AllFreeNovel
Share Us
As I explained how I tracked her down with my phone, I held my hands out to show her I didn’t mean any harm. I didn’t plan to rush her. I only wanted her to come back and heal.
The guilt was a sour taste in my mouth at the very sight of her. I just wanted to make everything better, and for her pain to go away.
“It’s alright, Mila,” I offered her, trying to get as close to her as possible. To convince her to trust me, to follow me.
But Mila shook her head and slipped a hand into the bag down at her side. She was reaching for something with a wild look in her eye, but I couldn’t see what it was. She looked unhinged, and no part of me could blame her. Mila’s rage was a perfect mirror image of how I felt inside.
Surely, she had some sort of weapon. She could’ve swiped a gun from the house, or maybe from a guard. But I couldn’t be certain.
I thought about reaching for the gun in my pocket. I was always armed, but was I prepared to shoot my wife? Would I be willing to take my daughter’s mother away from her?
Never.
If I wanted Mila to trust me, then I needed to trust her.
Crumbling from the pressure of it all, I dropped to my knees in the sand and looked at her, silently pleading.
Shallow breaths ebbed from my lips, and the sun was intense on the back of my head, beating down on me like it was my last chance to make things right. The damn was breaking, and I had nothing left to stop it.
“I love Kat and I will find her, alright?” I called to Mila, voice defeated, yet still determined to keep my promise. I held her gaze despite how the insanity in her eyes scared me, and I continued, “I told you I would, and I meant it.”
Even as our eyes remained locked, Mila continued to pull the weapon out of the bag little by little. My heart wedged into my throat, but it didn’t matter. I could only be honest, even if she planned on killing me.
I just wanted her to believe me.
When the bag finally dropped, the hammer was revealed.
Flooded with relief, I dropped my head and took a deep breath. It wasn’t a gun. I could deal with a hammer.
But all fight seemed to simmer away from Mila’s body then as the hammer landed in the sand and she began to cry. Difficult, soul-aching sobs wracked through her. I got to my feet and approached her before I could stop myself.
“Mila,” I whispered, reaching out to gather her in my arms. She leaned into me with her cheeks stained in tears, overcome with grief. “I’m on your side. I swear it.”
But Mila couldn’t form any coherent words. Still needing the last of her confirmation, I gripped her shoulders and held her there squarely, forcing her to look me in the eyes.
“I need you to tell me once and for all. Are you in on this with your father?”
That familiar confusion filled her gaze again, and Mila wiped at her tears. “I don’t know why I would be. How many more times do you need to hear it?”
Knowing I had no choice but to believe her, I nodded, struck by her indomitable will.
Mila was stubborn like me, and a fighter at heart even if she wanted nothing to do with the mob lifestyle. She knew what she wanted for herself and our daughter, and she wouldn’t stop until she had exactly that. But she did everything without ditching her morals.
Staring at her disheveled self then, it couldn’t be clearer that I didn’t just want her in my life because Kat needed her. I wanted her for myself, too.
I was unable to place those delicate yet tangible feelings into words. I never trusted myself enough to confess exactly how much I cared for her. If it wasn’t through harsh words or my fists flying, I never expressed myself.
Being stubborn meant keeping everything trapped inside, left to well up until my heart spilled out.
I was the biggest idiot for not getting it before, but she was the woman for me, and I had only ever taken her for granted.
“We were meant to be together,” I blurted, unable to hold it in. The surge of emotion in my heart forced me to keep going. “How could two people from the same small Russian town meet on the other side of the world, have a baby, and be promised to each other from birth without knowing about it?”
Mila’s eyes dropped from mine, and she seemed to not believe me. I shook her gently, pleading for a response.
She murmured, “It’s just a small world.”
“No,” I returned, judging her chin up with my hand. The pain in her eyes nearly killed me. “It's fate, Mila. It’s meant to be between us, and that “us” includes our daughter.”
