Page 26 of Pregnant Virgin of the Bratva (Sharov Bratva #14)

The room smells like tension and sweat.

Three captains, one underboss, and a bitter councilman sit scattered around the long oak table like vultures circling a carcass—each one louder than the last. Their voices clash, full of old grudges and new threats. I don’t interrupt. Not yet.

I lounge at the head of the table, one leg stretched long beneath, one arm curled over the back of my chair. My jaw is locked. I sip nothing. Eat nothing. I let them snap at each other until they wear themselves thin. Like dogs fighting for scraps.

I look bored—deliberately so. Every now and then, I flash a slow grin just to watch the captains flinch. Let them stew. It’s good for them.

The longer they argue, the more they forget who owns the table they’re gathered around.

Let them. They need the reminder.

Volkov slams his hand down, silver rings clinking against wood. “You think I’d risk another fucking shipment after the last two got hit? That was your side, Ardal!”

Ardal throws his hands up. “My side doesn’t need your shit product, Volkov. Maybe if you’d controlled your dock rats—”

“You watch your mouth.”

Yuri shifts beside me. He’s been silent until now, one arm draped over the back of his chair, but I can tell by the tilt of his head that he’s about to say something final. Arseni, leaning against the wall, remains a shadow—sharp, quiet, listening to everything.

I hold up a hand.

The room stills instantly.

“Enough,” I say.

That one word is enough to drop the temperature by ten degrees.

They fall silent. Not because they respect me.

They fear me.

I sit up slowly and place both hands flat on the table. Let the sound echo. Let the weight of the moment settle into their bones.

“You’re clawing at each other like this is some market brawl. I see grown men, but I hear barking.”

No one responds.

“You want answers? Bring me evidence. Not theories. Not pride. Facts. Or I will split the territory down the center and give your share to someone who still remembers how to follow an order.”

Silence.

Then—

The door creaks open.

The air shifts like someone sucked the oxygen out of the room.

Every head turns.

Esme steps through, and the silence becomes something reverent.

She carries a tray. Polished silver. Six crystal glasses and a carafe of tea—black, steeped strong, no lemon.

She moves with calm precision, one hand under the tray, the other steadying the handle.

Her shoulders are straight. Her chin high.

She does not glance around for permission. She does not pause to be acknowledged.

She’s showing now. Eight months in. Her belly curves beneath a soft beige sweater, sleeves pushed to her elbows, her leggings fitted and clean. Her hair is tied back in a smooth twist at the nape of her neck, her features composed and sharp.

She looks like she was born in power, and the men feel it.

Every one of them goes still. Even Ardal, who never shuts up. Even Volkov, whose fists were just clenched against the table.

She moves to the side of the room and sets the tray down without a word. Then she begins placing glasses. One in front of each man. No tremor in her hands. No falter in her gaze.

She places mine last.

She sets mine last. Our eyes meet. That’s all it takes—a silent dare, a quiet promise, and I have to fight the urge to laugh in front of the council.

I study the men without turning my head. They don’t know what to do, not one of them speaks, because Esme isn’t just the woman carrying my child.

She’s the woman who just walked into a room full of wolves and made them forget they had teeth.

“I overheard the argument,” she says calmly.

Her voice cuts through the silence with that quiet, pointed sharpness I know too well.

Every man turns.

She’s standing beside me now, not behind. She doesn’t wait to be introduced. Doesn’t falter when six pairs of eyes turn toward her like she’s stepped into the wrong room. She keeps her hands lightly folded over her stomach, protective but not weak, as if to say I’m here because I choose to be.

“The logistics don’t add up,” she says. “You’re flooding the port with more product than your runners can handle. It’s inefficient, risky, and borderline reckless.”

Volkov opens his mouth to speak—but she keeps going.

She doesn’t raise her voice. She doesn’t need to.

“You’re paying for warehouse space you don’t use and losing money in delays you could have prevented if anyone was checking route timing against personnel coverage.”

Her tone is matter-of-fact. Like she’s explaining a bad invoice. Like this is a business class, not a Bratva meeting.

Arseni straightens against the wall, his eyes narrowing just slightly. Yuri leans forward with the hint of a grin.

The captains blink like they’ve been slapped.

She takes a step closer to the map projected behind the table, eyes scanning the pinpoints and transport lines without hesitation.

“You’ve got two missed opportunities right here.

” She gestures—one hand still resting over her bump, the other lifting to point toward a crossroad highlighted in red.

“You could be using the old textile yard route. It’s not patrolled the way the main lanes are, and the rail line still connects—assuming someone bothers to grease the yard supervisor. ”

I say nothing. She’s already taken the room.

“This border point here?” She points again. “There’s no reason to keep pushing traffic through the western checkpoint when you could reroute east. The bribe is steeper, but so is the cost of having your men gunned down every third run.”

Her mouth twitches faintly. “Sometimes a fat envelope is cheaper than a funeral.”

There’s a pause. Then one of the captains—Turov, the youngest—clears his throat. “We looked at the eastern lane last quarter, but we assumed the pressure was permanent.”

Esme shrugs lightly. “Assumptions are expensive.”

Turov scribbles something down.

Ardal stares at her like she’s crazy.

Volkov doesn’t even bother hiding the way his gaze drifts from her face to her stomach to the chair at the head of the table—my chair.

I lean back in my chair, one arm stretched lazily along the backrest, watching her with a slow grin curling at the corner of my mouth. I know I must look smug, because this is exactly who she is.

If I had a cigar, I’d light it just to have something to bite down on while the old guard try to figure out how she just made them irrelevant.

Esme’s sharper than half the men in this room, and she’s only just begun to show it.

Volkov shifts uncomfortably. “You studied this?”

Esme’s gaze snaps to him. Calm. Cold.

“I have a degree in supply chain logistics, and I was doing more with less back when I worked warehouse schedules part time to pay my tuition.”

Volkov looks away.

Smart.

She doesn’t smile or gloat. She simply takes a slow breath, then folds her hands together over her belly again and lets the silence settle.

This time, no one tries to fill it.

I watch her.

The slight lift of her chin. The set of her shoulders. The way she carries not just herself, but the life inside her like it’s a shield and a statement. I have something to protect—and I will. Even if it means schooling captains in their own den.

She turns to me finally.

The scrape of my chair legs against the stone floor echoes through the room.

I don’t say a word to the table. Instead, I walk to her. I stop at her side and glance down, letting my fingers graze her lower back as I speak.

“You’ve all been trying to fix this for weeks,” I say evenly. “She’s been watching for fifteen minutes.”

Yuri lets out a single, low laugh. “She’s not in this business,” I add. “But she could be.”

No one dares object.

I grin, wicked. “She’s not even on payroll. Imagine the damage if she was.”

I look down at her again. Her eyes flick to mine, just for a second. In that second, something passes between us.

She doesn’t flinch when the meeting resumes.

No one questions the rerouted shipment lines. No one argues when Yuri marks the textile yard for immediate clearing or when Arseni sends a silent signal to the logistics team outside. The captains, once barking, now nod with clipped efficiency. Ardal doesn’t look her way again.

Esme moves with quiet precision, picking up the empty tray and retreating to the corner without fanfare. She doesn’t linger. She doesn’t look to me.

She’s no longer a curiosity in soft clothes and pretty manners—she’s the voice that reset the table.

As she passes my chair, I rise without a word. My hand slides around her waist, slow and deliberate. I lean in, my mouth brushing the shell of her ear.

“My queen,” I murmur.

She pauses, breath hitching just slightly.

Then she keeps walking.

***

The library is quiet when I find her two hours later.

Evening light filters through the tall windows, catching the motes of dust in the air and throwing long shadows across the shelves. She sits near the far end, curled into one of the leather armchairs, her legs tucked up beneath her. A book rests in her lap, but she isn’t reading.

She’s staring out the window, thoughtful. Calm.

I close the door behind me without a sound. She doesn’t hear me at first.

She only notices when I step into her line of sight. Her head turns slowly, eyes finding mine.

“You’re a hard woman to track,” I murmur.

She smiles, just a little. “Not really. You’ve got cameras in every corner of this place.”

“True, but I like to find you myself.”

I cross the room and sit opposite her. For a moment, neither of us speaks. The room is dim, the silence soft. It suits her here. There’s something about this room—old wood, worn leather, the faint smell of paper and dust—that settles her. Anchors her.

“You were brilliant,” I say. “Had half the room convinced you’d run the ports since birth. Should’ve passed you the boss’s chair and seen if anyone had the balls to sit down.”

She blinks. “What?”