The streets of St. Petersburg glisten with rain, neon from nearby bars smearing across wet pavement. Gasoline, cigarettes, and damp concrete hang heavy in the air, but you barely register any of it. Every muscle throbs. Bruises burn under your clothes. The cold seeps into your bones as you lie there trembling. Blood coats your tongue, metallic and bitter.

Boots crunch closer on the pavement—steady, deliberate—until they stop right in front of you. You don’t need to look up to know who it is.

Mikhailov Reznikov.

Once, his name had meant safety, even love. You’d given him more than a decade of loyalty and a heart you’d tried to keep hidden. Now he’s only a shadow looming over you, a man convinced you betrayed him, an executioner about to finish the job.

"Look at you," he says. His voice is cold, stripped of the warmth it once carried. "How pathetic."

You force your head up, pain lancing through your skull. His icy blue eyes bore down with hatred. He was always intense, but now the fire has gone cold—hardened into something darker.

"Misha…" The old name slips from your lips, a ghost of what you used to whisper in the dark. "Please… you have to believe me. I didn’t—"

His expression hardens. In a flash he crouches, fingers gripping your jaw, forcing you to meet his eyes. "Do not call me that," he hisses, breath hot against your bruised skin. "You lost the right the moment you betrayed me."

"I never betrayed you."

He laughs, hollow. His grip tightens. "Lies. You ran. Changed your name, your face, your life. Did you think I wouldn’t find you?"

Tears burn but don’t fall. "I ran because I had no choice. The evidence was fake. Someone set me up, and you—you were going to kill me without even listening."

His jaw ticks but his aim doesn’t waver. "You expect me to believe that? My right hand, my only trusted person, suddenly framed by the world?"

His men hover at the edges, silent, weapons hidden but ready. You don’t even know how he tracked you down. You’d been careful—new city, new identity, every step planned. But Mikhailov always gets what he wants.

And right now he wants you dead.

The click of a safety echoes. The gun rises. The barrel hovers inches from your forehead.

A sharp pain twists low in your belly. Your breath snags. Warmth spills between your thighs, unmistakable even through the rain. Blood. You don’t have to look to know. The baby—the life you’d been carrying—is in danger.

His gaze flickers downward. For a heartbeat his face falters. Doubt cracks through the fury.

You clutch his sleeve with trembling fingers. "It’s yours," you whisper. The words barely rise above the rainfall.

Silence.

His breath catches. The fury in his eyes fractures, leaving something rawer. Regret.

The gun slips from his hand. He catches you as you sag forward, his arms instinctively cradling your body. "No…" His voice breaks. His palms press against your abdomen like he can hold everything together by sheer force. "No, no, no…"

Your eyelids flutter but you still see him—the panic in his face, the tremor in his hands.

"Get the car!" he barks at his men, desperation roughening his tone.

No one moves. They’ve never seen him like this. Mikhailov Reznikov, ruthless mafia boss, unraveling in the rain.

"NOW!" His roar snaps them into action.

You manage a weak smile. "Misha…"

"Don’t talk," he says, forehead pressed to yours. "Just hold on. Please, just hold on."

For the first time since this nightmare began, you see it—something you haven’t felt from him in months.

Love.