CHAPTER NINETEEN
Anastasia
For ten years, I have lived in the misery of not knowing exactly what happened to my brother. Now I have all the answers, and while the real identity of the person responsible for my brother's debt is still a mystery, I am comforted by the fact that it wasn’t Fyodor.
I owe Fyodor a lot; after all, I am alive because of him. His efforts and my brother's sacrifice gave me another chance at life. My desire to get revenge might have landed me in trouble, but luckily, I ended on the good side of things.
My father has put a lot of arrangements in place to ensure my comfort.
In his words, he emphasized that the only thing he wants is for Fyodor and me to focus on his grandchildren.
Ivan and Dimitri have been strangely supportive.
The two of them insist that Fyodor should spend as much time as possible with me.
Everything looks good at the moment, but there are still a number of things I need to work on. Fyodor suggested that I receive therapy for my brother’s death, and he made an appointment with the Bratva’s therapist, who will keep everything we discuss a secret.
“Are you sure about that? I think we should put this here,” I tell Fyodor as he tries to set the cribs up.
“I think this is better,” Fyodor insists as he steps back, inspecting his work. “The cribs are better over here. They need to be able to see the stars.”
I chuckle and tell him that I know how much he wants the twins to be able to see the stars on the ceiling. Everyone is looking forward to my delivery date, which, according to my doctors, is only three weeks away.
The last few months have been kind of slow, with Fyodor and me spending more time together and learning more about each other.
Katya and Leonid are quite excited to be an aunt and uncle.
For our kids’ godfather, Fyodor suggested Dimitri, claiming that he’s the one person he would be able to trust with the kids.
I suggested Marina for their godmother, knowing that she’ll always look out for the good of my children. She was filled with excitement when I broke the news to her.
“I think we still have a long way to go. Who thought setting up a nursery would be this difficult?” Fyodor says.
“Which is why I initially suggested you get a decorator, but you insisted that you wanted to do it yourself,” I reply.
Fyodor’s argument had been that he wanted to put in his effort, and it makes me happy because it shows how invested he will be in the lives of our children.
The names of our children have already been easily decided; Fyodor suggested we name the boy Alexei in honor of my brother, who had been the catalyst for bringing us together.
For the girl, I suggested the name Galina, his mother's name, and Fyodor almost broke down in tears.
“Yeah, but this is better,” Fyodor tells me as he kisses me on the lips. “I will always be able to tell them how I put everything together.”
Who doesn’t love a handyman? As Fyodor returns to putting the cribs together, I lean against the wall, watching him as love stirs in my heart. This is nothing like what Dylan and I shared, and I have realized over the past few weeks that the love I have for Fyodor is different.
Not only does it make me feel safe, but it also creates this warm satisfaction in me that I know I never have to worry about anything.
Realizing that he won’t be able to figure the cribs out in time for us to meet up with our friends, Fyodor gives up, but not before he promises to be back.
“Should I help you get ready?” Fyodor asks.
Being pregnant makes me feel fat, and sometimes, I wake up in the middle of the night bawling my eyes out. Fyodor doesn’t seem to have any problem consoling me, even if I wake him up after he’s had a stressful day.
“No, I can manage fine,” I assure him as I change into one of my big gowns.
Thirty minutes later, Fyodor helps me into the car as we drive toward Nathan Peers’s condo. I am not sure exactly how Fyodor knows Nathan Peers, but he mentions that he’s a friend of Dimitri's.
“Really? Is he involved with us?” I ask as Fyodor helps me out of the car.
“Would you think worse of him if so?”
I pause for a moment, carefully weighing my answer as I realize that I won’t necessarily think badly of Nathan if I realize he’s in the mob. Most billionaires have some sort of connection to the underworld, and Nathan Peers wouldn’t be any different.
There are a number of people gathered in his living room, and I pick out Dimitri and Fiona’s faces instantly. They all look at me, and I feel a little nervous, realizing that they are mostly Fyodor’s age.
“Girls, this is Anastasia,” Fiona says as she gently guides me toward the girls.
Fyodor easily surrendered me to Fiona, but not before telling me that I was in good hands. The women around me introduce themselves, and the only person whose name I think I have heard once or twice before is Scarlet Fitzroy, who is an icon in the fashion world.
“With time, you’ll get to know everyone better,” Fiona assures me after the ladies switch to another topic.
“I know, but I feel like I’m the youngest,” I admit to Fiona, who laughs and tells me not to be silly.
“We don’t care about things like that. Our men are all friends, and all that matters is that we bond together and protect each other.”
Fyodor assured that I’d feel a kinship among them, and soon, my initial wariness vanishes as the ladies talk about the latest gossip. Nathan’s chef soon signals that the time for dinner is ready, and we all gather around the table to eat.
Rachel and Scarlet are very curious to know how well I am adjusting to LA, and I tell them that so far, it’s been a good experience, though I miss running into cowboys.
Everyone at the table laughs hard at my statement, and Nathan Peers tells me that I’ll get used to the eccentricities LA has to offer.
The soft and warm conversation drifts around the table, and I find myself really enjoying the evening.
Once it’s time to go home, Nathan tells us that he has hired a driver to get us home safely.
“He’s a really nice man,” I mention to Fyodor as we get into the car.
“Maybe. The Nathan I used to know is not the type of person you want to mess with. But he has changed because of Amelia.”
Intrigued by their story, I beg Fyodor to tell me more about it, and at first, he’s reluctant, telling me that he doesn’t believe in talking about other people’s business.
But once we get out of the car and head into our house, he draws me into his embrace and tells me that the only reason why he pretended that he wasn’t going to tell me was because of the driver with us.
“What exactly do you want to know about them?” he asks as he helps me into the kitchen chair. He places my feet on his lap and slowly massage them, a routine he has developed recently.
“I was thinking that you weren’t going to tell me,” I pretend to sulk, and Fyodor laughs.
“Trust me, you’re my partner, and apart from work-related stuff, I don’t think there’s anything I can’t tell you.” He kisses my feet.
My entire body tingles from pleasure, and I am getting slowly turned on by this act. He narrates what he knows about Amelia and Nathan Peers and how she somewhat redeemed him from the man he used to be.
“In the past, Scarlet, Rachel, and Fiona would rather die than be in the same room with Nathan.”
“Was he really that bad?”
Nathan shakes his head and says that he wouldn’t exactly call Nathan scum, but he definitely wasn’t the type of person anyone in their right mind would want to get involved with.
“The ladies once or twice suffered some sort of harassment from his hand, and everyone had given up on him till Amelia came and changed him. I guess that sometimes, all a man needs is one good woman to change him.”
“Just like I’ve changed you, right?” I tease Fyodor, who pleads the fifth.
After the foot massage, Fyodor helps me to bed, and tonight, all I want is for him to hold me. He wraps his arm around me as I sleep on his chest, looking at the ceiling.
“I want to know… what were you planning to do when you married me?” Fyodor asks softly.
“Destroy and sabotage you. I wasn’t exactly sure how I’d pull it off, but I knew that it was something I could achieve if I decided to put in all my effort.”
“Hmmm. I guess it would have taken me a while to suspect you if you had succeeded,” he says as he kisses me on the nose.
“Come on, stop it.” I try to stop him, but Fyodor continues to plant kisses all over my face.
“This is my way of showing how much I love you, Anastasia,” he tells me, and I let him kiss me all over.
“I guess I need to come up with my own way,” I answer, and he assures me that I have already shown how much I love him.