Page 79 of The Bratva Enforcer and His Virgin Bride

“Focus,” I mutter to myself.

The word feels useless.

Because even as I say it, I already know where my attention is going to drift back to.

Sofia.

I let out a slow breath and push back from the desk, chair scraping against the floor.

This is a problem. Not her. Me. Because I don’t lose focus. I don’t get pulled off course. And I definitely don’t let a situation I’m supposed to control start controlling me instead.

Yet here I am. Thinking about a woman who’s currently sitting somewhere in this house, probably reading, probably pretending she isn’t aware of me at all. A woman who ran from me like I’d done something unforgivable.

And still somehow occupies more space in my head than anything else I’m supposed to care about right now.

I stare at the screen again.

Karl’s file blurs slightly at the edges.

I close it with a sharp click.

Silence fills the office.

For a moment, I just sit there.

Then I lean back, staring at the ceiling.

This is getting out of hand.

Not because I don’t understand what I’m feeling, but because I understand it enough to know I should’ve already stopped it.

And I haven’t.

Just as I push myself up from the chair, the door opens, and Ben walks in. He doesn’t bother with greetings. That alone makes my attention sharpen. In his hand is a tablet. His frown is already in place.

“You have to see this,” he says, crossing the room immediately.

I take the device from him, suspicion already building in my chest. “What is it?”

“The background pull on Sofia that you requested,” he replies. “The full file just came through.”

My grip tightens slightly on the tablet. I lower myself back into the chair and start reading. At first, it’s exactly what I expected.

Basic background. Education. Residence history. Family ties. Things I already know.

Then I reach the section on her father.

And everything inside me goes still. Andrei Morozov. Also known as Creed. The name hits me square in my chest.

Creed. The person whose death sixteen years ago turned our financial systems upside down. The man who had operatedlike a ghost in the financial underworld. Clean on paper. Invisible in practice. He didn’t just move money but also designed the systems others used to move it without ever being traced.

We never asked questions. That was the agreement. He kept our finances secure. We stayed out of his personal life.

He was efficient. Precise. Untouchable.

And then he died. And like most ghost men like him, he left behind more questions than answers.

I read the line again.