way it hits her, the way her lips part and her shoulders tremble. She closes her eyes, pressing her fists to her chest like she’s trying to hold herself together.

I step closer, slow and deliberate. “You have my word, Talia. No more lies. No more secrets. Eli walks out of there with you—if that’s what you want. You don’t owe me anything.”

Her eyes snap open, wild and wounded. “That’s not true. I owe you… I don’t even know what I owe you anymore, but I do know what I owe him. I have to see it for myself.”

I reach for her, just barely brushing my knuckles along her jaw, grounding us both. “We’ll leave tonight. I’ll handle everything. I promise, we’ll get to Eli before he’s moved. You don’t have to do this alone.”

She leans into my touch for the briefest moment, eyes fluttering shut. Then she straightens, resolve settling over her like armor. “I’m not doing it for you.”

I almost smile. “I know.”

She turns away, staring at the car outside, at the folder on the table. “You’ll really break the rule for me?”

I nod again, fierce and certain. “I already have.”

In that moment, I know what it costs. I know the looks my men will give me, the rumors that will spread through the old houses, the punishment that will come from higher up the chain. There will be consequences. There always are.

I can live with them, if it means giving her this. If it means letting her see her brother safe, alive, free.

It’s another rule broken, another debt I’ll pay. It’s the only choice that matters.

She doesn’t thank me. I wouldn’t expect her to. The way she finally turns, the way she lets herself step closer, her hand brushing mine as she passes—it feels like the beginning of something new.

We move through the house together, gathering what she needs, exchanging few words.

She’s tense, watchful, but she doesn’t let go of my hand.

Not until we’re in the car, not until the gates open and the road unfolds before us, toward Eli, toward the future, toward the decision that will define everything we become.