Page 25 of Pregnant Virgin of the Bratva (Sharov Bratva #14)

Days blend together now.

Not because they’re peaceful—this house is never peaceful—but because they move in silence. In caution. In whispers behind closed doors and muted footsteps across marble.

The Bratva world still exists on the other side of the walls; I know it does. I hear the echo of hushed voices when I wake in the morning. I see the flicker of shadows moving past the windows. Armed guards who don’t speak unless spoken to. Men who stand straighter when Kion enters a room.

Here, in the softest corner of this fortress, I exist in a bubble. One that wraps around me like gauze and doesn’t ask for anything in return.

Since the hospital, I don’t argue about rest. Not anymore.

My body reminds me every time I shift too quickly. Every time I push myself to reach something just out of arm’s length. There’s a strange tightness in my muscles, like they’re waiting for something to go wrong again.

I’ve learned to listen.

What surprises me most is him, how much he’s changed. He’s still sharp, cold, impossible to read, but something’s different in the way he moves through my space now.

He doesn’t hover. He doesn’t fawn. There are no declarations or soft confessions or reassurances whispered in the dark.

Instead, it’s precision.

A rhythm.

Tea appears beside my bed each morning, perfectly steeped, never too hot. Always in the mug I once said I liked best.

I catch him sometimes. In the early hours, long before sunrise, slipping in with a quiet clink of porcelain. He thinks I’m sleeping. But I watch him through slitted eyes as he sets the tray down, adjusts the folded napkin, adds just a touch of honey to the side dish.

Today, the private nurse he hired arrives right after breakfast. Her name’s Helena. Tall, clipped tone, neat uniform. She’s professional, but kind enough.

Still—he’s the one who helps me into my robe.

I sit on the edge of the bed, arms raised slightly, and he lifts the fabric over my shoulders with rough hands that are somehow… gentle. Not trembling. Not rushed. Just patient.

“You don’t have to,” I murmur.

“I know,” he replies. “Maybe I enjoy pampering you, sweetheart.”

He doesn’t look at me, but he adjusts the belt around my waist anyway, then cups my elbow as I stand.

Later, I rest on the lounge chair in the sunroom. Helena hovers close but gives me space. I pretend to read. Mostly I just watch the garden and let the sunlight warm my legs.

The door opens behind me.

I glance up; it’s him again.

He crosses the room in long strides, saying nothing. But his eyes flick over me from head to toe—scanning for any sign of discomfort.

“You’re late,” I tease.

He raises an eyebrow. “Then fire me, but I know you love me too much.”

“Yeah well, I’d be bored without you.”

A ghost of a smirk tugs at the corner of his mouth. “You look lively.”

“Don’t sound so relieved.”

“I’m not just relieved.” He steps closer. “I’m making note.”

“Of what?”

“You winced when you stood this morning, and your breathing shifted during breakfast.”

I blink. “I… didn’t even notice that.”

“I did.” He says it so simply, so matter-of-factly and without his usual grin, that I don’t know how to respond.

Eventually I whisper, “Do you sleep at all?”

He doesn’t answer, just laughs, but I already know.

***

That night, I wake to the sound of footsteps.

I slip from the bed and pad quietly toward the hallway, careful not to let the floorboards creak.

Kion stands near the study door, phone pressed to his ear. His shoulders are tense, one hand raking through his hair.

“No. Raise the dose by five milligrams. She’s still iron-deficient. I don’t give a fuck what the chart says.” His voice is low, fierce. “If the cramps come back, I want her moved to the hospital within ten minutes. Not eleven. Not when it’s convenient. Ten.”

He listens.

Then: “Yes, doctor. I’ll keep her still.”

The call ends. He turns—and sees me.

For a moment, neither of us speaks. Then he exhales, walks toward me, and places a hand gently on the back of my neck.

“You should be in bed.”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“You should try harder. Next time I’m sending Yuri in a tutu to sing you lullabies.””

“Oh, absolutely not.” I lean into his touch, just a little bit. “I heard what you said,” I whisper. “About the iron. About the cramps.”

“I wasn’t trying to hide it.”

“I know.”

We stand there for a moment in the low light, the house quiet around us.

Then I say it. “You’re not warm. Actually, you’re kind of an asshole.”

His brow rises. “Finally, you see me clearly.”

“But you’re kind in your own way.”

He doesn’t react, not at first. Then he leans down, lips brushing my forehead with a whisper of contact.

“I don’t care about being kind,” he says. “I care about keeping you alive.”

***

Most nights now, he lies beside me.

He doesn’t say much. He doesn’t ask if I’m sleeping or if I need anything—not unless I wince or sigh or shift too much beneath the blankets, but he’s there, every night, without fail. Like gravity. Like a shadow at rest.

His arm usually stretches over the bed, resting just above my belly. Never fully touching. Just there. A loose guard. A quiet barrier between me and anything that might try to reach me while I’m vulnerable.

I wonder if he even sleeps at all.

Once, in the blur between dreams and wakefulness, I stir in the dark and find him watching me.

He’s not hovering, not intense. Just watching. His expression is unreadable in the low light—half cast in silver moonlight, half lost in shadow—but I can tell he’s been awake for a while. His hand moves without sound, brushing a few strands of hair from my forehead.

He tucks the blanket around my shoulders just a little tighter and murmurs, “Go back to sleep.”

So I do, because I trust him now. That’s the most terrifying part.

There’s still distance between us, though.

He touches me more often now—my wrist when I pass him something, my back as I ease into a chair, the briefest brush of fingers when he steadies me down a step. He doesn’t flinch like he used to. He doesn’t act like his own hands are weapons anymore.

There’s a space between us that neither of us knows how to cross.

It’s not a wall. Not exactly.

It’s more like a question neither of us has figured out how to ask.

Is this real?

Is this us?

Or is it just survival, repackaged in warmth and care and long, wordless nights?

I don’t know how to ask.

I don’t think he knows how to answer, but sometimes—sometimes—I catch the shape of something deeper in the quiet.

Like when he brushes my hair back before I sit up. His fingers linger just a second too long at the curve of my neck, like he’s memorizing the feel of it. Like he doesn’t want to let go.

Or when he rests his forehead against mine for just a heartbeat in passing, his breath steady and warm between us. We’re close, closer than he’s ever let anyone be.

Then it’s gone, like it didn’t happen.

***

Tuesday morning, the nurse leaves early.

It’s one of my better mornings. No sharp twinges or sudden tightness, just the usual weight in my hips and the quiet, pulsing ache of something growing inside me.

Kion walks in with tea, as he always does. Instead of setting it down and leaving, he pauses.

“Window or fire today?” he asks.

I blink. “What?”

He gestures to the lounge chair and the reading nook by the hearth. “Where do you want to sit?”

“Oh.” I smile faintly. “Window.”

He nods and helps me stand. His hand settles gently on my elbow, steadying me as I move.

Once I’m seated, he sets the tray beside me. Honey, no lemon. Just how I like it. Then he walks to the window and pulls the curtain back further. Sunlight spills across the floor.

“You’re getting good at this,” I murmur, taking a sip.

“At what?”

“Pretending you’re not watching my every move.”

He doesn’t turn. “I’m not pretending,” he says. “I am watching. I don’t care if you realize or not.”

I laugh softly.

He glances back. “You’re laughing more.”

“I feel… okay. Today.”

His jaw shifts slightly. “That won’t make me loosen security.”

“I know.”

He walks over and crouches beside me, one hand resting lightly on the arm of the chair.

I look at him. His eyes are sharp, always, but they don’t look cruel. Not anymore. “Kion,” I say quietly. “Do you think this will get easier?”

His expression doesn’t change, but something flickers behind his eyes. “What part?”

“Everything. The waiting. The quiet. Not knowing if this”—I touch my stomach—“is going to be okay.”

He doesn’t answer immediately. Then: “No.”

I nod. “Didn’t think so.”

“But,” he adds, “you’ll get stronger.”

“And you?”

He tilts his head slightly. “I don’t need to get stronger. I just need to keep you safe.”

I take another sip, eyes on his hand still resting on the chair.

“I didn’t think you’d be like this.”

“Like what? Obsessive, paranoid? Ridiculously handsome?”

I swat at him. “Attentive.”

He doesn’t smile, but his voice lowers. “I’d do anything for you.”

“I know.”

“You’re mine.”

I nod slowly. “And you’re mine too.”

That gets him. Maybe not visibly—but his fingers shift just slightly, like he’s gripping something invisible.

He stands a moment later, but not before brushing his hand against my shoulder. The touch is so light, so fleeting, but it lingers long after he turns away.

Something in me stirs: warm, slow, unmistakable.

Before I can second-guess myself, I reach up and catch his wrist, fingers wrapping around him gently.

He pauses, looking down at me.

I rise from the chair slowly, pressing my palm to his chest. His heart is steady beneath it. Unshaken. Like always.

And then I lean in. Our lips meet, his soft and full and pliable.

He kisses me back, slow and measured, his hand coming up to rest against the small of my back. His mouth moves with mine like he’s done this a thousand times in his head but is still tasting it for the first time.

When I deepen the kiss, he lets me—for a moment.

But only that, and then he pulls back.

I blink up at him, surprised. “What’s wrong?”

He smooths a hand over my spine. “We can’t.”

I scowl. “Why not? You kiss me like you want to. You touch me like you want to.”

“I do.”

“Then why are you treating me like I’m made of glass?”

His mouth twitches into something between a smirk and a sigh. “Because you are, right now.”

I fold my arms, frustrated. “I’m pregnant, not dying.”

He chuckles low in his throat, and God help me, the sound only makes it worse. “You’re impatient.”

“I’m horribly impatient.”

“You’re also still healing.”

“I can heal and get laid at the same time, Kion.”

That makes him laugh, and I want to throttle him.

“Do you think this is funny?” I demand.

“Only a little.”

I glare at him. “I’m not kidding. I haven’t had sex in months, and you’re walking around in half-unbuttoned shirts and growling at anyone who breathes in my direction, and you won’t even let me kiss you properly.”

He raises a brow. “You just kissed me.”

“Barely! That doesn’t count. That was… polite.”

He steps closer again, crowding into my space, and leans down until his lips brush the shell of my ear.

“You want impolite?”

My breath catches.

His voice drops to a low whisper. “When this baby is out of you, Esme, I’m going to fuck you until you forget how to speak.”

Heat flushes through me so fast I nearly sway.

He pulls back, smug. “Now,” he adds, calm as ever, “go sit down before I remind you what else I’ll do.”

“You’re the worst,” I mutter, turning back toward the chair.

“I’m the one keeping you healthy,” he says, already placing a pillow behind me. “You’ll thank me later.”

I roll my eyes, but I’m already flushed, already aching, already counting the weeks.