Page 30 of Pregnant Virgin of the Bratva (Sharov Bratva #14)

I wake to silence. Not peace—silence. Heavy, unnatural.

The kind that settles like smoke in the lungs.

My eyelids drag open slowly, the world too bright and too white, everything blurred at the edges.

It takes a moment to understand I’m not at home.

Not in our bed. The scent in the air is all antiseptic and cold linen, machines humming in the corners of the room.

A hospital.

I try to lift my arm. It takes more effort than it should. My body aches. Not sharp pain—just a deep, dragging ache in every muscle and bone. My limbs feel strange, like they don’t quite belong to me. Heavy. Empty.

Something’s missing.

My hand moves to my belly before I fully realize what I’m doing. There’s no weight there anymore. No curve. No pressure. No motion beneath the skin.

Nothing.

The breath I draw in is shallow. Thin. I turn my head, vision swimming, trying to focus through the dizziness and confusion pressing against my skull.

Kion is in the room.

He’s sitting in the chair beside me, just out of reach, his elbows braced on his knees, shoulders hunched forward. His head is bowed, hands clasped. He doesn’t look up.

He looks… broken.

He’s so still, like he’s been carved into that chair and left there.

Something inside me turns cold. The silence grows louder.

I force the words out, dry and cracking. “Did we lose the baby?”

His head lifts immediately. His eyes meet mine.

I can’t read the expression on his face. It’s not grief, but it isn’t relief either. It’s something heavier.

He stands. Slowly. Like he doesn’t want to move too fast.

Then I see it.

He’s holding something wrapped in white.

My breath catches and I forget how to exhale.

He crosses the room without a word. When he reaches the side of the bed, he doesn’t speak right away. He just looks at me, his mouth parted like he wants to say something but doesn’t know how.

Then he leans forward, and I see her.

A tiny face. Closed eyes. Soft lashes resting on full cheeks.

A baby. Our baby.

“She’s okay?” I whisper.

“She’s small, but she’s breathing. Strong heartbeat. Good lungs,” he says, his voice hoarse, rough around the edges. “No need for a ventilator. She came out swinging.”

He lowers her carefully into my arms. The second I feel her, something in me shatters.

He manages a crooked, lopsided grin. “Kicked the nurse too. She’s already got the Sharov attitude.”

She’s warm. So small I’m scared I’ll break her. Her fingers curl, twitching against the edge of the blanket. She makes a tiny sound—half sigh, half yawn.

Just like that, I start to cry. Tears spill down my cheeks before I can stop them. I hold her closer, curling around her, shielding her from the cold, from the light, from everything that isn’t me.

“She’s perfect,” I manage.

“She is.”

“She’s really here.”

“Yeah.”

I can’t stop looking at her. I take in every detail: her nose, her hair, her tiny clenched fists. I brush a fingertip across the downy softness of her cheek, and she stirs slightly, her lips parting.

“I thought we lost her,” I whisper.

“I did too,” he says. “For a minute, I thought—” He doesn’t finish. He just shakes his head and sits beside me.

I turn my face toward him. “You waited?”

He nods. “I never left the hallway.”

“How long—?”

“Hours. It felt longer.”

I reach for his hand, and he gives it to me without hesitation. His fingers are cold. He squeezes mine tight.

“Are we sticking with Liliana?” he asks, glancing at the baby.

I pause.

There are names we discussed. There were ideas. But only one has stayed with me. One I said once, long ago, almost in passing.

“Liliana” I say softly.

His gaze flicks to mine. “Yeah, it sounds perfect.”

I nod.

He doesn’t smile often, but now he does. Just slightly. Just enough to change the shape of his whole face.

“Liliana Sharov,” he says aloud, testing it. “It suits her.”

I press a kiss to her forehead. “Liliana,” I repeat, the name catching on a fresh wave of tears.

Kion shifts closer and rests his hand gently over both of ours.

“She’s going to be fine,” he says.

“So are we,” I whisper.

He doesn’t answer, but he stays right there, his hand covering mine, his eyes on her.

The world outside fades.

It doesn’t matter if the city burns or the empire shakes.

Right now, in this small white room that smells like antiseptic and warm cotton, nothing exists but the three of us.

Time slows. Breath softens. All I hear is the quiet rhythm of her tiny breaths and the steady murmur of the monitor beside me.

Liliana sleeps against my chest, curled in close like she’s always belonged there.

Her skin is impossibly soft, her weight barely there—but to me, she feels like the whole world.

I shift the blanket gently, brushing one thumb across her cheek.

She stirs again, a little sigh escaping her lips, but doesn’t wake.

Kion sits beside me, one hand resting on the edge of the bed, the other curled loosely beneath his chin.

He’s still in the same black shirt from last night, creased and faintly stained from where he held me.

His hair is damp around the edges, like he ran his hands through it too many times. He hasn’t shaved.

He looks… different.

There’s no sharpness in his face now, no edge to his stare.

His eyes follow every shift of Liliana’s body like he’s watching something fragile and holy, something that could slip away if he looks the wrong way.

It’s the same way he looked at me in the hallway before the doors closed.

Like the earth had tilted and left him behind.

This time, he isn’t alone.

I turn to him, watching the way the firelight flickers in his eyes, and he must feel me looking. His gaze meets mine.

Neither of us speaks.

There’s nothing to say when the moment is already full.

Eventually, I lay Liliana in the bassinet beside the bed. She whimpers once but settles easily, one tiny fist near her mouth, her breathing slow and even. I tuck the blanket around her and smooth the edge down gently, fingers lingering.

When I sit back, Kion’s eyes are still on me.

“She’s really ours,” I whisper.

His voice is low, almost reverent. “Yeah.”

I reach for his hand, and he doesn’t hesitate to give it. His fingers curl around mine, rough and warm and certain.

For a while, we just sit like that.

Then he speaks. “You were going to say something,” he murmurs.

I glance at him, startled.

He looks down, thumb brushing across the back of my hand. “Before,” he says. “Before you collapsed. You walked into my study like you had something to tell me.”

My heart stirs, remembering it. The softness I carried, the fear. The way I hesitated in the doorway, wanting to say something I hadn’t let myself feel fully until that moment.

I nod once, lips parting, but he continues before I can answer. “So was I.”

I meet his eyes again.

There’s something raw in them now. He shifts closer, like he can’t bear the distance between us.

“Say it,” I breathe.

He lifts his hand, slow and deliberate, and touches my face. Not with hunger, not with desperation—just with care. His thumb skims the corner of my mouth. His fingers trace my jaw, then slide behind my ear. It’s the softest he’s ever touched me.

“I love you.”

The words land quietly. My breath hitches. My chest tightens.

A laugh escapes me, wet and shaky, more exhale than sound. My eyes blur with tears again, but this time they’re different. Lighter. Realer.

“I love you too.”

I don’t say it because I’m afraid.

I don’t say it because I think it’ll keep me safe.

I say it because I mean it.

He leans in, pressing his forehead to mine, and for a while we stay like that, breathing the same breath.

Liliana shifts in her sleep, her fingers curling tighter.

Kion’s arm wraps around me. Mine curls around him.

His lips find mine before I even realize he’s moved.

It’s not a desperate kiss. There’s no urgency in it.

Just warmth. Care. Like he’s sealing the words we’ve just spoken with something truer than sound.

His hand cradles the side of my face, his mouth moving slowly against mine.

I lean into it without hesitation, heart full and chest tight in the best possible way.

When we pull back, he doesn’t let go. He presses a soft kiss to my cheek, then my brow, and finally rests his forehead against mine again. I smile through the tears I haven’t wiped away.

“I didn’t think I’d get to have this,” I whisper.

He strokes his thumb along my cheek. “You have it now.”

A quiet knock comes at the door, and the spell doesn’t break—but it shifts. The doctor steps in, clipboard tucked under one arm, expression politely neutral. He pauses when he sees us, then clears his throat.

“I won’t keep you long,” he says. “Vitals are looking good, Esme. The stitches look clean. You’re healing well.”

“Good,” I reply, my voice still hoarse.

He glances at me with gentle concern. “We can offer something stronger for the pain if the oral meds aren’t cutting it.”

I shake my head before he finishes. “No. Thank you. I’ve got everything I need.”

He raises a brow. “Are you sure?”

Kion’s hand tightens gently around mine. I glance at Liliana sleeping in the bassinet beside me and smile.

“I’m sure,” I say. “I have my daughter and my husband. That’s all I need.”

The doctor nods, scribbles something down, and lets himself out quietly.

Kion shifts closer again and places a kiss on my temple. “Stubborn.”

“You wouldn’t love me otherwise.”

He huffs a soft laugh. “True.”

***

Two days pass in a slow blur.