Page 83 of Baby for My Ex’s Dad

“Aw, you’re cute. You think you can hold me here?”

“We’ll do what we must, but we truly don’t want to have to do so.”

“That’s good.” I smile serenely at them. “Let’s talk about what keeping me here looks like. This is a hospital. It is full of cameras and security guards who have no idea who any of you are and wouldn’t care if they did. The second you put a hand on me, I start screaming.”

He sighs. “Please⁠—”

“I shout that two strangers are trying to force a pregnant woman out of a waiting room against her will. I have a loud voice, boys. And good lungs. Security rushes over, possibly police, and you end up spending the most important day of this family’s life in a holding cell. It’s pointless for everyone, especially for me, whom you’re supposed to be protecting.”

They share a defeated sigh.

“Or come with me, keep your eyes on me the way Max wants, and make sure I don’t even get a paper cut. You’re still watching me—just from a more interesting place.”

The short-haired one closes his eyes briefly, like a man watching a rockslide he can’t escape. “He’s going to kill us.”

“If he’s alive to react, it’ll be gratitude, not murder on his mind. That’s the entire goal. So, if you’re going to guard me, then you’ll have to keep up. I’m going. Move.”

Reluctantly, they make a hole, and I walk out of the waiting room into the corridor, passing a vending machine, a crash cart, and a nurse who ignores me. I don’t look back, avoiding the question of whether they follow, because turning around would mean asking, and I’ve had enough asking tonight.

I’m not asking anymore. I’m telling.

After three seconds, two sets of footsteps trail behind me, one on each side, matching my pace. A heady sense of calm takes hold of my chest. I’m doing this, and I’m going to win. There’s no other option.

I don’t falter. I don’t try. I just… do.

“Good,” I say, not slowing as we exit the building into the bright daylight. “Now one of you give me a gun.”

There’s a brief pause, a moment of complete disbelief. Then, the short-haired one—God bless him—gently presses a small pistol into my hand as we walk, grip first. It’s a bit smaller than the ones from back home. My hands are steadier around it than I wish they were.

“Let’s go.”

In the SUV, as the city rushes by and one of us speeds along while the other is in the back with me, I focus on breathing and clear my thoughts, since feelings are a luxury and I’m on a tight schedule. “Okay. We should call for backup. Right? There have to be more of you.”

“There are,” the driver says.

“Call them. Please and thank you.”

He quickly exchanges a sharp burst of Russian into his phone. Then he looks at me in the mirror, and I notice the question assembling behind his eyes—the one they’ve both been holding onto since the waiting room. “Miss, with respect, what is your plan exactly? Because we’re heading toward a pakhan’s heavily guarded estate with two teams and a pregnant woman with a very small gun. What do you think happens when we get there?”

Oddly, I actually have a plan—something I would normally laugh at if I had room to do so. It came to me fully formed as I approached the hospital doors. Turns out, I’ve been preparing for this very moment throughout my entire adult life without realizing it.

“We throw a party.”

“Come again?”

“It’s a party. I’ve planned hundreds, including galas, dinners, and a retirement event for a full ballroom with a border-war-worthy seating chart. It’s the same skill, I promise.” I twist to face him, and the plan lays itself out clean and bright in my head.

“I don’t follow you.”

“You invite the right guests. You seat everyone next to the right people. And you prepare a few good topics to keep the conversation moving so there’s never an awkward silence. That’s all tonight is.”

The driver and the back-seat man trade a look in the rearview mirror that says they’re a little afraid of me now, which is good.

“Guests first. That’s our two teams meeting at the estate, everybody arriving at the same time so nobody’s standing around alone looking suspicious.” I point at the back-seat man. “So, tell me about the second team. Names, numbers, what each of them is good at, what each of them is bad at. I need to know my guests before I can seat them.”

He blinks, shifts his position, and then speaks quickly, rattling off the details. I listen the way I used to when a caterer described which servers were quick and which might drop a tray of champagne on a CEO.

Volkov’s team consists of four men. One is a sniper, patient and more effective at long ranges than in hallway knife fights. Two are specialists in close-quarters combat—quick, loud, and confident in confined spaces. The youngest, nervous member drives at reckless speeds and, by his own admission, shouldn’t be near the front lines.