Page 50 of A Surprise Baby for the Russian

The sound of footsteps breaks us apart. The doctor comes back into the living room to say his goodbyes, and behind him, the entire family filters in—the room is suddenly packed with the formidable collective of the Volkov name.

The doctor stops near the doorway, looking over at me with a knowing, professional nod. “This afternoon, Raya? Don’t delay.”

I look at Yakov. He looks down at me, giving me a solitary, encouraging nod. The secret is over; after everything that’s happened, there’s no point hiding this from them now. I look at the crowded room, at my whole ridiculous, enormous, dangerous family, and clear my throat.

“I’m pregnant,” I announce, the words ringing clear against the high ceilings. “I need to go to the hospital this afternoon for a scan to make sure everything is alright with the baby.”

For a single heartbeat, the room drops into an absolute, stunned silence.

Then, it explodes.

Sofie lets out a loud, high-pitched gasp, her bruised face lighting up as she immediately reaches across the sofa to grab my arm. Selene bursts into fresh tears, clapping her hands over her mouth. The brothers erupt into a chaotic, roaring wall of sound—congratulations, heavy curses of disbelief, and the sudden, violent scraping of boots against the floorboards.

But through the sudden wall of noise, a low, murderous voice cuts through the chaos, clear as a bell. Simon, obviously, the one of my brothers I’ve always been closest to. His jaw is rigid, his eyes fixed on the wall with an intensity that could burn brick.

“I am going to kill that motherfucker,” Simon hisses, his hands curling into white-knuckled fists.

Yakov’s head snaps around, his eyes narrowing instantly into an icy, lethal glare as he locks eyes with my brother. The possessive, protective nature in him bristled at the remark.

Simon catches the look, lets out a dark, rough laugh, and shakes his head. “Not you, Mykros. Your fuck of a father.”

Yakov’s posture relaxes, his shoulders dropping as a satisfied glimmer returns to his eyes. “Not if I get there first.”

And then the room descends into pure, beautiful noise and chaos. The brothers are clapping Yakov on the back, Sofie is beaming and trying her best not to grimace through her swelling, and I find myself laughing and crying simultaneously—which I blame on the hormones.

In the middle of the noise and chatter, I reach out and find Yakov’s hand again. I squeeze his fingers hard, leaning in close until my lips brush his ear.

“Take me upstairs?” I whisper.

He looks down at me and nods. “Of course, malysh.”

I look out at the room, raising my voice enough to cut through Egor and Adrian’s shouting. “We’re going upstairs. We’ll be back down when we’re ready to go to the hospital.”

Nobody listens. They are already debating security protocols and arguing over baby names. Yakov doesn’t give them a second chance to notice. He hooks his arm around my waist, lifting me from the sofa, and guides me toward the staircase. We walk up the steps together, leaving the heavy noise of downstairs, so it’s just the two of us.

The second the heavy oak door of our bedroom clicks shut, the weight of the afternoon finally begins to lift. Yakov snaps the lock into place, sealing us away from the world. He turns to me and cradles my face in his large, warm hands, his eyes searching mine with such tenderness it makes my throat ache. He presses a soft, lingering kiss to my forehead, his breath hot against my skin.

“Let’s get the day washed off you, moya rados’t,” he murmurs, his voice low and soothing.

I nod, wrapping my fingers around his wrist as he guides me into the bathroom. The room quickly fills with a heavy blanket of steam as he turns on the shower, setting the water to a perfect, comforting heat.

Then, he turns back to me. His movements are agonizingly slow, stripped of the violence he unleashed only hours ago. He reaches for the hem of my ruined sweater, lifting it gently over my head and tossing it aside. He unbuttons my jeans and slides them, along with my panties, down my legs too. When I’m standing naked in front of him, he steps back to undress himself, his presence filling the small space of the steam-filled room.

He takes my hand and leads me under the spray. As the hot water hits my skin, I let out a long, shaky breath, leaning my forehead against his chest as the warmth floods over us. Yakov reaches for the shampoo. His fingers gently work the lather into my hair, massaging my scalp, washing away the lingering, phantom scent of the clinic parking lot and the terrors of the afternoon.

He rinses the suds away, his hands smoothing down my neck, over my shoulders, and down my back, stroking me with a slow, possessive rhythm. Then, his palms slide around to the front of my body, flattening over my lower abdomen. He curves his fingers over the slight, flat warmth of my belly, his chest heaving against my back as he presses his palm against the place where our baby is growing.

“I can’t believe it,” he groans against the shell of my ear, his grip tightening enough to pull me back against him. “Our baby. Ours, Raya.”

I tilt my head back, looking up at him through the cascading water, a sudden wave of vulnerability hitting me. “Are you sure you’ll still love me when I’m all big and round?”

A low, guttural sound rips from the back of his throat. He turns me around in his arms, pinning my back gently against the wet tile wall, his eyes darkening, thick with intense, unbridled devotion.

“Malysh, you have no fucking idea what you do to me,” he murmurs, his hands moving to cup my face before sliding down to hold me close. He speaks low and intense, his words a promise of total adoration for the changes my body will go through. He leans down, his mouth meeting mine in a hot, possessive kiss that tastes of clean water and deep surrender.

He kisses his way down my jaw, down the line of my throat, his lips finding the skin over my womb in a gesture of profound worship.

He looks up at me, his eyes black with a ruthless, protective heat. He lifts me effortlessly, my legs wrapping tight around his waist as he holds me against the wall under the falling water.