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“Christy?” I croaked, and coughed. My mouth was as dry as the desert like I had sand for breakfast.
Her head snapped up and she rushed to my side. There were shimmering tears in her eyes and she had her lips caught between her teeth. “Oh my God, are you okay?”
I hugged her and patted her back gently. “There, there…”
She pulled back and smacked my arm mildly. I managed a smile “It’s not fucking funny, alright? You had me there for a second. One moment, you’re perfectly fine, and the next, you're blacking out and fainting in the bathroom.”
“Good thing you were there. I might have bashed my head on the toilet and died. Then, I wouldn’t have to think about him or that brat ever again.”
She frowned harder when she said, “Seriously, Mari. Stop saying things like that. That man doesn’t deserve you. Look at what he’s turned you into. You’re not taking care of yourself, and you’re talking rubbish.”
“Stop overreacting. I probably caught the flu, or something. I’ll be fine, I promise.”
Just then a man walked in. Mid-forties, bright smile, blonde hair, and a lean muscular frame. He wore a white laboratory coat and held a clipboard.
“Definitely not the flu, Miss. Lopez.” The man beamed and stopped in front of us. He checked the drip and tapped on the equipment.
“Good afternoon, doctor.” I flashed a smile. “That’s great news. So, if I’m not sick, can I go now? I have to get back to work.”
“But I can’t allow you to do that, Mariana. You have to take some time off work to rest.”
Christy looked from him and to me. “But you just said she’s not sick, doctor.”
“Yes,” he grinned even more. “But we ran some tests, you see? And I have the results right here stating that Miss. Mariana Lopez is, in fact, pregnant.”
The word dropped like a bomb, and an explosion occurred instantly. My jaw dropped and so did Christy’s. I stared at my stomach, possibly burning holes through the wool fabric with an intense stare. A tiny human being slowly formed in there. My heart beat fast and my eyes grew wide.
It made perfect sense; Vlad and I didn’t use protection. But… but pregnant?
I waspregnant.
Chapter 18 - Vlad
Sergey sat at the end of the long table with a grimace. His chest heaved, up and down, and he curled and uncurled his fingers. Slanted on the chair, with a leg crossed above the other, an animalistic growl tore through his lips and he punched a fist on the armrest.
“Sergey, it’s getting worse. What the fuck is this? Why the fuck do they keep messing with us? We lost six men last night. A fight broke out, closet to the fucking harbor, and they got away with it. They’re trying to make a fucking statement. If there’s a time to strike, I say now is the time.” Nikolai thundered over the phone. He had business to take care of and was unable to show up for the meeting.
“Calm down, Nikolai,” Sergey ordered. “The Outfit is fucking large and organized. That’s why they lay as many as they want and get out unscathed. To defeat them, we have to be smarter and faster. Ten steps ahead, that’s the plan.”
“Sounds great, brother,” Maxim chipped in. Since the meeting commenced over an hour ago, this was the first time he was making an input. “I agree that we have to be smarter and faster. But we’re running out of time. They keep advancing, and it doesn’t look like they’ll stop anytime soon. Nikolai was right; they’re passing a fucking message across. Look, Sergey, those assholes want more territories; they want to conquer. They want what’s ours, but we can’t let them have it.”
“And we all know what’s going to happen if we keep resisting,” I added, kicking my legs up on the table and inclining on my chair. Sergey shot me a disapproving glare, but I tossed a rubber ball in the air, ignoring him. Asides from the Chicago Outfit nuisance, I had otherdisturbanceson my mind.
“A fucking war, that’s what!” Nikolai raved, sounding more like he breathed into his phone speakers.
Between the four of us, he had higher tendencies of losing his cool and expressing it without remorse ever since he had a family of his own to protect. “If we keep resisting, which is our plan, a war is going to break out, Sergey. What then, huh? What the fuck do we do then? Will we just sit around and wait for those fucking bastards to take everything? True, we’ve had Maxim handling things, but we sure as hell know we need more than one man for this. Soon, he will not be able to manage on his own.”
With anger, visible enough and almost felt, Sergey pushed himself off his chair and slammed his hands on the table. The green veins on his hands and neck popped through his pale skin, and his gaze was deathly cold. “No one’s sitting around like a fucking coward, Nikolai. No one is going to take what’s ours; not as long as I breathe this fucking air, do you hear me?”
I threw the ball in the air and caught it again. The sound of rubber smacking against my palm traveled across the room, and Sergey’s jaw clamped down harder. “...We’re on this, trust me. I know Maxim can’t hold on for too long but that’s why I’m getting reinforcements. I hate to admit it, but we can’t handle the Outfit on our own. The outcome will be bloody. We need help from the Camorra. There’s no time, and that’s why,” he glared at me, and I threw the ball, “We have to push Vlad and Sophia’s wedding forward. Hasten up the alliance.”
My hand froze in the air and the ball dropped to the floor.
“I agree,” I heard Nikolai hum in the background, and Maxim concurred with a deep, “Hm.Dah.That’s a good plan.”
I withdrew my legs from the table and sat upright. Something twisted inside me; something dark and gut-wrenching, squeezing my lungs hard, and knocking off my air supply. I leaned forward and arched a brow. My brother caught the look; he understood it. I was pissed, for reasons I couldn’t share.
“And that decision has already been made, I suppose.”
