Page 84 of Pregnant Bratva Wife
I hung up, and for the first time in my life, I had no plan. No strategy. No next move.
I’d finally found something I couldn’t take by force or manipulation, or clever maneuvering. Something that had to be freely given.
Her trust. Her forgiveness. Her heart.
All I could do now was wait and hope that someday, I’d have the chance to earn them back.
Chapter 20 - Autumn
I woke up and stayed curled up on Beatrice’s guest bed, watching the sunlight streaming in through the curtains.
It had been three days since I’d shown up at Beatrice’s. She had called right after I left Federico, and though I didn’t want to put her out, there was such gentleness in her voice, such pleading for me to be with her, that I saw no other option than to take her up on her offer.
Besides, there truly was nowhere else I could go. I had my best friend. Sure. But I had taken enough advantage of Chloe this year already.
I had shown up here, and Beatrice had opened the door like she’d been waiting for me. She probably had, after Federico called.
“You look like hell,” she had said gently. Then pulled me straight into a hug.
I wasn’t much of a hugger. But I sank into it anyway.
She didn’t ask what happened. She probably knew.
She just said, “Come on in. I’ve got leftover pasta and tiramisu.”
And that had been that.
It was only when I found myself curled up on her couch, two hours later, and with all the superficial small talk over with, that I let myself cry.
She didn’t push or prod. She just handed me tissues whenever I needed one and muttered things like “men are garbage” and “my brother especially.”
The next morning, she set up a little tray of breakfast for us both on the balcony. She did the same the morning after that. Always with that same breezy attitude—like I wasn’t temporarily wrecked, like she wasn’t tiptoeing around the broken mess of her idiot brother’s relationship.
I lay in bed for an hour after waking up. For some reason, the past few days had zapped all willpower out of my system. I felt constantly drained, as if all my energy had left the building.
Considering how I cried myself to sleep last night—again—I didn’t blame myself. Every night, I stayed up late, replaying every moment with Federico like a detective searching for clues I had missed.
How had I been so blind? How had I not seen that the entire disaster that led me to him had been a ploy?
He was in the fucking mob.
Of course, what happened between us wasn’t a coincidence. I wrecked his car. He offered me marriage. I turned him down.
He was a rich and powerful man.
And then the cash got stolen.
Of course, it wasn’t a case of bad timing.
I should have put two and two together.
I felt like a complete and utter fool.
The worst part wasn’t even the betrayal—it was the fact that somewhere deep in my chest, beneath all the anger and hurt, I still missed him.
A soft knock at the door pulled me from my thoughts.
“Autumn?” Beatrice’s voice was gentle. “I made breakfast.”
