Chapter 23 #2
The words sink in, and I start to tremble. That must mean he found the ultrasound folder, but how? Did I drop it when I stormed out of Yarik’s office? I leave the table to frantically check my purse, realizing I haven’t opened my work bag since coming home five days ago. The folder isn’t there.
Nina looks up from her plate, noting my suddenly frantic movements. “What’s wrong?”
“I think I left the ultrasound results at Yarik’s office. Valentin has them.”
Her fork clatters against her plate. “Valentin knows?”
I read the message again, looking for any sign that Valentin understands what he’s found. The text is neutral and professional, which suggests he either doesn’t know what’s in the folder, or he’s being discreet.
I stand and pace to the window, trying to consider the consequences. “The message doesn’t say, but if he looked at them...”
She joins me at the window, her voice tight with concern. “He’s sure to tell his boss. Yarik will know about the babies.”
The thought sends panic through my system.
I wanted to tell Yarik myself to control how and when he learned about the pregnancy, if I ever told him at all, which I don’t plan to do if he’s marrying someone else.
If Valentin tells him, it becomes a complication for Yarik to manage and gives him leverage over me to force me to whatever role he might want me to play.
I try to tell myself Yarik isn’t Alex and would never do such a thing, but I can’t bring myself to believe it.
Yarik will use this information to control me and by extension, my babies. I’ll be safe from Alex but imprisoned by another man. I can’t endure that. I grab my keys from the counter, already planning my route. “I have to get those documents back before he says anything to Yarik.”
Nina frowns, reading the message over my shoulder again. “Why would he want to meet at a warehouse? That seems weird.”
I pull on my jacket, checking my pockets for my phone and wallet. “It says he’s in the area on business. Yarik owns a lot of properties.”
Nina crosses her arms, her expression skeptical. “This still feels strange. Why not just bring them to your apartment or drop them off tomorrow?”
I consider her concerns, but the urgency of retrieving the documents before Valentin can examine them more closely overrides my caution. “I’ll be quick. I’m just going to grab the folder and leave.”
Nina reaches for her coat with determined movements. “I’m coming with you.”
I shake my head firmly, already moving toward the door. “No. If this is about keeping the pregnancy secret, I need to handle it myself.”
She doesn’t look happy, but she doesn’t argue further. I pause at the door to look back at her, suddenly needing the reassurance of a backup plan. “If I’m not back in two hours, call Yarik.”
Her expression grows alarmed. “Sarah?—”
“Promise me.”
She nods reluctantly, worry evident in every line of her body. “I promise.”
The drive to Industrial Drive takes fifteen minutes through parts of Greenwich I’ve never seen before. The warehouse district is quiet and isolated, being nothing like the busy commercial areas where Nina and I usually spend our time.
Warehouse 17 sits at the end of a dead-end street, surrounded by other industrial buildings that look abandoned in the gathering dusk. I park outside and check my phone, but there’s no message from Valentin with more specific instructions.
The main door is slightly ajar, which strikes me as odd, but maybe Valentin is already inside waiting. I push the open door and step into the cavernous space, noting how my footsteps echo in the emptiness. I call out into the vast space, my voice swallowed by the darkness. “Valentin?”
No response. The warehouse is darker than I expected, with only a few security lights.
A prickle of unease hits me, and I start to move back to the entrance.
This feels off, and I was stupidly rushing into…
What? I don’t know, but the voice of reason is shouting at me to get out, so I turn toward the door, but freeze after a couple of steps.
The air around me smells like dust and motor oil, with a sudden scent that makes my skin crawl. Sandalwood and spice. Alex’s cologne.
Every instinct screams at me to run, but before I can move, a voice speaks from the shadows behind me.
“Hello, Sarah.”
I turn slowly, my pulse jumping as Alex steps into the light.
He looks exactly the same as he did twelve months ago, when he left his apartment for a business trip, and I was there.
He surely expected me to be there when he returned, but I was gone when he got back.
He’s still tall, lean, and darkly handsome in a way that used to make my pulse quicken for entirely different reasons, but he also radiates fury.
I’ve seen this side of him many times, but never to this extreme.
His name comes out as a whisper as the hair on my arms stands up. “Alex.”
He smiles, flashing the same charming expression that once made me feel special and now makes me want to vomit. “You look good. Different, but good.”
Another figure emerges from behind a shipping container as a man I don’t recognize who moves with the easy confidence of someone accustomed to violence, steps into a small pool of light created by one of the overhead lights.
Alex gestures casually toward me, like he’s asking someone to pass the salt. “Grab her.”
My paralysis ends, and I bolt , but I’m not fast enough. Strong hands close around my arms, dragging me back into the warehouse despite my struggles. I scream as loudly as I can, hoping someone might hear and call for help. “Let me go!”
Alex laughs with cruel amusement. “Scream all you want. Nobody’s coming.”
The man holding me smells like cigarettes and cheap aftershave, and his grip is bruising as he forces me toward a small office space built into one corner of the warehouse. The stranger speaks with a thick accent I don’t recognize. “You want her in the office, Roman?”
“That’ll work, Demitrios.”
Roman. The name means nothing to me, but Alex doesn’t correct him, which sends a chill down my spine. How many identities has he been living under? How long has he been planning this?
When Demitrios jerks hard on my arm, nearly tripping me, I scream again, hoping the revelation might make them hesitate. “I’m pregnant. If you hurt me, you’re hurting an innocent baby.”
Alex stops walking and turns to face me, his smile widening into something predatory. “I know.”
The casual way he says it makes my blood freeze.
He knows about the pregnancy, which means he’s been watching me more closely than I realized.
Was he spying on me when I went to my doctor’s appointment?
I’m now sure I saw him at the parking lot of the baby boutique.
Did he somehow get the folder, using it to lure me here under the pretext of being Valentin?
He adds with conversational ease, his tone chilling in how even it is, “You’re pregnant…for now.”
I nearly freeze again, but Demitrios keeps pushing me along, shoving me into a small room despite my efforts to escape. He sends me halfway across the room with a big push, and by the time I get to my feet again, Alex is standing in the doorway instead of Demitrios.
The room is windowless and claustrophobic, containing nothing but a metal chair, a wobbly desk, and a bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling.
Alex follows me in, closing the door behind him.
In the enclosed space, his cologne is overwhelming, triggering memories of other small spaces where he made me feel trapped and helpless.
I remember the time he locked me in the blanket trunk at the foot of the massive bed, keeping me there for three hours.
I was gasping and lightheaded from lack of oxygen by the time he finally let me out, not doing so until my frantic fists pounding against the wood faded to light taps every few minutes as I depleted the oxygen in the trunk.
I block the memory for the moment, needing to be here and in the present, to deal with the current monstrous version of Alex instead of trapped in the past. If anything has changed about him in the past year, he’s probably gotten crueler. The thought makes me quiver, but I try to hide that.
He settles into the chair like he has all the time in the world, studying me with cold interest. “We have so much to catch up on, starting with why you thought you could disappear without consequences.”
I press myself against the far wall, as far from him as the small space allows. “How did you find me?”
He leans back in the chair, which shrieks with protest at the new position, as his voice takes on that intimate tone I remember from our relationship. “Does it matter? What matters is that you’re here now, and we can finally have the conversation you’ve been avoiding.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. I left you, Alex. I moved on.”
His smile grows wider, more predatory. “Did you? It looks like you’ve been hiding in someone else’s bed and are now carrying someone else’s baby.”
“That’s none of your business.”
Alex’s voice drops to that intimate tone he used to use in bed, and I shudder with revulsion. “Everything about you is my business. It always has been.”
The lock clicks shut from outside, and I realize the other man has left us alone. Alex and I are trapped together in this windowless room with no escape and no witnesses. I try to keep my voice steady despite the terror clawing at my throat. “What do you want?”
He smiles again, and this time there’s nothing charming about it as he removes a syringe from his pocket. “I want what’s mine.”