Page 84 of Pregnant Virgin of the Bratva
Then she keeps walking.
***
The library is quiet when I find her two hours later.
Evening light filters through the tall windows, catching the motes of dust in the air and throwing long shadows across the shelves. She sits near the far end, curled into one of the leather armchairs, her legs tucked up beneath her. A book rests in her lap, but she isn’t reading.
She’s staring out the window, thoughtful. Calm.
I close the door behind me without a sound. She doesn’t hear me at first.
She only notices when I step into her line of sight. Her head turns slowly, eyes finding mine.
“You’re a hard woman to track,” I murmur.
She smiles, just a little. “Not really. You’ve got cameras in every corner of this place.”
“True, but I like to find you myself.”
I cross the room and sit opposite her. For a moment, neither of us speaks. The room is dim, the silence soft. It suits her here. There’s something about this room—old wood, worn leather, the faint smell of paper and dust—that settles her. Anchors her.
“You were brilliant,” I say. “Had half the room convinced you’d run the ports since birth. Should’ve passed you the boss’s chair and seen if anyone had the balls to sit down.”
She blinks. “What?”
“Back in the meeting. Watching you shut down a room full of grown men like they were rowdy schoolboys…” I shake my head. “You were precise. Calculated. Controlled.”
She flushes. “They didn’t expect it.”
“No. They didn’t.”
“I didn’t plan it. I just… heard them talking, and it was so obvious what they were doing wrong.”
“I know.”
Her gaze drops to the book. She closes it carefully and sets it aside.
“I wasn’t trying to step on your toes.”
“You didn’t.”
“I wasn’t trying to embarrass anyone either.”
“You didn’t do that either.”
She’s quiet a moment longer. Then she says it, soft but sure. “I don’t want to just be a wife. Or a mother.”
My head tilts slightly.
“I want those things,” she adds quickly. “I do, but I also want to help. I want to be part of something. I want to contribute. To prove I’m capable.”
“You did.”
“That can’t be the only time.”
“It won’t be.”
She shifts in her seat, pulling the blanket over her knees a little higher. Her voice drops.
