Page 94 of Bratva Baby

I hang up before the silence can answer me.

Niko turns his head. “Who was that?”

I tuck the phone into my coat pocket and check that the scarf sits flat at my throat. “Insurance.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting.”

His mouth tightens, but he doesn’t argue. Anton’s men are good at orders, but they’re better at reading when a situation has already stepped past the point where obedience matters. Niko reaches under the seat and pulls out a thin folder I asked for on the ride over. It holds plain records, old shipping copies, enough stamps and numbers to look useful if someone wants to believe too fast. Empty paper dressed as weight.

He hands it to me. “This won’t fool him for long.”

“It doesn’t need to.”

“Sofiya.”

I look at him then. “If I don’t walk out, you don’t rush the gate. You call Kolya, and you tell Anton I bought him time because he taught me to stop waiting for permission.”

Niko studies me for one long beat. “He’s going to hate that.”

“Good. It’ll keep him busy.”

I step out before he can say more. The cold hits my face and slides under Anton’s coat, but I keep walking. My boots strike the cracked pavement, one step after another, while the man by the repair shed straightens and shifts his hand closer to his jacket. He knows who I am. Men always look twice when they’ve been told to expect a woman but not the one who arrives.

I stop ten feet from him. “I’m here.”

He looks past me toward the car.

I lift the folder. “If you waste time checking whether I brought an army, Maks loses what he asked for.”

That gets him moving. He opens the service gate just wide enough for me to pass, then reaches toward my arm. I angle back and let him see my face properly. “Touch me and I walk.”

He almost smiles. “You’re not walking anywhere unless he says so.”

“Then ask him whether he wants your hand on me more than he wants what I brought.”

The man’s expression changes. He has orders, but he doesn’t have courage. He steps aside, and I walk through the gate with my heart beating hard under the scarf that hides the real drive.

I’m still not sure why I brought it. Maybe I wanted one last hail Mary if all else would fail.

The yard stretches around me in strips of light and concrete. Trucks sleep in numbered lanes. A forklift sits dead near a loading bay. Somewhere beyond the archive building, a man shouts, then another answers fast.

Anton is out there.

I keep my face still.

Maks waits near the repair shed with his coat buttoned, leather gloves on, and that calm, pretty face arranged into something close to regret. The sight of him pulls me back to Moscow, to my father’s office, to the Yantar clock ticking while Maks asked why I’d been digging through files that should’ve stayed closed.

He looks me over once and stops at my stomach before returning to my face. “You came.”

“You gave me the address.”

“I didn’t think Reznikov would let you.”

“He’s bleeding. His opinions are less convenient right now.”

Maks laughs softly. “You always did choose strange moments for humor.”