Page 62 of Shattered Cradle (Makarova Bratva Duet)

I thought I experienced guilt when my dad died.

I thought I understood the sharp, piercing relentlessness of the emotion.

But even seven years later, it can still come and slice me open when I least expect it. Every time I think I’ve cried myself out, new tears come.

Some tears are for Mom. Some are for Dad. Some are for my siblings and myself and the bond that was severed in the last several hours.

Aleks hasn’t left my side, not even for a moment.

I know he must have more important places to be. Business and war and schemes to attend to.

But he stays next to me, silent and emotionless as always. Resolute. Unbreakable, at a time when my whole world feels like it’s been smashed into a million broken shards.

I feel him watching me. I know he’s waiting for the next outburst. I am, too, honestly. But after hours of crying and sobbing and shaking, I finally feel spent.

I’m not better. Not even close.

But I’m too tired to shed another tear.

“You need to eat something,” Aleks says.

“I’m not hungry.”

“Olivia.”

It’s amazing how much he manages to convey with just my name and that pointed inflection.The baby, he reminds me without saying it.Think about the baby.

But the moment I even think about food, I want to throw up.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I just… I feel so… I don’t even know how I feel.”

He nods. “It’s okay. You don’t have to.”

“She was my mother.”

“She doesn’t stop being your mother just because she’s gone,” he says gently.

“Doesn’t she?”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

My eyes snap to his. The fact that he even thinks to say that makes me feel like it must be my fault. He knows the truth and he’s just sparing me from it.

“Yes, it was,” I whisper. “I’m two for two.”

“What?”

“Two for two,” I say again. “I’ve killed both my parents.”

“You can’t cause heart attacks, Olivia.”

“I should have been there with my dad, instead of at a party trying to catch a stupid boy’s attention.”

“You were just a teenager. A kid.”

“A kid who knew better.”

“Nothing could have stopped your father dying that day, Olivia. Not even you. If willpower alone was enough to shift reality, I’d be ruling the world right now.”

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