Chapter 25
ALEXSEI
Misha and I hadn’t gone home for almost two months. Because he wanted to be with Kalina, and because she didn’t trust me to be the sole provider of her protection, we were here.
I wasn’t offended that Misha was so attached to her after what they’d gone through at the cabin. He’d tried to save her. He wanted to protect her too. Almost losing her had frightened him, and I wasn’t at all surprised that he wanted to cling to her now.
He saw her as a source of comfort, and it touched my heart that she favored him and wanted to help him get over the cabin danger too.
Whatever made him sleep better. Whatever helped to put a smile on his face. My son’s happiness was all that mattered to me.
Kalina’s happiness mattered to me, too, and that was why I couldn’t walk away and give up.
That wasn’t an option.
There was no way that we could’ve fallen for each other so strongly, deeply, and quickly in that cabin if it was all just a sham. If it was only a lustful connection that was borne in the heat of the moment and the close proximity we were thrust into.
My feelings for her would not change. If anything, this absence of having her close made me even fonder of her. At the same time, my feelings toward myself wouldn’t change, either. This guilt that plagued me wouldn’t be erased, no matter what I did or said.
Misha hadn’t forgotten about me, though.
He clearly enjoyed spending as much time with Kalina as he could, but he was still my little boy.
He would come to sleep in his room next to mine in our private wing of the mansion.
He would still love me. And I wanted to hope that the love he patiently and openly showed Kalina would be another bridge to getting back to that sense of a family we’d found in the cabin.
That with my patience, she might understand that I wasn’t going to quit.
That I did care. That I wasn’t going to give up on what we had.
That even though something terrible had happened with those two new Dubinin recruits selling the intel of our location, it was something I couldn’t have personally controlled.
Luka had tried to reason with her. He told me how he’d explained in blunt detail how he claimed personal responsibility for what had happened.
Gabriella was also talking to her, daily. I knew she was rooting for us to find peace again.
Everything seemed to be hinged on her forgiving me, on our returning to the companionship we’d found in her healing days.
Until she might open up to me and trust me again, I preoccupied myself by staying close yet with distance, hunting down her brother and Yusef. Because so long as they were alive out there, she would inherently be at risk.
Almost two months of this waiting game.
But I would remain patient. I had to hold on to this hope. Because it had taken me years to find her, for us to encounter each other in the worst and darkest moments. She was the light that I needed after all the despair over not saving my wife.
She was the hope that love could win in the end.
And at last, she came to me.
Unexpectedly, in complete surprise, one night after I had given up in my office, a night when Misha was spending the night at Raisa and Ivan’s house for a change to be with Lev, a soft knock sounded on my door.
Nobody here knocked like that.
I held my breath.
The raps on the wood came so quietly. Almost as though the person trying to summon me was timid. Or shy. Nervous.
Only one person came to mind.
Kalina?
I longed for it to be her. I got up from my chair to go to the door, my heart racing at the possibility that she could be on the other side. That she could be seeking me.
Knocks came again, faster and more impatient, with a sense of urgency that had me worrying.
Before I could get to the door and open it, it swung open.
There she was.
Beautiful. Gorgeous. And yes, nervous. Standing there in her pajamas, she stood there after all this time apart while being in the same building. Without any greeting, without waiting for me to say anything, she strode in and shut the door behind herself.
Now that she was in the dim light of my bedroom, I saw her clearly. I noticed her tension as she stared me down.
She wasn’t nervous. She was scared.
Every protective instinct flared to the surface. Adrenaline coursed through me with this need to be her hero. To save her. To rescue her from whatever was bothering her.
“Kalina?” It felt too good to say something to her after holding back for weeks. “What is it? Tell me, please.”
I didn’t care if she got mad that I was asking her pointed questions, as if I were ordering her to explain. Yes, I expected answers because goddammit, if something was wrong, I had to fix it for her.
She licked her lips, opening her eyes wide as she watched me.
Maybe the shock of finally facing me after avoiding me for almost two months was getting to her. Perhaps she was second-guessing herself to come and approach me at all. Especially like this, in the quiet darkness of the night, out of the blue.
I itched with the need to reach out to her, to take her hand and hold it just to give her a grounding sense that she wasn’t alone. That she didn’t have to ever struggle on her own.
“I…” She swallowed, her delicate neck straining with the force of it. Clearing her throat, she only watched me. Then she swallowed again and took one step closer to me.
The chasm stretching between us wasn’t more than a couple of feet, but it felt like miles, tugging at my heart. The longing to hold her and reconnect, to reconcile with these differences between us, was hell.
“I…” She shook her head and cringed, as if she were in pain.
Nothing showed on her. No injuries were obvious to my eyes. Blood was absent. Of course, she was uninjured. She was protected and safe in the Dubinin fortress.
Instead of telling me anything, she closed her eyes briefly as if she regretted coming at all.
No words came as an explanation. She showed me.
Lifting her arms, she extended her hand toward me.
In it was an object.
I locked my eyes on her, frantic and impatient to figure out what I could do to help her, to make her smile.
As she slowly rotated her wrist and uncurled her fingers, I saw a slim stick. White plastic.
What? What is this?
She raised it higher, and I peered at it while she waited for me to identify it.
As her fingers slid over the plastic item, a plus sign was revealed.
My mouth hung open.
Time stood still.
Instant realization swept over me with the force of a tidal wave.
A pregnancy test.
She was holding a pregnancy test stick—a positive one.
Kalina was pregnant. The shock of what this meant stunned me, making my body go rigid.
“Kalina…”
Words failed me as the surprise rolled through me. I could barely think, let alone speak.
I just couldn’t believe it. I struggled to understand.
We’d used protection. She was adamant about not being bred or used, and I hadn’t thought twice about catering to her wishes.
“How…”
She heaved in a deep breath, closing her fingers over the test as she jerked her arm down.
“How did…” I blinked, so shocked that it felt like I couldn’t even inhale a full breath. My mind was blown, but as the reality sank in, joy shielded me from anything else.
“Kalina,” I repeated, not in a curious and questioning tone but with a wondrous joy.
“We didn’t use protection at first and I didn’t think it was going to happen with the timing of my cycle and the fact that I was a virgin. Which I know doesn’t matter. But I didn’t think it would happen. I wasn’t thinking. And I just—”
“Kalina!” I couldn’t hide the grin stretching over my face. Dropping to my knees in front of her, I took her free hand and held it with both of mine.
All this time, I’d been fighting the chance that any happiness was over between us, and here she was, giving me proof that we could have a very real shot at a second chance.
“I’m scared.” She blurted it out in a rush, begging me to listen to her in her raw honesty.
I gazed up at her, not letting go of her hand as she clutched mine back.
“I haven’t had a family in so long. I don’t know how to trust myself to love again.
Not after all Erik put me through. He’s erased all the memories of the child I was, how to be normal in the real world.
To be a woman who could dare to have a family.
I’ve never been in love or known how to love like this.
I don’t know how to accept love and not fear it being an obligation that will control me.
I am lost and unprepared and I don’t know…
I don’t…” She withdrew her hand from mine, and I stood, wishing I could chase after her.
“I think it would be better if I tried to figure this out on my own.”
No!
“Kalina, please.”
She shook her head, near tears. “No, Alexsei. I don’t know how to trust myself with you again. How to trust love and that I won’t be hurt by you or anyone else. I don’t want to be trained and molded to behave by you or anyone else.”
This was bullshit. She knew it too. I saw how she missed the love we’d dared to explore. It lingered there in the sad hopelessness of her light-blue gaze latched on me.
Taking her hand again, I held her gently.
The time to be patient and give her space was over. I once told her that people had to make their happily-ever-after come true. To participate in the pursuit of love. To chase for what they dreamed of.
And she was mine.
My dream. My brightness.
It was time to share the truth to help her understand that she had to stay.
I loved her.
And it was past time that I fully explained that I needed her to be whole again. So we could be a pair, two halves slotting together so we’d both make each other stronger no matter what tragedy or danger could be waiting for us in the future.
“Kalina. Please stay.”
She blinked quickly as if holding back tears.
“Can you please stay and give me a chance to explain that I need you in my life?”