Page 122 of Nine Months to Bear

“Stefan—”

“Unless you’d prefer to go break the truth to Babushka yourself?”

The trap is so neat I almost admire it. He’s given me the illusion of choice when really there’s only one option: submit to hisdemands, or hurt an elderly woman who’s shown me nothing but kindness.

“This is manipulation.”

“Yes. It is.”

“And you’re fine with that?”

“I’m fine with keeping you close, by any means necessary.” He moves toward the bathroom. “Everything else is negotiable.”

I watch him disappear behind the door, leaving me wrecked and furious and desperately turned-on. My inner voice whispers vague promises:I’ll set boundaries tomorrow. New rules, better defenses, stronger walls.

But tonight…

Tonight, I’ll crawl into his bed and pretend it’s just for show. Pretend my body doesn’t crave his heat, his weight, his possession.

Tomorrow, I’ll remember this is temporary.

Tonight, I’m his.

The bathroom door opens and Stefan emerges, shirt already half unbuttoned. “Coming to bed?”

“I need a minute.”

“Take all the time you need.” He strips off his shirt entirely, revealing the tattoos and scars that make me shiver. “I’ll be waiting.”

47

STEFAN

“You’re distracted.” Mikayla doesn’t look up from cleaning her Sig Sauer when she speaks, but it’s an accusation as blunt as she gets, as sharp as the gun oil burning my nostrils.

“I’m focused,” I reply.

“On your dick, maybe.”

Taras snorts from the driver’s seat. “She’s got a point, Stef. You’ve been checking your phone every five minutes.”

I haven’t touched my phone in twenty. But arguing would only prove their point, so I don’t.

“Devon Manizer,” I redirect. “Our missing rat from Accounting, finally come back to the light. Tell me what we know.”

Mikayla slides a tablet across the leather seat. “He spent six years with us. Clean record until three months ago. Then small discrepancies. Missing inventory reports, delayed shipments, that kind of bullshit. But nothing that screams betrayal until?—”

“Until federal raids hit our exact routes.” I scroll through the surveillance photos. Devon at a coffee shop. Devon at his son’s soccer game. Devon sweating through his shirt at a meeting with someone whose face is conveniently obscured. “Who’s the contact?”

“Working on it. But the timing matches Iakov’s movements. And if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck…”

The SUV slows. Suburban sprawl replaces city concrete outside the windows.

“There.” Taras points to a colonial with children’s bicycles on the porch. “Number forty-seven.”

A plastic scooter lies abandoned on the walkway. Pink streamers dangle from the handlebars.

“Kids?” I ask.