Page 40 of Secret Baby of the Bratva
Waiting there is Gabriel Moreno.
I know him instantly, even though I’ve only seen his face in a photograph. His presence fills the room, not with Dimitri’s quiet gravity, but with the kind of restless energy that makes every other man sit straighter. My chest tightens so hard I almost forget to breathe.
Dimitri greets him with the measured calm I’ve come to know. No handshake, only a nod. The others exchange clipped words in Russian and Spanish, voices low but edged with the bite of steel.
I stand where Dimitri told me—at his side, close enough that my sleeve brushes his. His hand rests at the small of my back again, casual to anyone else, but I know better. It’s ownership. It’s a warning. Stay.
The conversation turns to shipments, routes, percentages. On the surface it’s business, but underneath I hear it—the tension straining at the seams, the threat coiled in every pause. Dimitri’s tone never rises, his words precise, unshakable.
Moreno presses harder, his voice smooth, but eyes sharp as blades.
I don’t dare speak, don’t dare ask the questions burning in me, but my mind races ahead anyway. If my father was seen with this man, what does that mean? Was he a pawn? An ally? A traitor?
Most of all, why is Dimitri meeting Moreno now, speaking to him like an equal enemy rather than a ghost in photographs?
Every glance exchanged feels like a blade slid under the table. Every silence hums with the possibility of violence. I watch Dimitri’s hands, steady as stone, his posture calm, his presence unyielding. He doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t waver.
I do. Inside, I’m already connecting timelines, motives, pieces of a puzzle that shouldn’t belong to me but now do.
I hold my breath, praying he can’t see the truth in my eyes—that I’m not only watching him.
I’m watching Moreno too.
***
Later, I sit on the edge of my bed, the curtains drawn tight against the gray evening, phone heavy in my hand. My thumb slides across the screen, the image pulling up with a dull glow. Grainy, blurred, but unmistakable.
My father.
I zoom in, heart thudding. His face is younger, lines softened by time not yet lived, but the wariness in his eyes is sharp. He looks like a man standing on the edge of something he can’t turn back from. Like he knew what was coming.
Beside him—Gabriel Moreno.
The name has been circling me for weeks, heavy in Dimitri’s meetings, carried in his men’s muttered tones. I thought it was another piece of business, another rival with teeth bared. But this photo tells a different story. Dimitri’s interest in Moreno isn’t about shipments or territories. It’s about something bigger. Something that swallowed my father whole.
I close my eyes, the phone trembling in my grip.
If Moreno was with him, if Dimitri has photos, if this war touches them both… then maybe the key to knowing why my father is gone sits in Dimitri’s hands.
I tell myself I’m gathering information for survival, that knowing keeps me alive in a house where ignorance is fatal. But the truth is sharper. I want to know everything. Every dark piece, every whispered name, every reason behind the violence simmering beneath Dimitri’s calm exterior. Even if it drags me deeper than I meant to go.
The door opens without warning.
I jolt, fumbling the phone and shoving it under the blanket just as Dimitri steps in. He closes the door behind him with a clean click, his presence filling the room like the air itself bends around him.
He studies me. Always studying. “Hiding something?”
I force a smile, light and brittle. “Maybe I was bored. Maybe I was waiting for you.”
His brow arches, the faintest ghost of amusement in his expression. “You’re a terrible liar.”
“You’re too sure of yourself.”
The space between us shrinks before I can think. He moves closer, slow but deliberate, his gaze locked on me as though daring me to break eye contact. My breath catches.
“You test me,” he says, voice low, “and you think I don’t notice.”
I tilt my chin, defiance coiling with the fear in my chest. “Maybe I like testing your limits.”
