Knocked Up by the Russian (Nikolai Bratva Brides #3)

Chapter 15 - Amy

The door clicked quietly behind Ivan, and Amy stared daggers at it, feeling a confusing mixture of emotions. As cavernous as his apartment was, she'd already spent more than a week locked inside these walls. She didn't have the patience or willpower to last another six months like this.

As she turned away from the door, Amy frowned at this morning's interaction with Ivan. Her mother had always warned her to stop freezing people out when she got angry, but it was easier this way. Amy exhaled a heavy breath, wrinkling her nose at the yogurt mixture he'd made her for breakfast. Control freak. She wrinkled her nose again, taking a bite and grimacing. The yogurt wasn't plain by any means; it looked like it had blueberries in it, and she recognized the chia seeds as well—but it wasn't to her taste. Still, she couldn't just leave it. Heaven only knew why, though. Ivan had enough money to pay for a hundred wasted meals. So why was eating something she didn't like?

Two bites later, she pushed the bowl away to press her head against the cool marble instead. She knew his passcode, and it would be a lie to say she wasn't tempted—but the agreement she'd made him on their wedding day played in her mind. As frustrated as she was, she wouldn't break it.

No matter how many arguments they'd had, Ivan always kept his promises—unlike her father. Anger aside, just the thought of leaving felt like a betrayal.

Spinning the ring on her finger, her eyes unfocused. Memories came unbidden, memories of how things had been before her father had left. Memories of trying to find odd jobs she could take in between school and looking after her siblings. How her mother pulled double shift after double shift; how they'd both been broken down and burned out only to get up in the morning again. Seven years of hell to reclaim a little bit of freedom. A little bit of independence for her and her family—now it was slipping through her fingers like sand.

Blowing out an exasperated breath, she abandoned the barstool to walk around aimlessly, her fingers trailing against the furniture in Ivan's home. She understood the reasoning behind his actions, but that didn't mean it was okay.

How much more did she have to give up because some asshole was threatening her life? Wasn't marrying Ivan enough? Moving in with him? She'd basically lost all the rights she'd worked so damn hard to achieve. Her freedom—gone. Just like that. And while she loved visiting Zia, Amy wanted to do more than wait around for Ivan to get back so that he could take her where she needed to be next. It pissed her off that she'd spent years getting to where she was only to have it snatched away by a threat.

Her whole life had been spent trying to catch up with everyone else, and now that she'd finally reached a point where she was earning a good enough salary to look after her family, it all went to shit. So while she understood his reasons for leaving her cooped up in his gorgeous apartment, it wasn't enough for her to pretend to be okay with it.

The silence played on her nerves, but Amy ignored it. Ivan liked to fill the emptiness with music or the TV. But she'd spent years without any peace, she wasn't about to fill it with unnecessary racket now.

With a sigh, she found herself walking back to the bowl of yogurt.

"So gross," she muttered, picking up the spoon as she carried on walking around, no specific destination in mind.

Somehow, she ended up in his office. The evidence of his wedding plans was splayed across the room, and she didn't know how she felt about that.

Her laptop was somewhere in the mess around her, but there was only so much admin work to do in her position; the rest of her work came from the operations in Eclipse. Without that, she had little to nothing to do.

Ivan's touches from that morning played in her mind as she walked toward his office chair and sat down. Her cheeks heated with a jolt of desire mixed with frustration. Flashbacks of the Russian he'd hissed and his body coiled tighter than a spring beneath her made her shiver with want and annoyance.

She didn't want to be in a relationship ruled by desire. She hadn't wanted to be in a relationship at all, actually—but it felt a bit late for that.

Damn it , why did he have to control everything that happened in her life? She wanted more from him than this clashing dynamic.

Placing the bowl next to a pile of fabric swatches, she pulled open a drawer at random. She dug through his stationery and closed it with a groan of boredom. She repeated that with another drawer and another until she came across one that was locked. It could've just been some sort of fault or something Bratva-related, but she didn't think so. For one, Ivan was too painstaking with everything that he would've either broken the drawer open from curiosity or even thrown away the desk in favor of a new one. And if it was for the Bratva... well, she doubted they kept important things in office drawers. No. It had to be something he didn't want her—or others—to just stumble on.

Curiosity straightened her shoulders, and mischief made her grin as she looked around the room for the key. It had to be here somewhere. What are you hiding, Ivan? Dirty magazines? A sex tape? Her amusement faded at the last thought and she scowled as she rose from the chair. Whatever it was, it had nothing to do with her.

She went to sit in the living room for a bit, but the drawer didn't leave her thoughts. Boredom chased her back into the office and she found herself looking for the key as she went through the wedding magazines.

It won't hurt to see, would it? She shook her head. Privacy mattered—but what if it was something she could use to get out of the apartment for a bit? No... there was very little Ivan was ashamed of and even if there was something, she couldn't do that to him. No matter how angry she was.

Still, as the day passed and Amy snacked on a candy bar she'd hidden in her purse, she kept finding herself back in the office. Walking around turned to scratching through things and before she even realized it, she was actively hunting for the key.

It didn't take her long to realize it wasn't in the office.

Walking around the house with a purpose, Amy drew her lip between her teeth. He had a bowl specifically for his keys in the kitchen, but none of those matched what she knew a desk key would look like. Her fingers played with one set that had a cute little bear charm, and she thought of his nickname for her. It'd taken bribing Adrian for her to finally realize it meant little bear. Leaving the bowl, peered through the living room.

Ivan didn't seem like the type to hide things in vases. His bedroom, maybe? It was ridiculous to think he'd keep an office drawer key in his nightstand, but something told her he might've, and Amy jogged up the stairs to narrow her eyes at both sides of the bed.

"Eenie, meenie, minie, mo," she whispered, skipping toward the closest drawer. She pulled it open with a jerk, only to blink in confusion at a familiar coffee cup. "Son of a bitch. That's where my work cup went."

There was a crack along the side, and she snorted, imagining Ivan bumping her cup before deciding to bring it home. The idea was ridiculous, but it was definitely her cup. The little chip in the bottom from when she banged it too hard on her desk was right where it was supposed to be. So why's it here?

Placing it back where she found it, Amy dug around a little more until her fingers touched cold metal. "Hah! Knew it," she hissed as she pulled the little key out. Something stopped her from leaving the room, though. She found herself staring at the other nightstand, feeling a benign curiosity about what else he might have brought home with him.

Uncertainty made her lips purse, but Amy still had the whole afternoon ahead of her and nothing to keep her busy. Why let the temptation drive her insane when she could open it right now and see what was inside it?

Humming under her breath, she approached the nightstand with a timid expression. Her hand reached out, and she opened the drawer... only to be disappointed. Nothing scandalous lay inside of it. Just a few framed photographs and a switchblade. Blowing out a breath, she was about to close it when the contents of one of the photographs caught her attention.

"What's that?" she muttered, eyebrow raised as she pulled it out from underneath the others.

It was them. Her, Ivan, a beaming Zia with baby Alex in her arms, and Lev's arm around her waist. Adrian with a bored expression, Mira and Mikhail each holding one of their twins. Kostya and even Ilya. Amy smiled fondly, then snorted as she put the photograph down. "I can't believe he kept that after I called him a spoiled playboy."

Looking back in the drawer, she found another photo from the same party—but this one showed her and Ivan standing near a sign reading the word 'Eclipse' with the club's signature of a dark angel leaning against the 'E'. Her expression was annoyed, but Ivan looked like he was having the time of his life. His arm hung loose around her waist, his palm touching her belly in a possessive way similar to how he held her this morning.

"Has he always touched me like that?" she whispered, eyebrows drawn into a frown. He always acted so casual about it, but now that she was thinking back on every time they were in a room together... Yes, he had.

Maybe it had been the eggnog they'd both drunk or the kiss he'd attempted underneath the mistletoe—but looking at the photo now, it felt like it had just happened. Her cheeks flushed as she tried to ignore his touch. A couple more incidents came to mind: his hand on the small of her back whenever they walked somewhere together, the seats he chose that were right next to each other—even when there was a whole table to choose from—him tucking strand after strand of hair behind her ear whenever they were looking at the club's designs.

How could I be so oblivious? But even thinking that, she knew the answer. Ivan's reputation as a playboy had always been at the front of her mind, making it easy to ignore how comfortable he acted around her. But he doesn't act like that with everyone, she thought, feeling a bit like an idiot that she hadn't noticed it before.

Glancing back in the drawer, Amy found another photo. It had been taken on her birthday when Zia bought her a piece of tiramisu from Giovanni's. So many people had been taking photos that day, so why didn't she remember Ivan taking this one? Another photo showed her and Zia with their heads together, beaming wide, naughty grins. If she remembered correctly, they'd helped Adrian distract Ivan that day so that his brothers could swap his bike with a similar model—only custom-ordered in bright pink instead of the usual black. Where had he got these from? Zia? No... she would've mentioned something, wouldn't she?

Closing Ivan's bedroom drawer, Amy walked down to the office. She wondered what she'd find in the locked drawer.

A few minutes later, her questions were answered as she unlocked the drawer and slid it open.

Laughter burst from her lips when she saw the white mug with black lettering spelling out the words, "I'm not a control freak, but you're doing that wrong."

She'd swapped his normal coffee mug with that one after he'd changed her computer screen to say the words, "Ice Queen," in sparkling, swirling letters.

Placing the mug on the desk, she chuckled lightly before finding a notebook and pen. Flicking it open, the smile died on her lips as she read the first page. Confusion lined her brow, and she skipped to the next.

It was notes. Hundreds, if not thousands, of notes that he must've made while they were working together. Notes about her, his family... about random things she'd mentioned they should add to Eclipse—and at the end of the book was a list of birthdays. Amy blinked in surprise at finding her family's listed along with his. Then she squinted when she saw Kostya shared a birthday with her mom. Weird.

"I didn't think he was paying attention," she muttered, feeling guilty as she closed it. What had he said the night before when she asked him how he knew those things about her?

"We share an office." That's what he said.

But she'd known it was more than that.

Underneath the notebook were Eclipse's original folded-up blueprints along with both their notes. She couldn't help but run her fingers over it all, remembering the light sparkling in his eyes as he listened to her. The way he'd let her come up with everything, and how he'd encouraged her to think big. Her heart pitter-pattered as she remembered it all.

When her stomach grumbled, Amy decided to leave her snooping for a little while and retreated to the kitchen in search of something to eat. Spotting the polystyrene containers from last night's date, she pulled all three out and laid them on the kitchen counter.

After grabbing a fork from a nearby drawer, Amy opened the first container, found two perfect tiramisu slices—and swallowed down the tears.