Page 43 of My Ex’s Dad

I huff a harsh laugh. “No. I can barely wrap my head around it, let alone share the news with him.”

“Then what was he there for?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. He heard me over the phone in the background, when he called Markus. He said he wanted to see me. Or he still does. I don’t know.” I shove my hair back and frown. “I have no clue what to tell him. If anything.”

“You’re going to hide this from him?” she asks.

“From everyone.” I swallow hard. “Except you.”

She cringes. “Oh, God…”

“Please. Don’t tell my parents.”

She scowls. “It’s not something you can hide forever.”

“Just for now. Until I figure out how to adapt and accept this and, I don’t know. I need to think it through. Anton. The bakery. The loan. Everything.” Listing it proves how horribly complicated my life is, but deep down, I can’t regret this baby. I can’t smother the love and joy already blooming at the thought of a child to cherish.

“Just for now,” she replies as she sits, her expression a mix of worry and resignation.

“For now.” I nod, as if that makes it final.

That night, I sleep terribly, tossing and turning with how I’ll manage this.

The next morning, I’m unnerved to find Sokolov men following Jenni and me to the bakery, even at the ungodly hour we start.

Over the next few days, it’s clear Anton is stalking me now. He doesn’t show himself, but he presses on me anyway, his men tracking my every move.

Jenni grows more anxious about the suited men at the periphery of our lives.

My parents notice too, when they check in through the security cameras at the front door. They ask why these men keep passing by, and I scramble for enough lies to wave it off.

By the end of the first week after learning that I’m pregnant, I’m no closer to knowing what to do. The only steps I’ve taken are to schedule my first checkup and to purchase vitamins. And I’m more than confident about one thing: I won’t cave.

No matter what Anton wants to do, I refuse to let another man control my life.

Not through meeting his expectations.

Not through this loan with the ever-changing terms.

That’s the only mantra that I can cling to and stay sane as I work endlessly at the bakery.

I will not let anyone tell me what to do with my life. Ever again. It’s the strength I need to bank on as I consider I’m not fighting for my own independence, but for my child’s too.

I can’t forget about Anton’s comments at the mansion, how unsatisfied he is with the prospect of Roman being his son and heir. Of course he’d be disappointed in him. But I won’t allow him to see my child as a thing for him to build his future on.

I won’t budge on my decision to avoid Anton.

But the next afternoon, when I leave the bakery to drop something off at the post office, I run into Roman and prove it’s not so easy to shut him out of my life either.

“Liliana.” He faces me as he comes down the sidewalk, and his focus is too deliberate for me to believe we’re happening to encounter each other like this through chance alone.

He’s here because he is looking for me.

Dammit.

I turn to walk another way, glad the warm front means the sidewalks are only wet with rain, not snow and ice.

“Liliana, wait!” He jogs after me, catching up and cutting off my path.