Page 6 of The Bratva Betrayal

Cady Gallagher doesn’t sit in the middle of the night shopping for dresses on a bratva laptop.

She just wants me to think she does.

And that’s a fucking problem.

2

Cady

I don’t sleep well in other people’s beds.

I also don’t stay after.

But here I am, staring at a ceiling I don’t recognize, under sheets that smell like expensive detergent and bad decisions, with Misha Makarov’s arm slung heavy over my waist like he’s trying to claim something that was never on the table.

I’m awake before him. The man was piss drunk by eight last night, drinking way too much vodka, but at least he drank it in a glass, so I’ll give him that.

There’s a rhythm to breathing when someone’s asleep next to you. You learn it if you spend enough time in rooms that aren’t yours, around people who don’t know you’re watching. Misha breathes slow and deep, like the world has never once denied him anything.

Must be nice.

I turn my head, studying him without moving. He’s attractive in an effortless, dangerous way. Dark hair, a little messy, strong jaw and lips that are used to smiling, or smirking, or talking their way out of things.

Playboy is the word people use.

Predictable is the one I prefer.

Right now, he’s all about me. That part is real enough. The way his hand tightens around me in his sleep when I shift, like he’s afraid I’ll disappear.

He’s not wrong, because I will one day. He’ll grow tired of me first, or I’ll come clean and say I’ve become uninterested. There’ll be no hard feelings, because Misha moves like the wind.

I slip out from under his arm carefully, inch by inch. He stirs but doesn’t wake, and I’m standing by the time his hand falls flat against the mattress.

Free.

I grab a shirt from his dresser, pulling it over my head as I walk. His bedroom is what you’d expect from a man who has enough money to run a country.

Clean, modern, and expensive without trying too hard. Floor-to-ceiling windows, a view that probably impresses people who aren’t me, and a lack of personality. Because how do you paint a room when you sleep with a new woman every night?

Staple her panties to the wall?

My bag is where I left it, tucked near the chair as I kneel, unzip it quietly, and pull out my small notebook.

The pages are filled with pressed flowers, each one flattened carefully between thin sheets of paper. Dried petals and fragile stems are labeled neatly in the corner with small, precise handwriting.

Dates. Places. Names.

I flip past a few.

A pale yellow one from last spring. The day my father shook hands with a man he shouldn’t have trusted.

A deep red one with its edges curled. The day someone didn’t make it home.

And then… I pause.

A small white bloom, simple and unimpressive, is tucked between two pages as if it doesn’t belong with the rest.

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