21. Nikolai

21

NIKOLAI

" W hat did you just say?" Amy asked, eyes wide. Her fingers tightened in my hand, but I was numb to the increase of pressure.

She'd looked from me to the doctor, shocked, but I was too riveted and locked in place with what she'd just led me to believe. No words left her lips, but when Dr. Francis pushed her on the identity of the father and whether she even knew who he was, Amy had given me that one look that said it all.

In her beguiling hazel eyes, I saw the truth she'd hidden from me all this time. Guilt warred with worry. Beneath them, I got the message. She'd given such a steady look and raised her brows that I would've had to be blind to miss what she wanted me to understand.

I was the father. This innocent, strong woman was carrying my child. From that one night that left me yearning for her and missing her so severely, we'd done more than fuck like strangers. We reformed who we were—lovers separated by our mistakes, and now, parents. I'd done more than escape her bed with the regrets that a single fling was all we could have. Although I didn't realize it at the time, I'd left my heart in her hands. My seed in her womb.

Our child.

I blinked, shaking my head to snap out of the stupor as a soul-deep amazement streaked up my spine and shook me awake.

Our children ?

"There's more than one baby?" Amy asked. Her tone wasn't teary or full of fear. She spoke with the giddy marvel of this miracle, the same sensation I grappled with as I realized I would be a father .

"Yes. Twins." Dr. Francis moved the instrument over Amy's flat stomach. The shapes made no sense. White on black, the images shifted, but I didn't know what anything meant. Hearing the heartbeat was proof enough that our babies were alive, but the doctor went back and forth, showing that it was two parallel thumps of life sounding in there.

"Baby A is here," she explained, then moved the device over. "And hiding back here is Baby B. The bleeding is likely from the placenta placement with Baby B, but again, no worries. I recommend resting for at least a couple of days, but I see nothing to indicate anything of alarm." She set the device on the small tray attached to the stand.

Alek purchased the equipment so Mila wouldn't need to go to a medical facility for checkups. With Dr. Francis on call and rewarded generously to be here for Mila and their daughter, he wanted to spare his wife any risk. If our enemies knew that they would have a child, it would be an additional danger. Mila's father, Sergei, had nefarious plans about Mila's offspring, and no one would blame Alek for wanting to secure the utmost security for his wife and their child.

I appreciated that the equipment was here, because now, Amy would need it.

"When was your last menstrual cycle?" the doctor asked .

Amy gave a date but didn't seem confident about it. "Over four months ago. It was brutal, worse than usual because I'd tried another birth control that I ended up stopping because it made the pain so bad. I spotted here and there since then, so I don't really know."

"Well, I can estimate a date of conception?—"

"March second," I stated. "That's the date."

Amy swallowed hard and glanced at me before nodding. "Yeah. We do know that."

Dr. Francis tapped more notes on her tablet. "All right, then working with that timeline, your babies are nine weeks old." She smiled at her, then me. "Which is precisely what I'd estimate from their sizes and growth so far. Everything is right on track. All is well and just as it should be."

For the babies, sure. But in my life? I felt like I'd never know what to expect next.

"Nik?" Mila stepped closer, not alarmed but so confused. "Nikolai? You're…"

I sighed, not wanting to speak with her, but instead, the mother of my children. I looked down at her, stuck in this fugue of shock yet.

"You said someone from the Cartel raped you," Mila said as Alek joined her. He wrapped his arm around her and shook his head. Tipping his head toward the nurse wiping off the gel from the ultrasound on Amy's abdomen, he indicated for his wife to mind her words.

"We'll be out in the hall, preparing to store the equipment. I'll wrap up my notes." Dr. Francis stood, seeming to understand when she should excuse herself. "Should I plan to forward this information to another doctor or practice for her continuing prenatal care?"

I shook my head .

"No. Amy isn't a temporary guest," Alek said as he saw the doctor out.

Lodged in this numbness of having my world altered in the blink of an eye, I sat there on the edge of the bed, staring absently at the wall.

I was going to be a father. I would have not one, but two babies to welcome into this cruel world with Amy. I'd never be able to explain how I knew that she was the one for me, but this seemed to cement that assumption as total, utter proof.

"Amy…" Mila said, shaking her head once it was just the four of us in here. "I don't understand." A trace of hurt hung in her words, and I realized how much Mila might have already welcomed and cherished having another woman in the house.

"Nik and I met at a bar." Amy removed her hand from my grip as my fingers went lax. I was too stunned to move and recapture her.

"We slept together that night. I'd just gotten off the pill, and I assumed with my history, a pregnancy wouldn't be likely. And…"

"You were never raped?" Alek asked.

Amy shook her head, and that motion, that answer, jerked me out of my trance of surprise.

She'd lied. She'd held not only the fact that she was pregnant from me for so long, but she'd also tried to deflect and fabricate how she'd gotten pregnant.

Her teary, sincere words came back to me.

"I'm sorry, Nik. For… for all the lies that stand and have stood between us."

She meant all of the lies, including the one she'd made up and told Mila about a Cartel member raping her a while back before they'd kidnapped her.

"Why?" I stood, needing to be on my feet and pace. I didn't move away from the bed, though, stuck on needing to be close with this earth-shattering revelation .

Elation claimed me. I was overwhelmed by the news that I would be a father, but the confusion and inherent lack of trust in her words warned me not to get too happy yet.

"I'm so sorry." She said it to me but glanced at Mila, then Alek. "I was just… so… overwhelmed," she admitted anxiously, parroting the exact feeling I had.

"Why? Why would you lie about that?" I demanded.

"I didn't know I was pregnant when Mila talked with me that morning. I strongly suspected that I could be pregnant, but I dismissed it all because I'd been sick. I had a stomach bug, and I assumed it was just that because I've always known I would struggle with fertility." She placed her hand on her stomach, lifting her brows in something like amusement, like she realized the irony of just how fertile she actually was, with twins.

"Talking with you helped me understand that I had to be in denial, that I had to be pregnant. I hadn't taken a test or anything, but I knew if I was, you were the father."

She captured me with her gaze, trapping me in a spell of hearing her out.

"I hadn't slept with anyone since the previous summer, the last year before I saw you," she explained. "And I didn't have sex with anyone after you."

Why? It hardly mattered, but I was dying to know why because I wanted to believe I'd made the same impression on her that she had on me.

"Then why lie about someone raping you?" Mila asked.

"Because when you were talking to me, explaining that this is a Bratva home, that you're all leaders and spies and… men in this crime world, I got more scared. I've been thrust into this life, and I don't know who to trust or what to think. And that was before I learned that some deranged man is paying millions to have me as his possession. This isn't… I'm not…" She shook her head, getting more agitated. "I'm struggling to adapt, and I'm doing the best I can. But when you emphasized that Nik's brothers would look after him, when I was worried why Nik hadn't come back yet, I understood how much family means to you. You said the Bratva wants to keep their bloodlines intact and how you look after your own."

"But…" Mila sighed. "Why would that make you say the Cartel raped you?"

"Because I was worried that if you knew my baby—or babies—were Nik's, you'd take them from me!" She furrowed her brow, looking among all of us. "I'm not one of you. I'm no one, a stranger. I'm not one of your Bratva. But my child would be, and I got stuck on the worry that you'd take my baby from me."

"Oh, Amy." Mila shook her head. "No."

"I want this baby. Both of them. I won't let anyone take them from me." She sat up, trying to get more comfortable. "It was stupid. It was irrational. But I panicked, and I thought that if you assumed my child was someone else's, eventually, you'd let us go."

"Come on," Alek told Mila. As he urged her to leave us, noticing how bewildered I still looked, he nodded his head to the door. "We'll talk more about this later," he told me.

Alone with Amy, I stood next to the bed and sighed.

"I know it was stupid. I'm sorry, Nik. I'm sorry that I lied at all and tried to deceive anyone. It's all been sprung on me, and with the kidnapping and Diego and… just… everything, it's been overwhelming to know how to process my life."

"You shouldn't have lied."

"I know that," she argued. "But you don't understand. "

"Then make me understand." I crossed my arms, then lowered them and shoved my hands into my pockets. And then I crossed them again. I wasn't prone to fidgeting like this, but I had to do something with my hands before I lost the fight to reach down and touch her, hold her.

"I've always wanted a family. I've never been a part of one, of anything. My deepest wish was to have a family. To fit in someone else's life so I wouldn't have to be so alone."

I stared at her, hating the tremble of her lower lip as she spilled her heart out like this. She spoke the truth, and it wasn't easy, but that was another testament to her determination.

"I was orphaned. I never had anyone to really support me or need me. Then when I learned how unlikely it could be to start a family, I got used to the idea that I never would." She took my hand and placed it on her stomach. "These babies are miracles, and I will never apologize for trying to protect and keep them."

"But to lie that you were raped?" I shook my head. "That's just crazy talk, Amy!"

"I feel crazy. All the time! In hindsight, I know how stupid it was to make up such a lie like that, and to your crime lord of a brother and sister-in-law. But I was put on the spot. I feel insane half the time from these hormones. And being sick all the time. And not eating well and sleeping terribly."

I lowered to sit next to her, reaching over to snuggle her to me in a hug. I couldn't stand to see her upset.

"And I missed you, Nik. Ever since you ran away that night, when you left me without a goodbye…" She wiped at her cheeks and sniffled. "I missed you the moment you were gone. It was just supposed to be random sex, right? One night of fun. But when I woke up, I knew it was anything but. "

"Fuck," I growled, lowering to kiss her lips. I couldn't resist. Listening to her so distraught cracked my heart in half.

She gasped in surprise at the touch, but with a breathy sound, she pushed back against me, kissing me harder.

I pulled back, gazing at her pouty expression in protest. I licked my lips, tasting the salt of her tears, but I refused to go any further. The doctor was clear that she should rest, and if I lost my control with Amy and showed her how badly I wanted to kiss her everywhere, that would be the opposite of taking it easy.

Framing her face, I stroked my thumb over the satiny skin of her cheek.

"As soon as I realized I could be carrying your baby, I was so scared, Nik." She sighed, resting into my touch as I lowered to lie with her.

I brushed her hair back, gazing into her gorgeous, soulful eyes.

"I was terrified I could lose the baby. I hated that I couldn't tell you. And when the men captured me…" She grunted a rough laugh. "It's been hell. I've been stuck in a loop of panic and being in nonstop survival mode."

"You don't have to be scared anymore," I promised, leaning closer to kiss her brow. It was impossible to resist touching her. The longer I lay here with her, calming down from the shock and soaking up her presence, the more I relaxed into what I needed to do.

"I will be here for you. Every second of the way."

She smiled slightly, almost nervous and timid to take my words as the truth.

"I missed you too. I can't explain it. I won't try to. But I wanted you every fucking day after the night we shared. I couldn't get you out of my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about you and wanting you again. When I saw you at the club, I couldn't believe my luck. "

She frowned. "But you tried to lie about who you were. You tried to make me believe that we were strangers, even though I felt like I recognized you." Her hand rubbed down my face in a sweet caress. "It was your voice. I just had this feeling that you were familiar, and when you kissed me, I felt torn, that I was being unfaithful to the memory of you that I wanted to keep."

"I knew you were too good for me. You didn't belong in my life. Like you told the others, this world—my world—is different from yours. I understood that. We were too different to ever make anything work."

I kissed her again, proving how wrong that ended up being. "But now that you are here, Amy, I'll do whatever I can to make you happy and safe."

Lowering my hand to her hip and brushing my finger over her stomach, I added, "All three of you." Dammit, her lips called to me. I had to keep this light, but I kissed her again, pulling back quickly. "You have your family, Amy. You will never be alone again. I'm sorry this family is not at all what you ever could have imagined or wanted, but you have a family here, and that will never change."