Page 21 of Knocked-up Bratva Bride
Telling her about Damien could wait for another week until she’d come to terms with her father being back in the city. Now was not the time to think about me or my problems.
I brushed unruly dark strands away from her face and sniffled back tears I hadn’t realized I was holding.
Maybe I didn’t have the world at my feet yet, and maybe it would take a while before I got liver donors and sponsors for my mother. But right now, all I could think about was the joy coursing through me.
The joy that Katya had me to help her through hard times like these.
“Goodnight, Kat.” I smiled at her sleeping form. “I’m so glad we’re friends.”
Chapter 7 – Damien
Another deep breath, and the alarm on my phone went off.Seven o’clock.That was the fifth alarm I’d set since two a.m., after storming out the Gipsy.
The silence that now weighed in was heavier than the emptiness that’d echoed after I’d first arrived at the house, and it was frustratingly uncomfortable.
I snoozed the alarm, set the time to seven-thirty. Wherever she was, she didn’t know it, but she had thirty minutes left to return home. Thirty minutes until I completely lost my shit and went out to track her down myself.
So, I waited in silence, sitting on the edge of the sofa that faced the foyer, hunched forward with my elbows on my knees.
The curtains were drawn, blocking out the light from outside, and the light inside cast a dim, amber glow that didn’t quite reach the corners of the living room.
My fingers curled tightly, nails boring into my kneecaps through the fabric of my jeans. I didn’t feel the sting: only the tension, the pressure, something to ground me while my thoughts spun further out.
A gust of wind rattled the curtains. I stared at the foyer. Still nothing. No tires crunching on the gravel outside. No jingle of keys. Just my breath, slow and forced, and the growing crescent moons my nails had left in the fabric of my jeans.
Where the hell is she?
That’s when I heardhersilvery voice at the back of my mind, telling me her name.Elena,she breathed, and smiled.
Then, one by one, fragments of her pictures spread out until the entire night unfolded before my eyes, starting with sparkling green eyes and succulent lips I could have continued kissing for hours.
Her eager arms around my neck. The sound and taste of her sultry moans traveling down my throat. The softness of her curvy figure perfectly carved to fit mine.
That young woman was…strange.
For someone who had survived as long as she did while advocating to maintain her purity, she stood there, uncertain yet proud, her wide, innocent eyes daring me to cross the line.
Fuck.I’d wanted to take her right there and then against that door.
The feel of her skin—warm, smooth, real—returned to me with disorienting clarity. Every breathless whisper, every brush of our fingers against sensitive places, came back like the ghost of a flame rekindling on my mind.
I shouldn’t be thinking about her. Not with my sanity teetering on the edge of explosion. Not with someone’s blood waiting to be spilled before noon.
There were more pressing matters at hand—
I heard the soft click of the door before I saw her. Katya stepped in, spine straight, chin high, and there was purpose in her stride, the kind that braced for impact.
Our eyes met: hers from the foyer and mine from the sofa. She didn’t flinch at the sight of me, but I noticed her eyes suspiciously sweep the room in one swift motion.
Rising to my feet, I strode closer toward her, eyeing her change of clothes. A cardigan hung on her shoulders over a pair of baggy jeans, and she looked clean, with her hair tied in a sleek ponytail, and her face rid of any makeup.
Up close, she looked older than I’d been expecting. More feminine, and yet, tougher. Not just in the deep-set dimples carved into her cheeks or the firm set of her mouth, but in the way she carried herself, likeme.Like someone who’d learned not to trust softness.
Her cheekbones had sharpened, and her eyes seemed harder now, but the resemblance to Irina was unmistakable. She had inherited her mother’s facial features, including dark hair and a fierce aura.
It caught me off guard, punched the breath from my chest. For a moment, all I could do was stare.
I tried to speak, but the words tangled in my throat, useless and heavy, but Katya didn’t wait.
