Page 14 of Pregnant Virgin of the Bratva

He yanks me back, spins me fast enough that the hallway tilts. Then his weight crashes into me, slamming my back into the wall with a dull, echoing thud. Pain blossoms down my spine. My legs fold under me, but I don’t fall, and he pins me there with ease, like it costs him nothing.

A sound punches from my throat, half gasp, half sob.

His forearm presses across my chest, just below my throat. Heavy. Controlled. Not choking, but I feel it. The warning in his grip. The heat of his body pressed too close. The concrete behind me feels colder now, like the walls are part of the trap.

He leans in slightly, head tilted, watching me like I’m something breakable. Like he’s considering it.

“I like when they run,” he says, voice low enough that I feel it in my bones.

I bare my teeth. “Go to hell.”

He smiles faintly, not amused. “You’re not the first to think you could outsmart me.”

I shove against him, hands slapping at his chest, but it’s like trying to move a wall. My arms ache, and every inhale is sharp around the pressure of his arm.

“Hope’s a funny thing,” he laughs. “It always dies ugly.”

The rage in me builds hot and fast. I want to scream. I want to spit in his face. My vision blurs with fury, not tears. My whole body trembles from it, but I’m trapped.

His breath ghosts across my cheek, impossibly close. The wall digs into my spine. There’s nowhere left to run.

He leans in close enough that I can feel the warmth of his breath against my cheek, and something shifts.

It starts low. A flicker, buried beneath the fear and the rage. Heat blooms in my chest, crawling up my throat, flushing my face in a way I can’t explain and don’t want to name. My breath hitches. My pulse skips. It’s wrong. It’s so wrong, but it’s there.

My body betrays me.

Goose bumps race across my arms, the hairs at the back of my neck standing on end. A tremor slides through me, not just from the cold or the pressure of his arm. This is different. Hotter. More confusing. My chest rises too fast, lungs fighting for rhythm, and his eyes—God, his eyes see it.

Of course he does.

He watches me like he’s been waiting for this. His gaze narrows, scanning every inch of my face, studying the flush in my cheeks, the quiver at the edge of my mouth. He doesn’t smirk, doesn’t taunt. His expression stays cold, precise.

I try to turn my head, to look away, to hide the truth written across my skin, but he doesn’t let me.

His hand comes up, fingers sliding beneath my chin. He tilts my face back toward him with a touch that’s disturbinglygentle. His fingers are warm, steady, the skin rough against mine.

I hate that I don’t flinch.

“You’ve never been touched,” he says, like the realization has only just hit.

Flat. Clinical. Not a question. A diagnosis.

He says it like it’s obvious. Like it’s written into the way I hold myself. Into the way I freeze under pressure and tremble under his hands. He names it like he’s peeling away a secret I didn’t even know I was keeping.

My lips part. I mean to say something. Deny it. Call him a liar. Scream.

Nothing comes out. My silence answers for me.

Something changes in his gaze.

It’s subtle, but I feel it before I see it. His smirk fades—not into softness, but into something heavier. Something darker. A stillness settles over him, the kind that coils beneath the surface like a predator crouched before the pounce. Every part of him stills except his eyes, and those keep moving—tracking me, drinking me in like I’m not just prey but something worthkeeping.

He doesn’t look like he wants to kill me; he looks like he wants to own me.

“You’re beautiful when you’re scared,” he murmurs.

The words slide over my skin like ice. My stomach twists.