Page 37 of Sexting the Silverfox

“I’m in love with him. Please, don’t hurt him. Leave him alone, Anton.”

“As long as he doesn’t hurt you, Audrey, he’s safe,” he says. “From what I’ve read, he’s quite accomplished. I’ll give you credit there; you picked a fine one. Does he know?”

“Know what?”

“About your heritage. About that baby you’re carrying. I presume it’s his.”

A gasp escapes from the back of my throat as I glower at Anton with all the outrage I can muster. “How dare you?” I hiss, leaning forward to make sure no one else hears me. “How dare you violate my privacy like that?”

“If there’s one thing you seem to have forgotten about me, it’s this: Your safety and well-being will always be my business, mine and Vitaly’s, no matter where you go or who you’re with,” Anton calmly replies. “The minute you sent me that message, warning me about the Abramovic Bratva, I made it my mission to find out everything there is to know regarding your new life because everything can be eventually used against you. Do you have any idea how much worse it’s going to get for you if Abramovic finds out you’re pregnant?”

“No.”

“He will turn the city upside down. He will kill anyone who stands in his way, including your precious Jason Winchester and his cute little daughter,” Anton says. “You are already valuable purely on account of your last name. Rumor has it that Abramovic is dead set on conquering New York, and we’re standing in his way. Having you under his nose is like a gift. That maniac will stop at nothing until he gets what he wants. And if Papa finds out that you’re pregnant—”

“You will keep your mouth shut!”

“Pipe down,” Anton hushes me. “I said if. I’m not going to be the one to tell him, so relax. But if I was able to find out, he will, too. And when he does figure it out, Audrey, there won’t be a fucking pebble left on this earth for you to hide under. You may think he’s putting his family second, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. He will crush anyone who threatens any of us—”

“What about Piotr?”

Anton waves that concern away with a mere flick of his wrist. “Oh, forget about that old fool. He’s just throwing a tantrum. He’ll come back around eventually.”

“Does our father know about the Abramovic Bratva’s attempt to take me?” I ask, my voice trembling slightly.

“Not yet. We don’t have that many eyes and ears in Chicago. We will from now on, though, because I’ll see to it.”

Minutes pass in eerie silence as Anton and I seem to have reached some sort of arrangement. It may be unspoken, but I find comfort in knowing that he’s got my back in the only way that he can, given the circumstances.

Being a Bratva lieutenant and having our father’s trust gives him freedom of movement and expenditures without anyone second-guessing him, which is why Anton can afford to give me his security detail.

I wish he could do more, but it was a long shot to begin with. Even so, it’s better than nothing. At least I’ll have trained professionals who are familiar with the Bratva’s tactics to watch my back while I sell my apartment and prepare to start a new life somewhere else.

“Does he know?” Anton asks me the question again.

“Huh?”

“Winchester. Does he know about your pregnancy?”

“He doesn’t know, and I would appreciate it if it stayed that way,” I sigh. “I have to leave Chicago under these conditions. I can’t just drop the bomb and then never be seen again. It would destroy Jason.”

“It’s not fair to him, either way, but I guess it makes sense.”

“What he doesn’t know can’t hurt him. It only hurts me, Anton.”

Anton chuckles softly. “I wish we’d been born into a different family; I really do. I would’ve liked to have had some Ivy League friends and to have been able to enjoy a nice gin negroni on a Friday night with you and Vitaly, but alas, it wasn’t meant to be. We were raised by wolves, and we live as wolves. I hope you understand that now. You’re a lone wolf, Audrey. You won’t make it far without your pack.”

“Don’t rub it in.”

“But it’s the truth. It’s your reality, can’t you see? You left New York thinking that you’d be able to live a white-picket-fence life with a husband and two kids, that you’d teach kindergarten for the rest of your days, and possibly take up gardening when you retire. Come on, Audrey. That is not what we were made for.”

“We decide what we were made for,” I insist. “Just because you got comfortable being Daddy’s good little soldier like Vitaly doesn’t mean I had to fall in line, too. There’s more to life than what he planned for us. Hell, our lives were never his to plan in the first place.”

“You’re going to be a single mother,” Anton reminds me.

Oh, God, that sounds awful. I don’t want that. I want Jason. I want to be with him, to spend every single day with him. To watch Lily and our own child grow up together and become better people than all of us combined. I want us to gather the sweetest memories so that we’ll have quite the story to tell in the sunset of our lives. This is not fair; it’s not right. Tears prick my eyes. I try to blink them back, but I fail miserably, so Anton gives me a tissue.

“No matter what you decide, Audrey, I will always have your back,” he adds. “It may not always seem like it, but I love you. I can’t always protect you from your own choices, though, especially since I still have my own ass to cover.”

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