Page 122 of Captive Prize

Soon after, the nanny stepped inside, a baby nestled in her arms and a small toddler clinging to her skirts.

Nadia’s baby and Samara’s toddler.

Everything changed.

The women melted instantly, softening for the child who pretended to be shy for a moment because she liked to bask in the attention. Laughter filled the space where only cool silence had once been.

Genuine laughter, not mocking, not forced or fake. But the sounds of an actual happy family.

I watched, detached, as they fussed over the baby and teased Alina about her own pregnancy, talking about names and how they were the most important decisions anyone could ever make.

I supposed for a lot of women, they were.

“Do you want children, Zoya?” Samara asked when it was her turn to hold the baby.

The question was genuine, and it was a natural question in the situation. But it still landed like a blow.

“You should,” Nadia said warmly, lifting Samara’s toddler to her knee. “Roman is wonderful with kids. He’s always wanted them, a family of his own. Even with all the complicated feelings around his own parents, kids have always just seemed like an inevitability for him. Roman will make a fantastic father.”

I opened my mouth, and the air was ripped from my lungs.

My vision blurred at the edges.

How stupid could I have been?

I allowed myself to believe—just for a second—there was a chance for me here. That I could find a way to belong and make a life among this family, be a part of something bigger. That just maybe, despite everything that happened and everything I did, I could make this work.

I should have known better. I thought I could be a part of this before I remembered what I was.

Before I remembered the one truth that I could never escape.

Reality always came crashing back down.

I could never give Roman what he needed most.

My medical condition made it impossible.

I tried to take a breath, but it caught in my throat, tight with the panic of knowing my body could never give Roman what he truly wanted. My lungs refused to work as tears burned behind my eyes, and I knew what I needed to do.

The warmth of the room, the laughter and the love suddenly didn’t feel cozy anymore. They suffocated me. The air was too thick; the walls were too close, and the weight of the conversation pressed down on my chest, refusing to let me breathe.

I needed to leave.

This couldn’t happen. This was not the life that I would be able to have.

I wasn’t built for this, and I needed to get out.

I couldn’t chain myself to a man who deserved everything, when I could only give him half of what he wanted, what he deserved.

It didn’t matter how I felt about him; it didn’t matter what I wanted anymore. Not when I knew—without a single doubt—that I would never be enough for him.

He was an honorable man, and he would keep his word no matter what, and I couldn’t force him to do that. He wasn’t like my father and every other man I knew that would just dispose of a wife who wouldn’t or couldn’t give him what he wanted.

He wouldn’t cheat; he wouldn’t go anywhere else to get what he needed. With or without my blessing, that just wasn’t who he was.

He was the type of man who would give everything up because he said he would; he had made a promise and he would follow through with it until it killed him, even if it turned his heart cold and whatever passion he felt for me shifted into resentment.

I couldn’t let that happen.

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