Page 28 of Claimed By my Ex’s Uncle

"You want to come back to my place?" she suggests, giving my arm a squeeze. "We can talk about everything, you can tell me what's going on, maybe we can figure something out⁠—"

I shake my head at once. I don't want to pull her into this; she doesn't deserve to be stuck with the same blade that has gutted so much of my life. She’s not the one who hooked up with her ex’s uncle on a plane and managed to get pregnant, or the one who is carrying a Bratva heir inside her right now. Better for her to just pretend like she never even laid eyes on me, and we can be done with this.

"No, I'm alright," I reply.

She eyes me for a long moment, still clearly not entirely convinced. "Rose⁠—"

But before she can continue, I hear someone calling my name from the bottom of the stairway. I glance downward to see our old landlord puffing his way up the steps towards us.

"There you are," he mutters, lifting a hand to indicate that I shouldn't go anywhere. "Jesus, I knew it was you the second I saw you on the CCTV cameras."

"What the hell are you doing here?" I ask, crossing my arms over my chest and glaring him down. "I thought you sold this place to someone else."

"That's none of your business," he replies, and a flash of irritation runs through me. All the times he left us without hot water or a working fridge, just because he couldn't be bothered to stay on top of his duties, and now he has the nerve to talk to me like I’m an inconvenience when I’m just trying to figure out what the hell happened here.

"Yes, it is," I reply. "I don't pay you rent anymore, in case you missed it. And I'm not going to let you talk to me like some kind of idiot. So, what the hell are you doing here?"

He jolts slightly, porcine features drawing back in surprise, but I make no attempt to correct my tone. He can be as pissed as he wants; I am not going to let this man talk down to me. But then, he draws himself to his full, inconsiderable height and looks me in the eye.

"You're banned from this building."

I almost laugh, eyebrows shooting upwards. "I'm sorry, what did you just say?"

"You heard me," he snaps. "You're blacklisted. The man who bought this place, he kept me on as security, watching the cameras to make sure no undesirables came through this place. And one of the people he told me to keep a watch for..." He looks me up and down. "Was you."

Fuck. So, not only did Ilya buy the apartment, steal it out from underneath me, but he also kept this jerk on to make sure that I never so much as set foot in here again? He must have known that this was where I would go, given the chance. That I would make it my mission to return to this place as soon as I got out. No doubt our old landlord has already alerted him to the fact that I’m here, and he will turn up at any moment to drag me back to his mansion.

"Don't need to tell me twice," I shoot back furiously, and I stalk towards the stairs once more. Becky calls after me, but I just lift a hand, silently telling her that I’ve got this under control, even if it feels like the opposite right now. I just need to get the hell out of here before anything else tears a chunk out of my old life and thrusts me into the new one.

I make it outside the apartment before the tears begin to trickle down my cheeks. Thank God—the last thing I want is to have Becky see me like this. She has never been good with crying, as much as she tries to be a good friend. I know that she doesn't mean anything by it, that she really wants to help, but sometimes it feels like she doesn’t have her feet under her at all. I mean, how could she let our apartment get sold like that? I just don’t understand. Did she not put the pieces together and figure out that it had something to do with the man who seems so intent on narrowing my world to just him?

A car pulls up while I sit on the edge of the stoop with my head in my hands. A voice calls out to me, and I look up to see Ilya sitting in the driver's seat.

"Didn't want to send one of your guards to do your dirty work?" I ask him bitterly as I get to my feet, stalking over to the car and sliding into the back seat. I don't want to be so close to him, and I am sure I will lose all my resolve if I let the alchemy of his presence get under my skin. For the time being, I want to just be pissed at him for everything that he’s done to me.

"I knew you would come here," he remarks, flashing me a grin in the rearview mirror. "Didn't think you would try to escape the first chance you got, but make no mistake, I won't forget this."

His voice is edged with venom, and a shudder works its way through my body. As if I haven’t made my life hard enough as it was. As if I haven't put myself in enough danger already. Now, he will keep the locks on my new life even more tightly wound than before. There isn't a hope in fucking hell that I’ll ever get out. The glimpse of freedom I tasted today was nothing more than a taunt, a reminder of what I’ve lost.

And as I watch Ilya in the rearview mirror, his eyes pinned to the road ahead, I wonder just what else this man might have in store for me. What other secrets he might have been keeping under lock and key. Because I get the feeling that my life is about to get a whole lot more complicated.

And despite myself, there is a tingle at the base of my spine as I imagine how exactly he might punish me for this particular misdeed.

Chapter 15

Rose

As soon as the bedroom door closes, I notice extra locks have been installed—a keycode, by the looks of it, along with a slide lock that I can hear scraping on the wood. He must have had his men install them the moment he realized that I had broken out. I guess that the bars of my cage are tightening with every passing second, and the chances of me getting out of here are even slimmer than they were before.

I slump down on the bed, staring off into space as I try to wrap my head around it. My apartment, taken right out from underneath me. I can hardly believe it. It feels like it must be happening to someone else, because I know for damn sure that I couldn't have gotten myself involved in something like this. Pregnant, by a man practically twice my age. The uncle of my ex-boyfriend, or so he claims. And living under his roof, whether I like it or not, trapped here under the weight of everything that’s happened, the walls closing in on me with every passing moment.

Ilya made the drive back to the mansion in silence, having nothing to say to me about the way it all went down. I wish I had the nerve to speak up, but his cold, calculated nature has made itself even more apparent to me, and I don't want to risk pissing him off further. I have gotten away with one escape attempt, but any more, I doubt that he will be as forgiving.

I run my hand over the covers, remembering the way he fucked me here just a few hours ago. God, I would have done anything to go back to that moment, to the way he felt inside me—no, more than that, the way I felt, the knowledge that giving myself over to him sexually felt so fucking good. Submitting to him feels like the most natural thing in the world when he has me like that, hands bound, pinned to the bed, sliding himself deep inside me while he reminds me just who is calling the shots.

Now, if I could just extend that enjoyment to submitting to him the rest of the time, we might actually get somewhere. I sigh. I just don't have it in me. I'm too independent to feel that way. Or, for that matter, to feel that this is the kind of life I want for my child, either. I mean, what the hell am I meant to do? I can't get out, but I can't stay here, and by the sounds of what Sergei was saying to Ilya the other day in his office, there are plenty of people around here who don’t like that I’m still in his home, people who doubt whether this baby is even his. Everything is swirling around me, leaving me standing in the eye of the storm. A strange quiet settles over me and this room.

My eyes begin to droop as I lay back on the bed, and I tuck my knees up to my chest and pull the pillow down so I can get some sleep. But as I move it, I hear a strange crumpling sound, and I lift my head to see a letter sitting on the immaculate white sheets below me.