11. Nina
NINA
I cannot believe I missed him.
That’s the thought that keeps hitting me while Alina Karelin stands in the middle of the hallway with one hand on her stomach and Luka Kazan’s name in her mouth, announcing that he’s her baby daddy.
I missed him.
For two weeks, I acted as if I did not. I sent emails.
I answered calls. I watched his staff move around his absence like a body moves around a wound.
I sent him stupid videos because I didn’t know what else to do with the ache of not seeing him, because a TikTok of a dog walking badly was easier than saying, are you healing, are you sleeping, are you thinking about the boardroom, are you thinking about me?
We even sexted. The thought actually makes me cringe.
When I was baring my all for him, he was hooking up with someone else?
And all that time, I told myself distance was sensible.
That Misha was right. That Luka Kazan was dangerous in ways I was only beginning to understand.
Then he walked back into the office today with his shoulder in a sling, looking pale and severe and furious at the weakness of his own body, and my heart had done the stupidest thing.
It had lifted. Like I was glad. Like I had been waiting.
Like the last two weeks had been a held breath and the sight of him had finally let me inhale.
I hate myself for that now.
Because standing in front of us is Alina Karelin, glossy and trembling and very publicly pregnant.
Pregnant.
The word echoes in my head with the sickening force of a door slamming shut.
I hear myself say congratulations. I even sound calm.
It’s honestly impressive, considering something in me is cracking apart so loudly I’m shocked nobody else turns to look.
Luka’s face is unreadable.
The man gets shot and looks mildly inconvenienced. Why would a surprise pregnancy announcement from one of his dinner companions be any different?
Alina’s smile wobbles. “I know this is sudden.”
Sudden.
I almost laugh.
No, sudden is accidentally sending your boss a filthy text during a board meeting. Sudden is being lifted onto a conference table and touched like you matter. Sudden is watching a man take a bullet in a garage and realizing every rumor you ever heard about his world was too polished to be true.
This is not sudden. This is obvious.
This is exactly who Luka is.
A vile man with beautiful manners, expensive shirts, a private doctor behind a bookshelf, and enough women in his calendar to make pregnancy less shocking than inevitable.
And I, complete idiot that I am, nearly told him I was resigning like it was some delicate emotional confession between us.
I had almost said it.
There’s something I need to tell you.
That was all I managed before Alina arrived and kissed his cheek.
Maybe fate is not subtle. Maybe fate saw me standing too close to Luka Kazan and decided I needed a public slap.
Luka turns slightly toward Alina. “Not here.”
His voice is calm. That makes me hate him more.
Alina blinks quickly. “I didn’t know where else to find you. You weren’t answering.”
“This hallway is not the place.”
“I’ve been calling your office.”
His gaze flicks once toward me.
I look away before he can see whatever is on my face.
Alina’s voice breaks softly. “I didn’t want you to hear it from anyone else.”
“That was considerate,” Luka says.
I stare at the wall behind his shoulder and decide that if I don’t leave now, I will either laugh, cry, or throw my phone at his head.
Possibly all three, in an order depending on available space.
Alina says something else, but my ears are roaring. I catch pieces.
Doctor. Dates. It could be yours.
Luka asks a question, still calm.
She answers too quickly.
His lawyers’ names come up.
That is when I’m done.
I step backward once, then turn and walk down the side corridor before anyone can stop me. My heels sound too loud against the floor. My hands are cold. My face feels hot. I pass Meredith, who takes one look at me and wisely says nothing.
I make it to my desk.
The diary is sitting in the locked drawer.
For one hysterical second, I think of opening it and adding a note.
Alina Karelin — pregnant. Possibly Luka’s. Likes public ambushes. Avoid eye contact unless emotionally bulletproof.
Instead, I sit down.
My computer screen is still open to the acquisition file. There are unread emails in my inbox. A message from catering. A revised security protocol. Three calendar alerts. His world still expects me to function.
I put both hands on the desk and breathe slowly.
In. Out. In. Out.
It doesn’t help, at all.
Through the glass, I see movement near Luka’s office ten minutes later.
Alina is there now, sitting in one of the chairs across from his desk, one hand pressed to her stomach, the other holding a tissue.
She looks hysterical in the controlled way rich women often do, like she has been trained to fall apart without ruining her makeup.
Two lawyers stand near the window.
Grigori is one of them.
The other is a woman from external counsel whose name I always forget because she looks like she has never once forgiven anyone.
Luka stands behind his desk, one hand braced on the edge, injured shoulder stiff beneath his suit jacket. He is calm. Perfectly calm. Cold enough to freeze the room from inside the glass.
Calm is his cruelty.
Calm is how he tells women they are not his girlfriends, tells staff they are safe, tells doctors he is fine, tells me nothing happened while everything inside me burns.
I open my drawer.
The resignation letter is already printed.
It’s been printed for three days.
I told myself it was only to make Misha stop worrying. I told myself I would keep it in my bag until I decided. I told myself I was not a coward for hesitating, because leaving a job is complicated and I had responsibilities and maybe things would settle after Luka returned.
That was before Alina Karelin walked in with a baby announcement.
Before I realized I was becoming another stupid woman in the story of him.
My hands shake when I take the envelope out.
I stand. Nobody stops me.
Why would they? I’m his assistant. I enter his office all the time. I carry files, signatures, private documents, excuses for women who should have known better.
The lawyers are still talking when I step inside.
Luka does not look up immediately.
I cross to his desk, place the envelope on the clean leather blotter, and set a small paperweight over the corner so it cannot slide.
Then I turn to leave.
That is when his eyes lift.
Only for a second.
He sees me. Not the envelope.
Me.
His expression changes by a fraction, maybe because he can finally read my face, maybe because I have stopped trying to hide it.
“Nina,” he says.
I don’t stop. Because if I do, everything inside me will break.
I walk out of his office, past my desk, past Meredith, past the elevator bay, and I don’t breathe properly until the doors close in front of me.
By the time I get home, I’m shaking with exhaustion, but still I don’t let myself cry.
I refuse to cry over Luka Kazan.
That’s where I draw the line, apparently, after allowing him to put his mouth on me in a boardroom and then spending two weeks sending him videos like a teenager with a crush.
But crying? No. I have standards.
Pathetic standards, but standards.
My apartment feels smaller than usual when I walk in.
I change into soft shorts and an oversized sweater because my body has had enough of professional clothing and emotional warfare.
Then I sit on the floor beside my bed and open my phone gallery like an idiot.
There are photos from before everything became complicated.
My coffee on my desk.
A blurry picture of Misha glaring at me because I took a photo of him eating. Screenshots of absurd calendar entries.
A picture of Luka’s office from six months ago, taken because the sunset behind the city looked beautiful through his window. His shoulder is barely visible in the edge of the frame, black suit, one hand holding a phone.
I zoom in on it.
Then immediately hate myself.
I swipe.
There’s a photo from the charity gala last winter. I’m in the background, laughing at something Meredith said. Luka’s at the edge of the shot, turned slightly toward me. He’s not looking at the camera, but straight at me.
My throat tightens.
No. No, I’m not doing this.
I lock the phone and toss it onto the bed.
The doorbell rings. I freeze.
For one second, I think it is Misha.
Then I know it’s not. I know before I look through the peephole and see Luka Kazan standing outside my apartment door in a black coat, face hard, eyes colder than the hallway light.
My heart slams once against my ribs. I open the door before I can decide not to.
He holds up the envelope. “What is this?” he asks. His voice is calm.
I grip the door. “You read it.”
“Yes.”
“Then you know.”
His eyes move over my face. “Say it.”
“No.”
“Nina.”
“There it is again,” I snap, and my voice shakes so badly I hate it. “That tone. Like you own my obedience, but news flash, you don’t. I’m not your employee anymore.”
His jaw tightens. “Let me in.”
“No.”
His gaze flicks once down the hallway.
I hate that he is right before he says anything.
“You want to discuss this here?” he asks.
I look past him, toward Mrs. Sokolova’s door, where I know for a fact she listens whenever someone so much as coughs near the elevator.
I step back. “Fine.”
He comes in.
The apartment instantly feels half its size.
Luka has no business in my home. He’s too tall for it, too dark, too expensive, too harsh against the soft mess of my real life. He looks at the little kitchen, the blanket over the couch, the books stacked on the floor because I never bought the shelf I kept meaning to buy.
His eyes soften for half a second.
That makes me angrier.
“Don’t look at my apartment like that,” I scowl.
“Like what?”
“Like you have thoughts.”
“I do have thoughts.”
“Keep them.”
He looks back at me. The envelope is still in his hand.
I close the door and fold my arms. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“You left this on my desk.”
“It was not an invitation.”