Champagne Venom (Orlov Bratva, #1)(24)

“Within the next half-hour, if you’re feeling up to it.”

“Great. I’m ready to go home.”

He nods and backs out of the room, leaving Misha and me alone. The silence boils like his eyes always do. Heat from an unseen source makes my skin flush and my heart pound. He hasn’t moved since the doctor entered and left so casually, like he wasn’t dropping an atomic bomb in his wake. He might as well be carved from stone.

“I didn’t think I could get pregnant,” I say softly, mostly just to end the silence. “I honestly believed that.”

I pause to swallow. Misha doesn’t move or blink or breathe a word. Maybe he really is carved from stone in a non-figurative sense.

“But if what the doctor just said is true, I am pregnant. And I want this baby. So you don’t have to do anything if you don’t—”

“Am I the father?”

I grit my teeth and urge myself to stay calm. “Yes. You’re the only man I’ve been with in over seven months.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m positive.”

“You’ll forgive me for being skeptical,” he drawls. “After all, you were ‘positive’ you couldn’t get pregnant in the first place.”

If the move wouldn’t rip out my IV, I’d grab the vase next to my bed and hurl it at him. He deserves way worse than that, the asshole.

“It shouldn’t matter to you either way,” I snap. “I’m not asking you for a thing. I don’t want or need anything from you. You’re off the hook, Misha.”

“Off… the hook?” he echoes, as if he’s unfamiliar with the term.

“Isn’t that what you’re all pissed off about?” I demand. “That you’re being forced into fatherhood with a lowly little secretary? Well, you don’t have to worry, because this lowly little secretary can fend for herself. I can take care of this baby without your help. I. Don’t. Need. You.”

Even as I say it, though, real life sticks its finger in my eye. I’ll have to get a new job. A bigger apartment. Find a way to afford daycare and clothes and bottles and all the stuff babies require.

Expenses and responsibilities pile up in my mind, but I shove them aside. That’s a Future Paige problem. Present Paige wants to tell this asshole to stick it where the sun don’t shine.

“And if you think for one second that you can convince me to get an abortion, then think again,” I continue. “This baby is a miracle. I haven’t stumbled upon many of those in my life, so I’m going to hold onto this one.”

He’s silent for a moment. His chest rising and falling is the only sign he’s still alive. Then, when I’m about to tell him to get the hell out of my hospital room, he finally speaks.

“I’m not in the habit of walking away from my responsibilities in any circumstance,” he says. “Even if

I were, it would be impossible to do so when you and I are living under the same roof.”

I snort. “I have my own apartment. Plus, I don’t think Human Resources would be super thrilled about me shacking up with my boss. P.A.s and CEOs don’t usually live together.”

“No,” he agrees. “But husbands and wives do.”

My pulse starts to throb in my temple. “We aren’t really husband and wife, Misha. That was your lie.

You got what you wanted. It’s over now.”

“No,” he repeats, “I didn’t. And it’s not. Because you and I are getting married.”





17

PAIGE

We’re checked out of the hospital and in his car before I can even begin to process what Misha just said to me.

“We’re going to get married?”

I repeat the words slowly, hoping that they’ll start to make more sense this time around. Nope. Better luck next time.

“I’m sorry. Have you gone insane?”

“You’re pregnant,” he points out. “With my child. Thus, we’re getting married.”

“What kind of archaic nonsense is that?” I scoff. “We aren’t going to get married and play House because of a one-night-stand.”

“No. We’re going to get married because of a one-night-stand that resulted in you carrying my child.”

I place a hand over my stomach. “You don’t own this baby.”

“I own everything,” he snaps, his voice shattering like glass on cement.

My heart hammers in my chest as I realize that Misha is completely serious.

And completely capable of getting exactly what he wants.

“Just let me—oh, for God’s sake, I’ll leave you alone,” I say, hating the plea in my tone. “I don’t want child support or your involvement or anything like that. You don’t have to… I mean, why do you even want to do this?”

“I am the don of the Orlov Bratva,” he snarls with a ferocity that terrifies me. “That baby in your belly is my heir. I have a responsibility now, both to him and to you. My child will not be illegitimate.”

Don? Bratva? Heir? That catch in his voice that seems to scream that he doesn’t want this bullshit forced wedding any more than I do?

Too many things to count jump out at me, so I focus on the part I can understand.