Page 30 of The Russian's Stalked Bride
At that, I blink back at him, feeling as if something grips hard at my chest. “What?”
Ivan stops then, and neither of us says a word for a long stretch.
In the contemplative silence, my mind drifts back to all the times he mentioned things to me that sounded just vague enough to not be too alarming, yet too personal to be a coincidence. How he always says it like he knows me better than I know myself.
That train of thought halts me completely, and I don’t look away from him.
“Ivan…what aren’t you telling me?” I ask, leaving enough room for him to answer. But when he hesitates, I add, “What’s going on?”
When the quiet space between us becomes almost agonizing, I’m prepared to demand more from him when he finally exhales, looking down at the floor like a child caught taking something they shouldn’t have.
“I looked into you. Before our paths ever crossed.”
My pulse falters, and my brows furrow, but I can’t manage the right words for a moment like this.
“After your dad died, I gathered intel,” he continues, absently drumming his thumbs against the marble before meeting my gaze. “On your family and you. Your brothers vanished, and I needed a starting point. It was necessary.”
“Necessary?” I question, voice rising. “Youstalkedme because it was necessary? That’s supposed to justify you following me?”
Ivan doesn’t deny it, and that burrows even deeper under my skin. “I watched to understand the situation.”
“You followed me. Watched me. You invaded my life without my knowledge.”
“Yeah, I did, and you aren’t the first,” he returns, allowing his own anger to rise to the surface. “You wouldn’t get it, but keeping tabs is par for the course.”
My brows pinch together, hating how easily he says it. “If I don’t understand, then explain it. Tell me why. Tell me what this is all about.”
“You want to know…truly?” He asks, tone cold enough to reveal just how far this goes. “You want me to tell you why I had to watch you?”
“Yes!”
“Your family took Elena and threatened to take her away from us, and away from Wyatt, so we killed your dad, Mila,” he says, laying it all out with a sharp edge to every syllable. “He died by our hands, not some criminal on the street. Your brothers fled like cowards, and after months of nothing, I caught sight of you, coming and going without them knowing. You led me straight to them.”
Completely stunned, feeling like I’ve been smacked over the face, I don’t say a word as I stare at him. The more he says, the less it sounds real.
“That’s why your brothers need Maksim to deal with their ‘Lukov problem’…because we’ve been on their asses ever since,” he continues, eyes narrowing. “And don’t misunderstand me. I was nearby when you fled your brothers, but I didn’t set out to take you. You ran by me. Maybe I should’ve stopped watching after I located your brothers, but I didn’t. That’s how I know more about you than I should.”
I don’t say anything for a while as I try to process everything at once, unable to address everything.
They killed Dad. Not some unknown villain in the streets, but a Lukov. And after all of it, he has been stalking me ever since.
It’s all so crushing, making me feel like I was never clean with his eyes on me without my knowledge. Yet, the way he said it doesn’t escape me, and neither does the way he looks at me.
There’s even more beneath it all, even if he won’t say it outright.
“You liked watching,” I murmur, barely loud enough to hear.
Ivan clenches his jaw, and his attention on me becomes even more intense. “Careful, Mila.”
“Why, because I’m right?”
The kitchen somehow feels impossibly small in this moment, like all the oxygen has been pulled away, leaving behind the kind of volatile state I’m more used to enduring.
Then, Ivan says with a note of finality, trying to force the conversation to end here, “It doesn’t matter. I’m not letting you go, even if I overstepped. You’re not leaving.”
The way he tries to control even this makes my blood boil. After everything he just told me, he still assumes I have no right to question him.
“I hate you.”
