“Sleep now,” I tell her. “Dream of bright things.”
“Like having Bella bringing me to school!”
“Like an empire,” I reply, quieter than I should.
I linger longer than I should, watching her breathing slow, her fingers curled tightly around the bear’s ear.
Then I rise and leave her room.
I close Alya’s door behind me, letting the quiet settle over the hallway.
The house is still, save for the faint hum of the night.
As I pass the bedrooms, my gaze catches on Bella’s door.
Light spills from beneath it—thin, golden. She is still awake.
I pause, only for a breath.
She should be asleep. It is late enough for the house to rest, but the glow beneath her door tells me she is not resting.
My mind works too fast. Wondering what she is doing. Pacing the room? Reading? Thinking about me? About us?
She is my wife.
I could go in now. If I wanted. I have that right.
And yet, the image of her face from earlier flashes in my mind—the curve of her lips around the blackberry, the stubborn light in her eyes when she spoke to the children.
Too tempting.
Too much for this week.
I let the thought die there.
I move on, my footsteps measured against the pull in my chest.
No. She is not my family.
She is not my future.
I walk on, leaving her behind.
20
Bella
There’s a special kind of cruelty in waking up to your own alarm. Not because you set it. Not because it works. But because it has the audacity to functionperfectlywhen you’re in the middle of mentally stabbing your husband in your dreams.
The obnoxious jingle of my phone buzzes me straight out of sleep at exactly 6:30 a.m. Sharp. Military precision. Of course it does. I should’ve just set it to“Mock Me Mercilessly”at this point.
I groan and blindly slap at the screen like I’m trying to murder a mosquito.
“Shut up, you traitorous rectangle,” I mutter, finally silencing it.
For a second, I lie there, disoriented and still tangled in a blanket that feels like it belongs in a five-star hotel spa brochure. And then it hits me.
Oh, right. I’m still here. Inthisroom. In Konstantin Belov’s absurd, criminally luxurious estate that looks like a billionaire’s Pinterest board threw up on it.
