Page 136 of Gilded Cage (Kovalyov Bratva 1)

“We’re not going to a church first?” I ask.

No one answers me.

I fall back against my seat, frustrated and sick of resisting the urge to rest my hand against my belly.

The cemetery is quiet and empty when the car pulls in.

But then we turn a corner and I see the number of cars converging through the narrow roads. They all look the same—dark, anonymous, luxurious.

Mobster cars.

My heartbeat ratchets up as our vehicle pulls to a stop. I just sit there with my hands in my lap until my door opens.

“What do I do?” I ask Crew Cut as he shuts the door once I’m out of the car.

He looks at me with an expression that I’m almost convinced is sympathy, although I’m probably just projecting my own anxieties onto the same blank look he always wears.

“The family is gathering over there,” he says, gesturing with his chin. “We’ll take you.”

It’s not really what I meant. I was half-heartedly hoping he’d crack into a big, sympathetic smile, sweep me up in his arms, and tell me to go live free as a bird with my baby somewhere far away from here.

Wishful thinking, obviously. I wonder if Crew Cut even knows what a hug is.

I follow him and Blue Eyes across the cemetery to the crowd gathering around an open grave.

A coffin sits off to the side of the pit in the ground. One glance tells me that it’s the expensive kind.

My bodyguards flank me, but I feel utterly alone as I continue the walk towards the crowd. Eyes settle on me, piercing and suspicious.

“Esme.”

I look up hopefully.

But it’s not Artem who’s spoken my name. It’s the blonde, boyish friend of Artem’s I’ve seen a few times before.

He gives me a sympathetic smile—real sympathy, not my imagination projecting onto Crew Cut’s blank canvas of a face—and offers his elbow to me.

Instinctively, I take it. He leads me towards Artem, who’s standing at the head of the open grave.

My husband doesn’t even look at me.

Clenching my jaw, I turn my eyes to the coffin. It’s a deep, elegant rust-brown that manages to glint even in the muted sunlight. The golden handles seem to glow.

I stand beside Artem like the dutiful wife Papa had always expected me to be. The others gathering around glance at me—some with open dislike, others with tempered curiosity. They’re all dressed well in dark, expensive fabrics.

And they have piercing eyes. The kind of eyes used to seeing straight through to someone’s soul.

I want to shrink back, turn around, and hide in the car.

But for some reason, Artem’s presence is the one thing that keeps me standing.

He’s shrouded in darkness, his expression shadowed and steely. I would have thought I’d shrink away from him, too, but instead I find myself wanting to reach out.

To take his hand and give him the comfort I never got when Cesar died.

My hand twitches towards his, but I can’t bring myself to do it. Not because I don’t want to, but because I’m scared that he’ll pull away from me.

Before I know it, they start lowering the coffin into the grave. No one has spoken any prayers or anything, and I’m pretty damn sure none of these people are priests, so I’m not sure if we arrived too late for the formalities or if the people in this world just don’t give a shit about sending off the dead with respect.

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