Page 97 of Scarlet Thorns

Does Osip have a girlfriend?

The thought makes me feel physically sick. Here I am, agreeing to carry his child, and there’s some gorgeous blonde with a prior claim to his affections? But if that’s true, why didn’t he mention her? Why make this offer at all if he’s already involved with someone?

Because it’s business,my rational mind whispers.

Just like he said. Personal relationships have nothing to do with surrogacy arrangements.

Except nothing about what happened between us felt like business. The way he touched me, the heat in his eyes— none of that was professional or detached.

I sit in the garden for another ten minutes, trying to process what just happened and failing miserably. Questions multiply in my head like cancer cells, each one more troubling than the last. Who is she? How long have they been together? Does she know about his offer to me?

And why do I care so much?

Because you’re already attached,the honest part of my brain admits.

It occurs to me that somewhere between discovering his secret room and watching him fall apart in his sleep, I started wanting more than just a business arrangement.

The realization should terrify me. Instead, it just makes me more determined to understand what I’ve gotten myself into.

One thing is clear— I need to talk to Osip. Need to know exactly what I’m agreeing to, and whether his personal life is going to complicate an already impossible situation.

But first, I need to stop my hands from shaking and find a way to wash the taste of that woman’s venom from my mouth.

Welcome to your new life, Ilona,I think grimly.Population: you, a dangerous Russian businessman, and apparently his psychotic ex-girlfriend.

This is going to be interesting.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Osip

My coffee is growing cold as I review construction contracts for the club renovations.

Numbers and timelines should occupy my thoughts, but my mind keeps drifting to last night. For the first time in months, I slept through the night without pills, without nightmares clawing me back to consciousness, drenched in sweat and guilt.

Instead, I dreamed of soft hands on my skin, gentle whispers in the darkness. Dreamed of Ilona curled beside me in my bed, her warmth chasing away the ghosts that usually hunt me through sleep. The dream felt so real I woke harder than steel, my body aching for something I can’t allow myself to want.

Blyad.

The woman is already under my skin, and she hasn’t even started carrying my child yet.

My phone buzzes with a message that makes my lips curl up with satisfaction.

“Offer accepted.”

Two words that change everything. Ilona will carry my baby. Give me the family that was stolen from me, the future I thought died with Galina. It will give her the opportunity to have a child too, a child she would not be able to have without medical treatment and close monitoring. The relief flooding through me is so intense it’s almost painful.

“Tonight,”I decide.“Tonight I’ll go to her room and we’ll start this properly.”

That’s when my office door explodes open without warning.

“Who the hell is this ‘new house manager’ of yours and why is she in the garden sipping tea instead of working? Is that why you pay her?”

Anett storms into my space like a hurricane of platinum hair and misplaced rage, her eyes blazing with the kind of fury that makes smart men reach for weapons. She’s dressed to kill in some designer creation that I probably paid for somehow, but all that expensive beauty can’t hide the desperation radiating from her like heat from a nuclear reactor.

I lean back in my leather chair, keeping my expression stone-cold while violence builds in my chest like pressure in a boiler.

“Good morning to you too. May I ask what the fuck you’re doing here?”