Page 91 of Keeping Ruby

He lifts me into his arms, sweeping me from the room in the current of his wrath as he lays me on the bed, stripping quickly from his clothes to join me. He wraps me in his arms again, the rage an endless ocean crashing through him as he vows again and again, “No one will hurt you. I will lay my life down for yours. I will keep you safe. You mean the world to me.”

It’s not how I wanted it to happen, but the words slip from between my lips. It’s a heartbroken cry of desperation whispered on the wings of a fraught prayer. “I’m pregnant.”

I shudder in his arms as he holds me even tighter, his voice a deadly rumble in my hair as he says, “I know, wife. And I will protect you both with my life, for the rest of my life.”

Forty-Three

Ruby

The property is flooding with men, many of whom I recall seeing roam Kirill’s property back in Russia. They do the same thing here, walking the perimeter, seeing everything, missing nothing.

I’m working on accepting that this is to be my life, and being at the very least content with it, even if I can’t quite find happiness yet. It’s hard to find comfort in your life when you’re constantly surrounded by people who are being paid to ensure that life continues.

I honestly don’t know how famous people do this day in and day out. How they choose this.

I would never choose this.

But Kirill had never been my choice. I’d been his, and that had been it.

Pavel moves into the space where I’m tending to the roses, I can’t wait to begin blooming. I’ve already replaced the chips around their beds, careful to wear proper gloves during this task as the thorns they shed can be deadly to the hands. I’ve cut back the wayward stems, and now it’s about waiting for the blooms. The beautiful blooms that will remind me painfully, beautifully, of Mama.

“You enjoy gardening?” Pavel observes.

“I used to do it with my mother.” I take the glass of lemon water he hands me. “It reminds me of her now. I like it very much.”

“My mother died, like yours, of cancer. She was obsessed with the night sky. She would sit out beneath the stars for hours, her head tipped back. She would wake me often in the night to watch the stars fall, the aurora’s dance. I was never quite as entranced by the sky as I was by her.” It’s the most words he’s said to me at once. I listen raptly. “Now, I find myself under the same sky more often than I would like. It is nice to have something left behind that we can stand with and feel close to them again.”

Quietly, I agree, “It is.”

We stand for a long moment, staring at the rose bushes that have yet to bloom. A moment of silence for those we loved dearly, and lost early.

When I glance back at the house, I see the other two men who have joined my personal detail standing on the back porch, watching me. Always watching me. They are intense in a way that I know Pavel and Maxim try not to be.

“Do you think I’ll always need them, Mac?”

He no longer grumps at my name for him. Usually, now, his lips twitch. “No.”

I sigh. “They’re nice enough men, but they don’t fit here. Things feel tense.”

“They are not our men.”

I look to Pavel, my brows furrowing. “Who’s men are they?”

“They belong to the Cosa Nostra.”

“The—what is that?”

Pavel looks at me. There is a hint of a smile playing at his amusement. “That’s the Sicilian Mafia, Ruby.”

My mouth falls as my eyes bug wide. I whisper-hiss, “But you’re—Bratva!”

He dips his chin. “I am.”

“They’re a rival gang!”

“We’re not a gang. We’re far too organized to be called something like a gang.” Pavel looks put out. “We’re an organization. A family. And the Volkov Bratva has an alliance with the Cosa Nostra.”

“But Kirill isn’t really Bratva. He oversees the Volk Vault Banks.”

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