Page 75 of Bratva Bidder
She’s shaking. From the rain or from me, I don’t know.
All I know is she’s standing in front of me and I want to drag her into my arms and scream at her all in the same breath.
“You lied to me,” I say, the words cutting between us like a blade. “You looked me in the eye every damn day?—”
“You don’t get to yell at me,” she snaps, voice trembling. “You don’t even remember me.”
My heart pounds once—hard.
She’s right. And it only makes it worse.
“What do you want from me?” she demands, stepping closer despite herself. Her lashes drip with rain, her cheeks flushed with heat or humiliation or both.
“You had five goddamn years to tell me,” I hiss.
“And you had five goddamn years to remember me!” she fires back, voice trembling. “But you didn’t. Not once.”
Silence stretches thick between us, only the sound of rain crashing around us like a second heartbeat.
“I want to know everything,” I say, rain pouring between us like a wall we can’t cross. “Who are they, Nadya? Are they mine?”
Her mouth parts, but no sound comes out.
She swipes at her wet face, chest heaving, and then snaps, “Are you fucking serious right now?”
My jaw clenches. “You owe me the truth.”
She laughs. It’s bitter, like glass underfoot. “You want the truth? Fine. I met you almost six years ago. In Barcelona. You gave me a fake name. We spent the night together and you left the next morning like I was some layover souvenir.”
I take a step forward, heart pounding harder now for a different reason.
Barcelona.
The word slams into my chest like a blow.
“You’re saying?—”
“I’m saying you got me pregnant, Konstantin,” she spits. “And then you disappeared. You never looked back. Never searched. I thought maybe I meant something to you, but you didn’t even remember me when we met again.”
She shakes her head, tears and rain running together now. “I thought you were just cruel,” she says, voice cracking. “But turns out you’re just blank. How convenient.”
“Stop,” I say, my voice low, strained. “You think I chose to forget you?”
She looks up, stunned.
“I don’t remember Barcelona,” I say slowly, my breath frosting in the cold air. “Not because I didn’t care. Not because you didn’t matter. Because I couldn’t.”
She blinks.
I step closer. “The night I left that city, I was ambushed. My father’s men found out I’d sabotaged one of his arms deals. It was the first time I ever crossed him. He sent them after me.”
Her expression flickers, shock cutting through her anger.
“I woke up three days later in a hospital outside Madrid with broken ribs and a fractured skull. No ID. No records. I didn’t even know where I’d been the week before. Just blank space.”
The memory’s still jagged. Still sickening. I’ve spent years trying to claw back what I lost in those days.
“And you—” My voice breaks. “You were in that lost time.”
