“What’s wrong with you?” I asked, voice cold. “Tell me the truth.”
“Nothing.”
“Luna.”
She hesitated. Blinked too fast.
I reached for her arm, gently, and felt her tremble. “You barely sleep. You avoid meals. You vomit in secret like you think I won’t hear. You think I don’t notice?”
Silence.
Her lashes lowered. “Ever since you became Pakhan, you’ve been distant, always too busy for me.”
“I’ve been trying.”
“I know.”
“We are not what we used to be.”
“I’ll fix it.”
“You can’t fix it with promises. You fix it by showing up.”
She wasn’t yelling. That was the worst part. She wasn’t angry. She was hurt.
“I love you,” I said. “I’d burn the world again for you. But don’t ask me to be less than I am just to earn what I already died for.”
She looked up at me, eyes glassy.
“That’s not what I’m asking.”
I exhaled. Stepped back. “Come with me.”
“Where?”
“The cinema.”
She blinked. “Now?”
“I booked it out hours ago. But I didn’t go. Too much work.” I paused. “Watch something with me. Sit next to me like you used to. We don’t have to talk.”
She hesitated, eyes darting to the door—like she meant to walk away. But she didn’t.
A long beat.
Then a whisper. “Okay.”
Chapter 24
LUNA
Three weeks pregnant.
That’s how far along I was when I went into that apartment outside the city, the one Chernov and his brothers used like a goddamn slaughterhouse.
I didn’t know it then.
I walked into hell with a baby inside me.
