I need to know. Need certainty instead of this spiraling anxiety that’s eating me from the inside.
Getting a pregnancy test while living under constant surveillance requires strategy.
I find Aleksandr in his office three days after the kidnapping. He’s been hovering since we got back—not obviously, but I feel it. The way he tracks my movements through the house, the increased security, the careful attention to whether I’m eating, sleeping, healing.
It should feel suffocating. Does feel suffocating.
There’s something else underneath. Something that feels dangerously like care.
“I want to visit my family,” I say from the doorway.
He looks up from his laptop. “Why?”
“I haven’t seen them since the wedding. I choose my words carefully. “I’m homesick.”
It’s partially true. I do miss the familiarity of my childhood home, even if the people inside it never truly felt like family.
Mostly, I need an excuse to leave this house. To stop at a pharmacy on the way. To get answers to the question burning through every waking moment.
Aleksandr studies me for a long moment. “I’ll arrange it.”
“I can go alone.”
“No.” The word is absolute. “You were just kidnapped three days ago. You don’t go anywhere alone until the threat assessment is complete.”
“The Petrovs are gone.”
“Artyom is gone. His faction is scattered. That doesn’t mean there aren’t others looking to exploit perceived weakness.” He closes his laptop. “I’ll accompany you. We’ll go tomorrow.”
My stomach sinks. “That’s not necessary.”
“It’s not negotiable.” His tone softens slightly. “Your family wants to see you. I’m sure they’ll be thrilled by my presence as well.”
The sarcasm is obvious. My family hates him. Hates what he represents. The fact that I’m married to the man who destroyed our empire is a humiliation they’re forced to accept but will never forgive.
I should argue. Should insist on privacy, on autonomy, on the basic right to visit my own family without my captor-husband hovering.
Arguing will make him suspicious. Will make him question why I need to be alone so badly.
“Fine,” I say. “Tomorrow.”
He nods, already turning back to his work. “We’ll leave at ten.”
I retreat before he can see the panic on my face.
Tomorrow. With him beside me the entire time. No chance to stop at a pharmacy, no opportunity to get the test I desperately need.
I’ll have to find another way.
***
The drive to my family’s home takes forty minutes through heavy traffic.
Aleksandr sits beside me in the back of the car, working on his phone, hand occasionally settling on my thigh in a gesture that’s become automatic. Possessive. Territorial.
Every time he touches me, my body reacts. Heat pooling low in my belly, pulse jumping, skin prickling with awareness I don’t want.
I hate it. Hate that after everything—the force, the captivity, the reduction to breeding potential—my body still responds to him like this.
