Held by the Bratva: an Age Gap Mafia Boss Stalker Romance

Epilogue

10 years later

People who say you can have too much of a good thing have clearly never met my husband.

I peek around the door to the twins’ room to watch Brody read them a bedtime story.

It’s their birthday tomorrow, and when I shooed them upstairs to bathe after their two younger siblings had already been washed, they were hyped up with excitement. But they’re both now calm and entranced by their dad reading to them.

He does excellent voices. I’ve tried to tell him he should do audiobooks. His are the best growly man dragons, and sweetest girl dragons. I bet he’d do rough and sexy romance heroes who would cause mass swooning events, even as mothers everywhere insisted they only followed his social media because their children adored his kids’ book’s characters.

He’s making this dragon book so good I’m honestly listening, despite having read it to the twins at least a hundred times.

“And then, the red dragon roared out red flames. Raaaahhhhh!”

I grin. He gets so into reading to the children, my sulky, grumpy quiet husband. He’s still a scary shadow of a mafia boss. My Dark Angel remains part rumour, part legend, part hushed disbelief when some lowlife goes missing.

But the Dark Angel will laugh with his babies. He’s bright and fun with them.

And with me.

I keep watching as he reads, the soft glow highlighting the planes of his face. He has more silver hairs now, but I love that even more. He says he loves my stretch marks in the same way, and certainly he has shown no signs of enjoying my body any less.

Quite the opposite, in fact.

I can’t believe I get to see him whenever I want. The years of longing—we laugh sometimes when remembering our mutual pining—are a distant memory. Almost forgotten. The story of how we met has taken on a rosy hue with time, and us being together with our kids is the source of so much joy it’s hard to remember it wasn’t always like this.

He’s been a doting father from the beginning, and loves nothing more than when I’m pregnant, or when he has a baby to carry when we walk in the garden. The children are strictly forbidden from the maze, and we say it’s because they might get lost. But it’s at least as much because we don’t want them seeing us doing some more baby-making, imaginary or not.

“Then, the blue dragon roared out blue flames. Blllaaaahhhhh!” Brody says, changing voice seamlessly.

I giggle and Brody sees me from the corner of his eye. He gives no visible sign of his split attention as he continues to read, but there’s a smirk that tugs at his mouth.

The kids are almost asleep, watching him with hooded eyes and teddy bears clutched to them.

“Then, the violet dragon roared out violet flames. Vaaaaahhhhh!”

Nine years old tomorrow, our first babies are tucked up in bed. Our other two are six and three, and we have yet to decide on whether we’ll have one more.

“And that is how a rainbow is made.” Brody closes the book with a snap.

“Again,” comes sleepily from one of the kids.

As Brody chuckles softly, and kisses both the twins good night, I think we will have another child. Just to hold on to this sweetness of my husband reading for them a little longer.

He turns off the lamps, checks the nightlight, then herds me out of the bedroom and closes the door behind him with an almost silent click and gathers me into his arms.

“You know,” he says conversationally, “in the Greek tradition, children’s birthdays are a celebration for the mother.”

“Really?” I say, distracted by his closeness. I breathe in the delicious neroli, steel, musk, and sea water scent of him.

“Apparently so. A new Greek mafia acquaintance was telling me. Mothers do all the work, no?”

I snort. I do plenty, yes. But Brody makes it sound like he’s nothing more than the sperm donor, when yesterday he was on his knees playing with the kids.

“If you say so.”

“I have a special present for you, moya koshechka.” My husband blinks at me, smiling his subtle, smug smile that means he has something truly devious planned. “Come to bed and find out what it is.”

Curious? Get the bonus scene of what Brody has planned as a treat for Caterina into your inbox here.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed Held by the Bratva. For another obsessed and protective kingpin, check out Kingpin’s Baby.

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