Page 119 of Cruel Submission

I give a wry smile. “He’s an impossible man. But his heart’s in the right place.”

“Don’t let anyone hear you say that,” Yanis chimes in. “As far as our men are concerned, Arkady Laurov keeps his heart in the armory, and it pumps pure gun oil.”

The car turns off the road, and Yanis pulls up right in front of the entrance. “You go in while I park the car,” he tells me. “The men will be right behind you until I catch up.”

I nod, exit the car, and head through the front door.

Dr. Petrov’s clinic smells like antiseptic and the lavender diffuser his receptionist insists on running, a combination that shouldn’t work but somehow does. The waiting room is populated with the usual suspects—women at various stages of transformation, clutching partners or phones or both, flipping through magazines they’re not reading.

Debra sits beside me, her hands folded in her lap. Not frozen, but purposeful. Chosen calm. She’s wearing her favorite blue cardigan again, the color gentle against her skin, and her hair has grown long enough to brush her shoulders. We match again, almost. Mirror images, except for the basketball strapped to my midsection.

“McLeod?” The nurse appears, clipboard in hand.

“That’s me.” I haul myself upright with all the grace of a cargo ship docking. “The one who looks like she swallowed a planet.”

Debra’s mouth curves. “A small planet.”

“Jupiter is not small, Deb.”

Her smile widens. “Well, go see your baby, Jupiter. I’m going to find out where Yanis has gone.” She stands and heads out of the reception while I make my way to the doctor’s office.

The examination room is cold in the way all examination rooms are cold, as though comfort might interfere with the clinical process. I shiver as Dr. Petrov applies the gel to my stomach, the blue substance shocking against my stretched skin.

“Let’s see how she’s doing,” he says, pressing the transducer against my belly. The screen fills with the now-familiar landscape of static and shadow, the alien geography of my daughter’s private world.

And there she is.

The whooshing rhythm of her heartbeat fills the room—steady, strong, insistent. I hear it, and everything else falls away. The security detail outside. Gavriil’s shadow. The wedding plans and the war plans and the impossible collision course they’re on. All of it dissolves into this sound, this proof that something good and real and mine is growing despite everything.

“I’m happy with everything,” Dr. Petrov says eventually, moving the wand slowly. “Weight is on track. Head circumference perfect. Heart rhythm strong.” He angles the screen toward me. “See here? She’s sucking her thumb.”

I see it. The tiny fist, the impossible smallness of fingers curled near her mouth. My throat tightens.

“Sara,” I whisper. Because that’s her name—the one Arkady and I chose, lying in bed, while he traced circles on my stomach and pretended he wasn’t terrified. Sara Laurov. Our daughter, who has no idea she’s being born into a dynasty that runs on blood and secrets and a love story that would terrify most sane people.

“You’re doing great, Mirabel,” Dr. Petrov says, handing me paper towels to wipe the gel. “Continue with the supplements. We’ll check again in three weeks.”

I dress quickly—well, as quickly as someone shaped like an oversized avocado can dress—and head through the waiting room to the car park where Debra and Yanis are standing beside the sedan. Debra stands close to him. Not touching, but in his orbit. I notice the way his body angles toward her even when he’s looking elsewhere.

“All good with the baby,” I announce, climbing into the backseat. The sedan swallows me into its leather interior—bulletproof glass, reinforced doors, the whole paranoid package disguised as a perfectly ordinary Audi. “Sara is sucking her thumb and ignoring the outside world. Smart girl. Takes after her mother.”

Yanis catches my eye in the rearview mirror. A brief, warm acknowledgment. “Good news.”

“The best news.” I settle back, rubbing my belly where Sara kicked moments ago, like she’s impatient. “And because we’re celebrating, I vote we go baby shopping. I saw this maternity boutique called Juicy Baby on Lexington Avenue, and they have the most gorgeous crib bedding.”

Debra turns in the front seat. “You don’t have enough baby things? The nursery is already—”

“The nursery is never finished, Deb. That’s the first rule of nesting. There is always another blanket. Always another onesie. It’s biological. I can’t fight evolution.”

Yanis is already pulling into traffic, one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the center console where Debra’s fingers are dangerously close. If they think I don’t notice, they’re underestimating the observational powers of a woman whose entire hobby used to be snooping.

“Lexington Avenue,” Yanis confirms. “I’ll let the team know.”

The team. As in, the six or seven men currently following us in unmarked vehicles, dressed in civilian clothes, pretending to be regular people going about regular lives while carrying concealed weapons and maintaining surveillance on a pregnant woman who wants to buy crib sheets. My life is surreal.

The shopping district is crowded, fast-moving pedestrians weaving through focused shoppers while traffic cruises by in a busy stream. It’s the kind of chaos that makes Arkady’s security detail go rigid, too many bodies and blind spots and variables that can’t be controlled. But for me, it’s heaven. The noise, the color, the blessed normalcy of strangers carrying shopping bags and arguing about parking.

We spend an hour in the baby store, Debra and I filling bags with things Sara doesn’t need and won’t appreciate for years. Organic cotton sleepers. A set of muslin swaddles printed with tiny rabbits. Matching booties that are so small they make my chest ache. A soft toy elephant that Debra picks up, holds against her cheek, and adds to the pile without explanation.