Tangled Innocence (Egorov Bratva Book 1) by Nicole Fox

Author:Nicole Fox [Fox, Nicole]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-04-03T00:00:00+00:00

31

WREN

Clack, clack, clack.

“What’s going on?”

Blushing furiously, I keep trying to get the damn seatbelt to cooperate. “It’s stuck,” I complain. “Hold on a⁠—”

“Let me help.”

“No!” His hand freezes mid-air. Pretty sure I’m the color of watermelon right now, but I stick to my guns. “I can manage on my own.”

I take a deep breath and fuss with the seatbelt one more time. There must be a god having mercy on me today, because finally, it slides over my chest easily and I can breathe a sigh of relief. Not because it’s working, but because it means Dmitri doesn’t have to touch me.

I turn away from him pointedly and pretend to be transfixed by city traffic as we drive to my very first appointment with this new OBGYN Dmitri intends to force on me.

“What was her name again?” I ask, if only because the silence is driving me nuts and the heat in my cheeks refuses to dissipate.

Dmitri’s gaze stays fixed on the road ahead. “Dr. Liza Zaitsev.”

“She sounds Russian.”

“Very astute observation.”

“Does that mean she works for your Bratva?”

“Yes.”

I know why I’m being evasive and standoffish; I’m just not sure why he is. Unless of course we’ve both stumbled across the same problem: which is that the lines are getting blurred and it’s becoming harder and harder to figure out what’s real and what’s not.

I woke up this morning with a mental list running in my head. It’s a work-in-progress, as at the moment, there are only two points on the list, but that’s fine, because they’re both impossible to forget and easy to repeat. It’s simple math, really.

Bee + Dmitri = real.

Me + Dmitri = not real.

Easy, right?

I just got a tad bit carried away after the concert. I was high on music and freedom and maybe the faintest hint of residual marijuana floating around the crowd. I was out and about and having fun for the first time in a long time.

Then I saw Cian and it just reminded me of old times with Jared and Rose. Let me rephrase that: it reminded me that he and I are still here and Jared and Rose are not.

After that unsettling encounter, I’d gone back to the dance floor and tried to lose myself in the music again. But something had changed. I wasn’t dancing to have fun anymore; I was dancing to forget. So when Aleksandr came to get me, I didn’t even negotiate for more time. I gave Syrah a tight hug goodbye and followed him to the Grim Reaper waiting in his blacked-out hearse by the curb.

I don’t know how the topic of my dad came up. I don’t know why I decided that sharing all that information with Dmitri was a good idea.

I just know that for once I didn’t want to feel so alone.

And talking to him accomplished that.

Feeling less alone accomplished what followed: sprawling on the couch in Dmitri’s living room and touching myself while I fantasized about him making good on his threat to spank my ass until he left behind a permanent imprint of his hand.

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