Chapter 20 - Vera #2
“So.” Elisse smiled from across the table. “Let’s discuss the important things now. Nico and Vera, when are you getting married?”
I nearly choked on my spaghetti and Nico sighed heavily.
“Five minutes.”
“What?”
“You waited five entire minutes before jumping to the marriage train, Misha. Let the girl eat.”
“Oh no,” Ilana shook her head. “It has been too long since a wedding has happened in this house. I need you two to decide a date so we can start planning. There is so much to do.”
Vera laughed while all the men at the table looked resigned.
“Do we really have to grill the poor couple like this?” Jarek asked.
“No, we don’t,” Nico added. “We can simply let them live and when they decide to get married, they will let us know.”
“That’s not how it works in families, I am afraid,” Elisse said. “So seriously, you two. When?”
Nico took a drink. “Not tonight.”
“That wasn’t an answer.”
“It was.”
“Not a good one,” Ilana laughed.
“I wasn’t aiming for good.”
I tried to hide my smile but failed miserably. Nico noticed. His hand found my knee beneath the table just briefly, but it was enough. My pulse immediately betrayed me, and his mouth twitched. Bastard.
“We haven’t decided yet,” I shrugged and threw a glance at Nico. “And part of the reason probably has to be that Nico hasn’t proposed yet.”
I raised my hand to show them my bare ring finger, and all the women at the table gasped.
“Nico, what are you even doing?” Ilana almost shouted, her eyes wide. “You better propose to her before I have to personally knock some sense into you.”
Nico looked at me like I had thrown him to the wolves, and I shrugged, letting him take everyone’s wrath. I wasn’t worried about the proposal. I knew he wasn’t going anywhere and the ring would come eventually. But it was still rather fun watching him appease Ilana, Misha and Elisse.
An hour later I was genuinely enjoying myself, which should not have been surprising but somehow was.
These people felt like a family. They weren’t perfect, and they argued and interrupted each other and mocked each other relentlessly.
But underneath all of it was loyalty. The kind that couldn’t be broken. At some point, Ilana leaned toward me.
“How are you feeling?”
I knew what she meant immediately. She was referring to the pregnancy.
She had come to see me when I was healing from the bullet wound and I had ended up telling her.
I had been living with the terrifying realization that an actual tiny human existed inside me and Ilana had been a grounding force during that time.
“Better.”
“You still nauseous?”
“A little.”
“That’s normal.”
“Easy for you to say.”
She laughed. “Trust me. It gets worse.”
I stared at her. “That was not comforting.”
“Oh, trust me, I remember Clara telling me she was nauseous for the entirety of her pregnancy and that must have sucked,” Ilana laughed.
“Who’s Clara?”
“Clara Aslanov, now Chernykh. She is the wife of my oldest brother, Iosif, and she herself also comes from a bratva family, the Aslanovs.”
“Good god, how many bratva families are there?”
“Way too many. But you don’t need to worry because the Romanovs are now in a close alliance with everyone, including the Aslanovs and the Chernykhs. So you are in a very safe bratva family, except you just need to look out for all these pregnant symptoms.”
“Again, not comforting, Ilana,” I chuckled.
“I am sorry,” she laughed. “What really matters is if Nico is taking care of you. If he is, everything will automatically get better.”
I immediately thought of everything Nico had been doing for me.
From cooking for me to feeding me with his hands.
He had been carrying me in his arms everywhere and had been giving me massages.
He had also been making me workout with him so I could gain some strength and stay healthy.
Despite him being swamped with work, he had been there for me.
“He’s the best,” I confessed, glancing at Nico. He was busy in a heated conversation about football with Fyodor, and it was refreshing to see him laughing and smiling.
I had missed that.
Later, dessert appeared and nobody admitted to ordering the cook to make three different kinds. Everyone blamed everyone else, and the argument lasted ten minutes. Jarek somehow ended up being accused despite having said approximately seven words all evening.
“I wasn’t even here.”
“Suspicious,” Ilana said, stealing a hefty bowl of tiramisu at once.
“That’s not how evidence works?” Jarek countered, but no one was listening to him.
“It does in this family,” Kliment shrugged and went for the ice cream.
The table dissolved into chaos again, and I found myself looking around.
Really looking. At Ilana smiling at Avgust. At Elisse threatening Fyodor with a spoon.
At Kliment pretending not to care while clearly caring very much.
At Misha rolling her eyes. At Jarek silently regretting every life decision that had led him here.
And at Nico, who was already watching me.
His gaze held mine. Soft. Steady. Certain. And the room faded around us. Not completely, but just enough. He grabbed a bowl of cake and walked towards me, sinking into the sofa.
“ Are you okay?” he asked quietly.
I nodded. I was more emotional than I wanted to admit. “Yeah.”
His expression gentled. “You sure? It looks like you are ready to burst into tears any second.”
I swallowed and then smiled.
“I’m happy. I have never seen this, you know? I have never had a family or siblings or banter or dinners like these. I just can’t believe I get to be part of this.”
The words came out before I could stop them and his eyes changed immediately. His thumb brushed across my knuckles beneath the table.
“I’m glad you are getting to experience it.
That was all he said, but it was enough. The conversation eventually shifted toward children, which turned out to be the worst possible topic because everyone immediately became an expert.
“Romanov children are nightmares,” Fyodor said, shaking his head.
“They are not,” Jarek replied, appearing offended.
“You literally threw a knife at me when we were little,” Fyodor countered, and I burst into laughter.
“We were twelve!”
I stared at Nico. “Did this actually happen?”
“It did, but it sounds worse than it was.”
“It really doesn’t,” I shook my head.
“And Nico, oh my god,” Ilana suddenly chimed in. “Kliment told me how Nico refused to eat every time he had an argument with someone like a little drama queen.”
“That is believable because he is still a little drama queen,” Jarek said, rolling his eyes at me.
“Am not!” Nico all but shouted.
“Only one person can settle that,” Kliment suddenly added, his eyes trained on me. “Vera, is Nico a drama queen or not?”
“You love me, Vera. Don’t forget that,” Nico said, his eyes twinkling.
The room was silent as if everyone was waiting for me to say something.
“He definitely still is a drama queen.”
Everyone cheered, and I laughed so hard my stomach hurt. Beside me, Nico looked increasingly offended while everyone else looked delighted.
“When the two of you have kids, they’ll probably inherit Vera’s stubbornness and Nico’s temper,” Jarek said, looking at us. “We should start praying now.”
“Immediately.”
Nico rubbed a hand over his face. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t.”
“No.” He sighed. “I really don’t.”
Silence settled briefly. Warm, comfortable silence. Family silence. The kind that didn’t need filling. And for the first time in a very long time, I allowed myself to imagine the future. Not tomorrow. Not next week. Not surviving the next crisis. But the actual future.
Birthdays. Holidays.
Arguments over nothing. Children running through hallways. Nico teaching them terrible habits. Me trying to undo the damage.
The possibility of a life. A real one. Not perfect but ours. My eyes drifted toward him again and he must have felt it because he looked over immediately.
“What’s that look for?”
I smiled. “Nothing.”
“Liar.”
“Maybe.”
His hand squeezed mine beneath the table, hidden from everyone else. A small gesture. A private one. And somehow it meant everything. For months I had believed I lost him. Then I believed he hated me. Then I believed we had destroyed each other beyond repair. Now he sat beside me.
Annoying. Overprotective. Impossible.
Mine.
And for the first time since this entire nightmare began, the future no longer felt like something to fear. It felt like something to look forward to. Just for a moment. Just for one fragile, precious moment. It felt like peace.
Just then, Kliment walked towards us and whispered something in Nico’s ear, but it was loud enough that the voice reached me. “We have Adrian and Manny’s location. We attack tomorrow.”