Page 74 of Forced Plus-Size Bride of the Bratva

“No,” I rasp, taking a step back.

Yelena presses on, her face stricken but unyielding.

“Ten years ago, he took a job from a rival faction. Dangerous men who wanted to make a statement.” She swallows, the tray tilting again before she pulls it tighter to her chest. “The target was Maxim Sharov.”

My blood turns to ice.

Maxim. Andrei’s younger brother. The one whose death still darkens the corridors of this house like a ghost.

“He was lured onto a boat,” Yelena says, voice tight with the effort of saying it out loud. “Under the pretense of a deal. Your father shot him. Point-blank to the head. Then they dumped the body into the sea.”

I shake my head, my whole body starting to tremble. “You’re lying.”

“There were no witnesses,” Yelena continues, unmoved by my denial. “No evidence. Only whispers. Rumors.” She draws in a shuddering breath. “Andrei spent years digging, suspecting, searching. There was never anything solid to tie it together.”

My heart slams against my ribs, desperate to outrun the words.

“Until recently,” Yelena says. “Old security footage surfaced. From the docks. It captured just enough. Your father. Maxim. The betrayal.”

She looks at me then, full in the face, and I see that she’s not angry. She’s grieving. Grieving for me?

“I’m sorry,” she says, voice barely a whisper. “You deserve to know.”

I stumble back, the garden blurring around me. The roses, the rain, the twisting stone paths—all of it becomes a smear of color as denial floods my chest.

“No,” I breathe.

Not him.

Not the man who tucked me in at night. Who built my swing set. Who taught me to ride a bike.

Not my father.

Yet—

The pieces start clicking into place, fast and merciless.

The sudden explosion of wealth. The new house in the better neighborhood. The business that flourished overnight, when before we were always just scraping by.

I press a trembling hand to my mouth, the truth blooming ugly and undeniable inside me.

Had it all been blood money?

My hands won’t stop trembling.

I stare down at them like they belong to someone else, the tremor so sharp it rattles through my bones. My mouth is dry, my tongue stuck useless to the roof of it. Every breath scrapes raw down my throat. I feel like I’m going to be sick, the nausea riding high in my chest, clawing its way up.

Yelena’s face blurs in front of me. Her words, too heavy to bear, are still hanging in the thick garden air. I can’t focus on her. I can’t hear anything anymore except the vicious pounding of my own heart.

“I need—” I choke, not even knowing what I’m asking for. “I need air.”

I stumble back from her before she can say anything else, before her pity can gut me even deeper than her truth already has. My feet move without direction, carrying me blindly through the garden’s twisted paths, through the suffocating perfume of overripe roses.

Every memory of my father reels through my mind, jagged and disjointed.

His laugh, low and warm. The way he’d ruffle my hair and tell me no boy would ever be good enough for me.

The promises he made when the world felt too big—promises that sound like lies now, thin and hollow and poisoned.

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