Chapter 43
SIMA
On the day of my lunch date with Jemma, I’m a mess of nerves.
My jitters start before I’ve even walked out the door. The penthouse feels like a safe haven, one I’m not sure I’m ready to leave on my own. Though I won’t be on my own—Luka will be there, too.
But Petyr won’t be.
I try to silence that voice at the back of my head. I’m glad to finally be seeing Jemma. Just the thought of it makes my chest swell with relief. A piece of my old life, a piece of me, waiting at our favorite café table like none of this ever happened.
But my stomach still feels like a knot pulled too tight. Part of it is excitement, but the rest… I don’t want to name it yet.
I don’t feel ready. Petyr’s absence nags at me at the most random moments, making me ache for him even when there’s no reason to want him there.
Taking a nap? Want Petyr.
Having a cup of tea? Want Petyr.
Watching History Channel After Dark in a hopeless bid to keep awake through Petyr’s ridiculous office hours? I. Want. Petyr.
I’ve never been a clingy person, but God, if I’m not turning into the teenager I never got to be.
I’m just tired. That’s what I keep telling myself as I slip into the car. Baby-making is hard work. That’s why my body feels so sluggish, like my bones are made of sandbags. I just haven’t been getting enough sleep.
Luka drives me to the other side of the city without speaking a word.
I’m used to it by now, so I don’t expect him to.
But I can tell by the drumming of his fingers on the steering wheel that my presence alone is probably causing him a stress ulcer.
By the end of this, I’ll quietly cover his hospital bills.
The thought of anything ending plunges me into the mopes again. I’m looking forward to my pregnancy, but in a way, I’m dreading it, too.
Because it’ll mean I’m that much closer to the finish line.
And I’m not so sure I want to cross it.
Finally, Luka pulls up in front of the café. Funny how parking spots seem to free up on their own accord whenever a Bratva car rolls up, even in the middle of rush hour. Should the History Channel look into that? Flying pyramids, Bigfoot, and now, mysterious parking vacancies?
Then Luka starts getting out, too, and my panic flares. “You’re coming?”
“I… have to?” he answers, somehow sounding more confused than me.
I join my hands in a prayer pose. “Please, Luka. Please, please, take your lunch hour. The last thing I need is Jemma clocking you at the door and assuming I’ve got a bodyguard shadowing me.”
“You do have a bodyguard shadowing you.” His brow creases. “And I don’t get a lunch hour.”
“I’ll get you a union contact then. But first, pleeease?” I give him my best puppy dog eyes. “I really don’t want Jemma to think I’m a mob wife.”
“But you are a—”
“She doesn’t need to know that!” I glance around in panic to see if Jemma is anywhere nearby. The second-to-last thing I need is her overhearing some crucial piece of information that’ll get her sniped at her next wedding reception. “Please? For me?”
Something gives in Luka’s expression. I want to say it’s kindness, but it looks like the beginning of a panic attack. Either way, I’ll take what I can get.
“Okay, then. I’ll be in the car.”
Yes! Victory!
“Bless you,” I whisper. “I’ll bring you back a Danish.”
“I’m actually gluten—”
But I’m already too far away to hear.
The light inside the café is much warmer than outside. I spy Jemma at our usual table, craning her neck and waving me over, like she’s been waiting a decade and a half.
My chest squeezes. God, I missed her.
When I get to the table, she’s out of her chair before I can blink. “SAMMI!”
Her hug is a chokehold of familiarity, the scent of coffee and vanilla clinging to her hair. For a second, I almost fucking cry.
“Girl,” she says, pulling me back to search my face, “I was literally two kitten reels away from sending out a missing persons report. Again.”
I laugh, too high-pitched and nervous to fool her. “It’s all good. I just ran late. Please, remove 911 from speed dial.”
Her eyes narrow like she doesn’t buy it, but she lets me slide into the booth across from her. “Only if you start spilling. Real tea, not that weak brew you gave me at the office.”
“Can we get literal tea first? Or coffee? Or anything with crazy amounts of sugar in it?”
She summons over a server. “Don’t need to ask me twice.”
We place our orders. She gets a dirty chai, her go-to drink. I opt for my usual coffee, but with three sugars and a double helping of cream. Jemma gives me a curious look, but doesn’t press.
And since I’m way too panicked to remember the cover story I thought up, I pivot. “You go first,” I say with a confidence I’m one hundred percent bullshitting. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever. What’s going on with your life?”
Her eyes light up. “Okay, so, you won’t believe this crap…”
She launches herself into story after story. Bob’s outstanding assholery at work, a date gone so badly it sounds like a 90s sitcom plot, her neighbor’s cat that keeps sneaking in to pee in her closet.
For a few minutes, I let myself drift, lulled by the illusion that I’m just me again. No secret past, no Bratva husband, no suffocating lies.
And then it comes, inevitable as the bill. She leans in, eyes sharp and glittery, like she’s just sniffed out gold. “So. How’s married life?”
I force a laugh, stirring what’s left of my coffee. “It’s… fine.”
“Just ‘fine’?” Jemma’s eyebrows wiggle like she’s back in tenth grade. “You’ve got to give me more, girl. Otherwise, I’m just gonna start making up songs.”
“Please, no songs.”
“Sammi and Petyr, sitting in a tree, F-U-C—”
“Okay, okay!” I throw my hands up in surrender. “Fine, I’ll talk.”
She settles on her elbows, waiting.
And waiting.
And waiting…
I try to think of something, anything that’s harmless enough to tell her. Something true and safe at the same time, though those two words have hardly ever been in the same sentence for me.
But my brain betrays me, unspooling images of Petyr in utterly unsafe situations.
His mouth, hot against my skin.
His eyes, burning holes through me.
The way he held me down a few nights ago, rough and demanding, until I shattered beneath him.
Heat flashes up my neck. I duck my head, wishing the table would swallow me whole. But the damage is done now—Jemma has seen. Like a hound, she zeroes in on her scent.
“Oh my God,” she crows, pointing at me. “You’re blushing. You’re actually blushing.”
I choke on my sip and cough. “I am not.”
“Are, too.”
What are you, twelve? I want to say, but all I can think about is that night. He surprised me, but… not in a bad way. Definitely not in a bad way.
I want to do that again. The thought catches me off-guard. Granted, it’s not the most effective way to conceive, but—
I fucking loved it.
Jemma must see it, too, because she doesn’t let up. “You are so in love, girl.”
“What?” I straighten up. “No, I’m not.”
“Mhmm. Keep telling yourself that.”
“I mean it,” I insist, but my voice cracks, betraying me.
“Uh-huh,” Jemma says, unimpressed. “And yet, here you are, looking like someone who just hobbled her way down to breakfast from her honeymoon suite. Don’t fight me on this. You’ve got the glow.”
I groan, covering my face with my hands. “You’re impossible.”
“And you’ve got a hot plate for a face, so who’s got it worse?”
Me. Definitely fucking me.
Jemma leans back, grinning wickedly. “You know, you’ve always been the least romantic person I’ve ever met.
The wedding planner who swore she’d never get married.
We had a pool going on at the office. I had my sights on a later-in-life romance, but you just had to go and find yourself a hot, rich husband you apparently actually love. ”
“I do not—”
“It’s not corny to admit you love your husband, Sam. You married the man. In the most dramatic way possible, might I add.”
I roll my eyes and hide my face behind an empty cup. “It wasn’t that dramatic,” I mumble.
“Oh, please. If there had been fireworks, pigeons, and a Broadway overture, it still wouldn’t have topped you.”
“Jem.”
“Though your husband apparently tops you a lo—”
“JEM!”
Jemma starts cackling like a maniac. I bury my face in my hands, wondering if Luka will use his service gun to shoot me if I ask real nicely.
I realize my heart is racing. Can’t stop, won’t stop kind of racing.
A horrible doubt stabs me then. Could Jemma be… right?
Am I actually in love with Petyr?
I can’t be in love with him. He’s the pakhan of the Gubarev Bratva, my family’s sworn enemies. He kidnapped and blackmailed me, and only came up with a mutually beneficial agreement because he didn’t want me to keep trying to sneak out of his creepy-as-fuck mansion of horrors.
But then I think about the other side of him.
The kind, caring, occasionally nerdy man I’ve come to know over these long weeks together.
I think about the way my chest expands at the memory of his rare laugh, the warmth that seeps into my body when I remember his hands on me.
The strange safety I feel in his arms, a sensation I’ve never felt before.
Not back at my family home, not once in the twelve years I’ve been on the run.
Jemma must see something flicker across my face, because she groans and waves her spoon at me. “Don’t tell me I just sent you into some existential crisis.”
“Maybe a minor one,” I mutter, trying for a smile.
“Come on. You don’t need to keep up the tough act.” She reaches over and grabs my hand. “So you got married and you liked it. So what? I certainly won’t be holding it against you. No one will. I mean, maybe Bob.”
“Definitely Bob.”
“Yeah, he flipped his shit when he saw your resignation. Heard he went to your place and tried to kick down your door to demand your two weeks, but you were nowhere to be found.”
“Yeesh.”
“Yep. Anyway.” She fixes her gaze on mine. “You’re not bound by your past, Sammi. Whoever you were—that’s not who you have to be for the rest of your life. You’re allowed to change.”
My eyes grow teary. She has no idea how much those words mean to me. Jemma doesn’t know about my past, but everything she just said hits me right there. The girl I used to be, the woman I am today—they’re so different. Sometimes, it gives me whiplash to think about.
Sima Danilo. Sammi Banks. Two halves of my life I’ve tried my damnedest to keep separate.
What if I let them merge into someone new? A person I can actually be proud of?
A person I can be?
But then I remember Dimitri, hooked to all those machines. I remember that Petyr is fatherless now because of what my own dad did.
There’s no way I can ever reconcile with that.
No way I can ever be in love with him.
The thought lingers all the way through our second round of drinks. Through Jemma’s chatter, through every smile I fake. By the time I excuse myself to the bathroom, my nerves are ready to snap at a moment’s notice.
I splash cool water on my face, gripping the sink as if I can anchor myself to something steady, something real.
But it doesn’t help. My reflection looks pale, wide-eyed, worn into transparency by the weight of her own lies.
I am not in love with Petyr. I chant the words silently to myself, hoping the repetition will make them true. I am not in love with Petyr. I am not in love with Petyr.
I am not—
The smell of my own lies follows me back to the table.
Jemma and I talk some more. This time, I steer the conversation towards business. Our plans for the future—the only real thing I can count on.
When we hug goodbye, it feels like we’re two soldiers heading back behind opposite battle lines. Dramatic, sure, but when are we not?
“Promise me we’ll do this again,” Jemma sniffles. “But not like people who say, ‘We should do this again’ and then never pick up the phone. We’re actually gonna do it. Okay?”
“Okay,” I whisper, teary-eyed. “I’d like that, too.”
When I finally step back out into the hallway, Jemma’s perfume is still soft against my nostrils.
And then my breath snags in my throat.
Blond hair. Blue eyes. A scar on his right cheek, thin but visible.
That’s Maksim.
My youngest brother.