Chapter 7
Ivan
The ceiling fan clicked with each rotation.
I’d given up counting hours ago, just like I’d given up on sleep.
Four a.m. had bled into five, then six, and now pale morning light leaked through my bedroom windows, turning everything gray and accusatory.
My jaw ached from clenching. My mind wouldn't stop replaying that moment—Anya standing in her wedding dress, hands clasped to hide their shaking, while I confessed attraction she clearly didn't return.
I'm attracted to you. Very attracted.
Her silence had been answer enough. The way she'd just stood there, frozen, probably terrified I was about to become exactly the monster she'd expected. Another man with power over her body. Another cage with prettier bars.
I'd thought I was saving her. That was the sick joke of it.
Viktor Morozov had delivered his daughter like a package, and I'd accepted delivery thinking I could protect her, give her autonomy, show her that marriage didn't have to mean ownership.
Instead, I'd trapped her in a penthouse with a man who wanted her while she counted down the days until her father's threats became reality.
Because he would know, somehow. Men like Viktor always knew. He'd have contacts, spies, some way of verifying whether his daughter had fulfilled her purpose. And when he discovered she hadn't—
I threw off the covers, needing movement, needing to stop thinking about what Viktor might do to punish perceived failure.
My bare feet hit cold hardwood, grounding me in the present.
The bedside clock read 6:47. Thirteen minutes until seven.
A reasonable hour to be awake. A normal time to make coffee and pretend everything was fine.
The shower ran too hot, but I didn't adjust it.
Let the water scald away the feeling of Anya's eyes on me last night.
I dressed mechanically—jeans, black t-shirt, the casual clothes that made me look less like a bratva boss and more like someone she might not need to fear. As if clothes could change what I was.
It was ridiculous. I was married to a gorgeous woman, but there was no joy in my heart. None.
The hallway stretched between my room and the living space, twenty-three steps that felt like crossing a minefield.
Each footfall might detonate whatever fragile peace we'd managed.
I could hear something—the whisper of pages turning.
She was awake. Of course she was awake. Probably hadn't slept either, too busy calculating escape routes and survival strategies.
I found her exactly where I'd expected—the Eames chair, angled toward the morning sun.
But everything else made my chest constrict.
She'd pulled her knees to her chest, making herself small in my oversized t-shirt.
The one I'd given her that first night, now wrinkled from being slept in.
Or not slept in. Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment rested against her thighs—because apparently she was reading about guilt and moral suffering, which felt too appropriate.
The sleeve was in her mouth.
She chewed the fabric unconsciously, jaw working in a rhythm that probably matched her racing thoughts.
The cotton was dark with moisture, bunched between her teeth like she needed something to bite down on just to keep from screaming.
A tell so obvious it might as well have been a neon sign: I'm not okay.
I'm drowning. I need help but don't know how to ask.
Her eyes were swollen. Red-rimmed. The kind of puffiness that came from crying hard enough to give yourself a headache. Her hands trembled slightly as she turned a page, and I could see her fingernails had been bitten down to the quick. Fresh damage. Last night's anxiety made physical.
She thought she'd failed the treaty. Thought punishment was coming.
Thought her father would somehow know his virgin daughter remained untouched and extract whatever brutal price he'd promised.
All because I'd been noble. Because I'd insisted on consent.
Because I'd confessed feelings that made everything worse instead of better.
"Coffee?" I offered, keeping my voice carefully neutral. Like we were roommates. Like this was normal.
She startled, the book sliding sideways as her body jerked. The sleeve pulled from her mouth with a wet sound that made something in my chest twist. Her eyes found mine—dark, exhausted, careful.
"Thank you," she whispered. Barely audible. The voice of someone trying not to take up space.
I moved to the kitchen, muscle memory guiding me through the ritual. Grind beans. Measure water. Start the machine. Normal movements while nothing felt normal. The coffee maker gurgled and hissed, filling the silence with something that wasn't the weight of everything unsaid between us.
Two mugs. Black for me. I’d try white for her today. See how she reacted. I brought both to where she sat, extending hers like a peace offering I didn't deserve to have accepted.
She took it with both hands, wrapping her fingers around the ceramic like it could warm more than just her palms. "Thank you," she said, though I hadn't asked.
I sat on the sofa. Twenty feet away. Might as well have been twenty miles for all the distance between us.
I had to fix this.
Breakfast was another performance in careful normalcy—scrambled eggs that she wouldn't eat, toast that would grow cold, orange juice neither of us wanted.
I stood at the stove pushing eggs around the pan with mechanical precision while Anya remained in the chair.
"Food's ready," I announced to the silence.
She moved to the dining table like she was approaching an execution.
Each step measured, controlled, the kind of walk you did when your body wanted to run but your mind knew there was nowhere to go.
She sat in the same chair she'd used yesterday, folded her hands in her lap, waited for permission that didn't need to be given.
I set the plate in front of her. Scrambled eggs, wheat toast with butter, orange juice in crystal that caught morning light and threw it across the table like scattered diamonds.
A normal breakfast for an abnormal morning where my wife—that word still felt foreign—believed she'd signed her own death warrant by not fucking me on our wedding night.
She picked up her fork with steady hands. Started moving eggs around her plate in precise patterns.
Time passed. Her eggs had been reorganized a dozen different ways. Not a single bite had made it to her mouth.
"You need to eat," I said quietly.
"I'm not hungry." Her voice was flat. Empty.
But I could see her pulse hammering in her throat.
Could see the slight tremor in her fingers when she set the fork down.
Could practically hear her thoughts spiraling: He'll know.
Father always knows. The informants, the spies, the people who report back.
Someone will tell him his daughter is still untouched.
Still unused. Still failing her purpose.
Her shoulders had crept up toward her ears. Defensive posture. Protective.
"I want to take you somewhere," I said carefully. Testing the words like stepping on ice that might crack.
Her eyes snapped to mine. Surprise and suspicion tangled together in those dark depths. Her fingers found the edge of the table, gripped tight enough to turn her knuckles white.
"Where?" The word came out sharp. Defensive. Ready to catalog the trap before it could close.
"The New York Aquarium in Coney Island." I kept my voice even, casual, like this was a normal suggestion between normal people. "It's quiet on weekday mornings. Peaceful. I thought—"
I stopped myself before saying what I really thought.
That watching jellyfish might make her feel small and safe in the good way.
That the dim blue lighting would be soothing for someone whose nervous system hadn't stopped firing since her father dropped her off.
That sometimes Littles needed environments that made them feel protected without having to ask for it.
"I thought you might like to get out," I said instead. "See something beautiful. Not think about last night or treaties or anything else for a few hours."
She studied me with those intelligent eyes that missed nothing.
Looking for the angle. The leverage. The reason a bratva boss would want to take his treaty bride to look at fish.
Her mind was probably running through scenarios—public execution, meeting with father's enemies, some elaborate punishment disguised as an outing.
"You want to take me to an . . . aquarium?" She said it slowly, like she was tasting the words for poison.
"Yes."
"To look at . . . fish?"
"And jellyfish. Penguins. Sea turtles. They have a whole shark exhibit if you're interested, though personally I find the jellyfish more—" I caught myself before saying 'soothing.' "—interesting."
Her brow furrowed slightly. The confusion of someone who'd prepared for violence and been offered something else entirely. "Why?"
Because you haven't eaten in two days. Because you're shaking apart from anxiety. Because you need to see that the world outside isn't all cages and consequences. Because maybe, possibly, you'll uncurl from that defensive posture if you're somewhere that feels safe.
"Think of it as our honeymoon," I said simply.
"Look, I know that you’re worried. But sitting in this penthouse won't make anything better or worse.
Your father won't know about last night any faster if we stay here.
Nothing changes. So we might as well look at something beautiful while we wait for nothing to happen. "
She processed this with that computer-brain of hers.
"You don't have to," I added quickly. "If you'd rather stay here, we can—"
"Okay." The word escaped like she surprised herself by saying it. "I'll go."