Chapter 36 Under My Protection
Under My Protection
—Maksym—
It had been two months since we moved in. Two months since the girl who once wrinkled her nose at my “tiny” apartment somehow made it feel like a home.
She didn’t just settle into it—she took it over.
Dropped the university without a second thought. Said she never wanted it in the first place, just something her father pushed on her like everything else. I didn’t argue. The moment she said it, I knew she was right.
As long as she was like this—bright, alive, finally choosing for herself—I didn’t give a damn what it cost or what came next. She could do whatever she wanted. I wouldn’t let anything take that light from her. Not again.
Instead, she painted.
Constantly.
The guest room turned into her studio in less than a week—canvases stacked against the walls, paint on the floor, on her hands, sometimes on my clothes when she got careless. The whole place smelled like turpentine and something softer underneath it.
She was good.
No—she was fucking exceptional.
I’d catch myself standing in the doorway longer than I meant to, just watching her work. Focused. Quiet. Alive in a way I hadn’t seen before. Like she finally belonged somewhere.
She kept drawing me.
Didn’t matter how many times I told her to stop.
“Find another subject,” I’d say.
She never listened.
Every version different. Every version still me.
I didn’t like it—having that much attention on me, that much of myself laid out like that—but I never made her stop.
We were finally free.
No more shadows, no more bullshit sneaking around corners like rats.
We walked everywhere hand in hand—open, like normal people.
I took her places—good restaurants, those overpriced spa things, short trips out of the city.
I used to think all that couple shit was for weak men, but for her?
I did it. Sat there looking like I’d rather be breaking kneecaps, but the truth was I liked seeing her smile.
Some evenings we just lay there under a blanket, watching Dexter.
I kind of liked the bastard. Smart. Calculated.
Didn’t waste words. Reminded me of someone.
It had also been two months since I found out she was pregnant.
Two months of trying to figure out what the fuck it meant to be anything close to a father.
And if I was honest, I’d been furious at first—really fucking furious.
She’d stopped taking the pill without telling me and let her body decide something that would change our lives forever.
I wanted to stay mad longer, but then I’d look at her—mouth parted in sleep, her belly rising and falling softly under my hand—and the rage would shift into something else. Something terrifying. Something tender.
But don’t get the wrong idea—I hadn’t let her off easy.
She’d been “paying” for it every single night.
Gently, of course. She was pregnant, and I wasn’t an animal.
Still, she always gave me that sharp little look when I reminded her, like she was about to argue—until I had her under me, legs shaking, mouth slack, eyes gone soft and glassy, and the attitude disappeared just as fast as it came.
Then she was quiet, pliant, mine, with no interruptions.
One upside of pregnancy—no periods. I wasn’t wasting a single night.
Kira still saw Valeria sometimes.
Except “sometimes” turned into her showing up at our place every other day like she’d moved in without asking.
She was obsessed with Kira’s pregnancy—it was like it had taken over her entire personality overnight.
She started bringing things—tiny clothes, soft socks. We didn’t even know the gender, but she kept showing up with onesies in every damn color.
She had already claimed the title of aunt before the kid even had a name.
“Cool aunt,” she corrected once, like it was an important distinction.
One time she showed up with miniature headphones, holding them up like she’d brought something brilliant.
“For the baby,” she said, completely serious. “You know, when I take it to raves.”
I just looked at her.
“Over my dead body.”
She smirked, like she’d already decided that wasn’t going to stop her.
But she looked different.
Not in some dramatic, overnight way—just… clearer. Cleaner. Like she was actually present instead of halfway gone all the time. Still Valeria, still chaos, but something in her had settled, like she’d finally found a reason to stay in her own body.
And I noticed the way she watched Kira. The way she hovered around her, like she had something fragile to protect and didn’t trust anyone else to do it right.
Maybe that was what did it.
Seeing Kira like this—pregnant, steady, not alone.
Whatever it was, it dragged Valeria back from wherever the hell she’d been disappearing to, and for once, I didn’t mind having her around.
We also started spending more time with Sashko and his wife, Marina, drifting into something that almost passed for normal—double dates, dinners, evenings that didn’t end in blood or silence.
Sashko, of course, ran his mouth like always. He kept smirking, calling me soft, asking when I was going to start carrying diapers in my jacket next to a gun.
I told him to shut the fuck up.
He laughed harder.
And the worst part?
I didn’t break his jaw.
I just sat there, Kira’s hand warm in mine, and let him talk shit.
Because I actually liked the bastard. Even when he annoyed the hell out of me.
It was the kind of annoyance you secretly don’t want to lose.
But still. The truth? I didn’t think I could do it.
Be a father. I’d lived in shadows too long.
My blood was dirty. My hands were worse.
But Kira had this way of steadying me. Like she’d figured out the right weight to press against the madness when it tipped too far.
When I doubted, she pressed my hand to her stomach.
That small curve where our child was growing.
And somehow, just somehow, I started to believe I wouldn’t fuck this up.
But the business didn’t run itself. It was still dangerous—always would be. Roman was gone. I’d made damn sure of that. And someone had to step in.
That someone was me.
Most believed Moscow had finished the job.
And with no heirs in sight, I was the obvious successor.
I had been his right hand, the one who knew every corridor of his power structure.
I already had his men—loyal to me long before the fire.
Then I claimed his routes, his suppliers, his underground contacts.
It was never supposed to be long term. But how did you find someone decent to run a rotten empire? I needed someone who wouldn’t traffic kids. Who wouldn’t hurt little girls like Mila. Or boys like me. But so far? No one like that existed. So I had taken the throne of a dying kingdom. For now.
Weapons. Drugs. Smuggling. Money laundering.
Protection rackets. You name it—we still did it.
I cleaned up the worst of it, but I didn’t pretend I was pure.
I wasn’t. I never would be. I’d slit throats and carved names into flesh.
Some nights I slept beside her, her hand curled around mine, and still dreamed of blood.
I hadn’t visited Mila yet. I kept telling myself it wasn’t the right time.
That her life was better without me in it.
That I’d only ruin whatever peace she’d managed to carve out.
And maybe that was true. Maybe I was just trying to be less selfish.
Trying to think of someone besides myself for once.
Especially now.
Now that I was building something new. A life. A future. A fucking family. Damn.
The word alone tasted unreal.
I was going to be a father.
The son of a monster, raising a child of my own. I used to think that kind of legacy couldn’t be broken. That blood made you doomed to repeat the sins of your father. But maybe not. Maybe knowing what he was gave me a map of everything I refused to be.
At least I had the perfect example of who not to become.
And now, as we drove toward the asylum to visit her mother, my men trailing us at a careful distance like they always did these days, Kira slept lightly in the seat beside me, her hand resting on that barely-there bump.
And for the first time in a long while, I started to think that maybe I had been made for something more than killing.
It had been a few months since that visit—since I’d stormed into that godforsaken facility and threatened the administrator within an inch of his life.
I’d told him to take care of Kira’s mother.
Treat her like a human being. Help her recover for real this time.
I’d meant every word. And now? Now it had been long enough.
She should have been showing some kind of response. Some flicker of humanity.
And if she wasn’t—if that bastard had done nothing, if her eyes were still glassy and her body still slack—then I would finish what I’d promised. I’d kill him. And his entire bloodline.
Kira had been so happy when I told her we could go. She’d jumped on me like a kid—wrapped her legs around my waist and started crying into my shoulder. Whispered thank you again and again.
I couldn’t let her be disappointed. Especially not now. Not when she’s carrying my child.
Anyone who makes my girl cry pays for it. With interest.
Kira stirred as the car came to a stop. She blinked at me, bleary-eyed, then stiffened as she looked out the window.
The asylum stood quietly in front of us, almost unremarkable at first glance—low, pale walls softened by the early morning light, tall windows reflecting the gray sky, and a neat path leading up to the entrance.
The kind of place that sat too still in the early hour, wrapped in a calm that felt almost deliberate.
She brushed her hair back with one hand, eyes fixed on the structure like it might swallow her whole.
“Hey,” I said, brushing my fingers against her knee. “We can turn around. Say the word.”