Page 155 of Sweet Deception

She shook her head, “No... no! Tell me it’s not true... my daughter cannot die. She was healthy, I felt her move while I was in labor. There’s no way she would be dead.”

I watched as the panic set in, her chest rising and falling in short, erratic breaths.

“I’m sorry.”

A scream tore from her throat.

She yanked her hand from mine, clawing at her hair, pulling it wildly. Her sobs were gut-wrenching, shaking the entire room.

“They killed her... they did...” she gasped, her voice breaking. “You couldn’t even protect our daughter. You let them kill her!”

“Anna...”

“Don’t you dare say my name!” She dug her nails into her scalp, her eyes wide, frenzied.

“Is my daughter really gone? Forever?”

I couldn’t speak. My throat burned, my fists clenched at my sides. I had underestimated my grandmother’s cruelty, and now it had cost me everything.

She will die for this.

Anna shoved me away. “Get away from me!”

I reached for her. “Babe, you need me now more than ever.”

“No, I don’t.” Her eyes were red-rimmed, wild. “You could have protected her if you wanted to. But you didn’t.”

Her voice turned bitter. “Something wasn’t right. The labor had been too hard. The doctors kept saying I needed surgery, but I felt her moving. What if... what if they did something to me?”

“What if the nurses delivering me worked for your grandmother? You knew how much power your family holds in Russia. You knew. Yet you let them kill our daughter.”

The way she looked at me, like she was seeing me for the first time, sent a sharp pain through my chest.

She wasn’t the naive woman I had married.

She wasn’t blind to our world anymore.

“Don’t say that, babe.” My voice was raw. “I wanted her as much as you did. We prepared for her arrival together.”

Her face twisted with agony. “I imagined what it would feel like to breastfeed my baby. Now, I have swollen breasts filled with milk for a child who isn’t here to drink it. Because she was killed by your evil family.”

“I had men at the hospital. Trusted men. I made sure of it. Or at least, I thought I did. But I hadn’t accounted for how deep my grandmother’s control ran. She didn’t bribe the doctors, she owned them. She hadn’t just infiltrated my security, she had always been one step ahead.”

She wiped her face and spoke in a voice devoid of warmth. “Can you give me some space? Please. Don’t come back anytime soon.”

“Anna... please.”

“Just get out.”

I stepped out, but I didn’t leave. I leaned against the door, listening to the sound of her sobs, her pain carving deep, bloody wounds into my soul.

I was drowning in fury.

The next few hours, the next few days, would be a bloodbath.

For now, I just needed her to heal. Even just a little.

I stood there for a long time, lost in my own torment. The silence eventually settled, but when I cracked the door open, my stomach twisted into a knot.