Page 131 of Ivory Oath

The only time I get to be with Mikhail is on his terms. He’s too busy to show up for me, but I’m supposed to strap my bloated, pregnant body into a dress and heels the moment he snaps his fingers? It’s not exactly the give-and-take relationship I always dreamed of.

Which is why, when I finally hear the front door open at two in the morning, I’m sitting in bed with a book I don’t care about in my lap and one hell of a bone to pick with my other half.

I can hear muffled voices and footsteps. I’m itching to jump out of bed and charge downstairs, but I don’t want to look even half as desperate as I feel. So I wait.

And wait.

And wait.

Naively, I imagined Mikhail would see that I wasn’t with Raoul, hop in his car, and be back at the mansion to drag me out of bed within an hour. We’d scream and fight at first, sure. But by the time we made it to the bar, we’d have made up. Preferably in the backseat of his car. Twice.

Now, he’s in the mansion—and he still isn’t coming to find me.

“What the hell?” I mutter, tossing my book to the end of the bed.

By the time I hear him coming down the hallway, I have our entire argument mapped out in my head. Every point he could make, I can counter it. I’m ready.

It takes all the restraint I have left to wait until the door has just barely cracked open to start talking.

“You’re finally home,” I note coolly. “I almost didn’t bother waiting up for?—”

My planned speech careens off the rails when Mikhail steps into the room… covered from head to toe in blood.

“Oh my God.” I throw the comforter back and slide my legs to the edge of the bed. “Where have you been?”

Are you okay? Are you safe? Those are the questions I’m too upset to ask.

“Busy.”

He peels his bloody shirt over his head and I don’t see any wounds or bruises on his body. So the blood isn’t his, which should be nothing but good news. But in the back of my head, I wonder who he killed and why they were more important than me.

“I had a scan this morning.”

“I know.” He kicks his pants off and tosses them in the ruined pile with his shirt. It’s been months of living with Mikhail and seeing him every day, but I’ll never get over the way he moves. The strength that ripples through him. Even with nothing on except a pair of black briefs, he’s a weapon.

“If you knew about it, that means you chose not to show up, then. Don’t you even want to know how it went?”

He’s covered in a dead man’s blood and we’re talking about my doctor’s appointment. It’s weird, but this is our life, apparently.

He shakes his head. “I know how it went. Dr. Rossi texted me as soon as you left his office.”

“I have a phone, too. You could have texted me.”

“I wanted it straight from the source.” If that’s his way of saying he doesn’t trust me, it’s as subtle as a chainsaw.

“You promised me I wasn’t going to be one of those Bratva wives whose only purpose is to birth your children.”

“Not tonight, Viviana.”

The strain in his voice is impossible to miss. I should let this go. I should—“It has to be tonight,” I snap. “Because I never know when I’ll see you again.”

He turns to me, his bloody hands in tight fists at his sides. “We’re at war.”

“And we’re having a baby. You and me. The two of us. If it’s bad timing for you, you have no one to blame but yourself. You did this. You didn’t have any trouble clearing your schedule when you wanted to ‘fuck a baby into me.’ The war didn’t stop you then.”

His eyes narrow. “Things have escalated since then and you know it. If I wait until all my enemies are dead to fuck my wife, we’d never have a family.”

He’s right.

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