Nine Months to Bear By Nicole Fox - 14

14

I drum my fingers on the mahogany desk, wood hard under my hand. I check my watch yet again. Third time in the last five minutes. The second hand keeps sweeping around as if time is moving forward, but it sure as fuck doesn’t feel like it. The ticking doesn’t settle me. It just winds me tighter.

Olivia will be here soon.

Her text last night still burns in my memory: Tomorrow. 9 A.M. Finally, the stubborn doctor is going to surrender.

And why shouldn’t she? I always get what I want. Always. It’s merely a question of how long it takes for people to accept the inevitable.

I adjust my tie, though it’s already perfectly centered. Something about Olivia Aster makes me restless. Like I need to dominate something… someone… just to regain equilibrium. It’s fucking irritating.

Last night’s dream returns unbidden: Olivia in my penthouse, my shirt hanging loosely over her shoulders, hair cascading down her back as she stood at the window overlooking the city. My city.

I haven’t had a woman in my house in years, but I didn’t mind seeing her there. I wanted to move behind her, press her against the window, lift up the hem of her shirt, watch her moans condensate on the cool glass.

Then she turned. Her belly was round, and I knew instantly that the child was mine. The possessive satisfaction that surged through me was unlike anything I’ve ever known.

Better than fucking her—I owned her.

I woke up harder than I’ve been in— Well, since right now.

My cock aches in my pants, and I readjust in my office chair, shaking the image away.

When Olivia Aster walks into my office today, it is going to be about my lineage, about securing an heir and gaining a foothold in her company. I want to own Olivia’s business—and that all starts with planting the seed of my legacy inside of her.

My cock twitches.

A simple business transaction. That’s all this is.

How exactly that transaction will occur, though, is still on the table. I smooth my hand over the wood of my desk. Maybe on this table, in fact.

The image of her tight body bent over this very desk, that pristine white coat hiked up around her waist, invades my mind. Her dark hair would spill across my papers. I can see her looking over her shoulder at me, eyes narrowed, challenging me even as she submits…

My phone buzzes violently, shattering the fantasy. I assume it’s Olivia and I reach for it, but the screen is flashing red.

FIRE ALARM – ELENA SAFONOV RESIDENCE .

“Fuck.” Just like that, every thought of Olivia—of anything except getting my ass across town as fast as possible—is gone. The first vibration hasn’t even finished and I’m already moving, grabbing my keys.

The drive to Dorchester is supposed to take twenty minutes.

I make it in twelve.

I careen to a stop along the familiar curb, my car still running. Smoke trails from the kitchen window of my grandmother’s modest house. Even from the road, I can hear the alarm inside wailing.

I sprint to the door, punching in the code lock I had installed after she lost her keys on her morning walk for the fifth time. The door swings in and I cough at the acrid taste in the air.

“Babushka…?” I leave the door open behind me. I’d have to take the roof off to clear out this smell, but a little fresh air is better than nothing.

She doesn’t answer. Annoyingly, that isn’t unusual. Her hearing aids leave a nonstop buzz that her doctor can’t figure out, so she almost never wears them. My own ears are practically bleeding right now, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she couldn’t even hear the fire alarm.

I push through her overcrowded living room, grateful the floral couch isn’t on fire, and round the corner into the kitchen.

Finally, I see her. There’s a half-second of relief before I realize my elderly grandmother is standing on a chair, waving a dish towel at the smoke detector. As if her falling and breaking a hip would be worth stopping the noise.

In a matter of a half-second, I assess the situation: a melted plastic container in the sink, smoke dissipating, but no active flames.

“Get down from there.” I cross the small kitchen in two steps and lift her off the chair, ignoring her protests. “Before you break something.”

“Ach, always so dramatic.” She swats my shoulder with surprising strength for a woman in her eighties. “A little smoke and suddenly, the world ends? No, I don’t think so.”

I set her down on her feet. “What happened?”

“The container said microwave-safe.” She shrugs with the indignation of someone betrayed by modern conveniences. “Clearly, it lied.”

I reach up and push the silence button. Quiet descends like a thick blanket, but my ears are still humming from the shrill noise.

I turn to give her another lecture—this time about using the food service I’ve arranged for her instead of cooking all of her own meals—but she’s already busy at the island. There’s a steaming teapot there with a handmade cozy wrapped around the fat middle to hold in the heat.

She pours a mug and slides it towards me. “Since you’re here, have some tea.”

“Is this how you get my attention now? You should try calling.” Smoke floats above and around us, not that she appears to notice or care.

“Why bother? You find some reason or another to get over here most days. I don’t even have time to miss you.”

The reasons this week alone include this fire scare, her neighbors reporting a gas stench when she left the stove on during her hair appointment, and the time she set the back door alarm off in the middle of the night because she wanted to see a meteor shower. I found her in her bare feet, staring up at a sky lit only with light pollution from the city.

“If I stayed away,” I drawl, “this whole place would crumble to the ground.”

Again, she couldn’t possibly care any less. “I’ve made it this far, Stefushka. I’m sure I can make it these last few years.”

“You’re not at the end of your life yet. So stop trying to cut it short.”

I drop into the stool across from her and my grandmother studies me with eyes identical to my own—except hers miss nothing. Never have.

She nudges the mug towards me. “Don’t blame your bad mood on me. Tell me what’s happening with this woman.”

I freeze, cup halfway to my lips. “What woman?”

Olivia’s face fills my mind. Her full mouth, her rounded stomach from my dream. I blink the image away before I end up in a very embarrassing situation in front of my grandmother.

“Don’t play stupid, Stefushka. It doesn’t suit you. The fertility doctor. The one in the gala photos.”

Of course. The society pages had a field day with our dance. A reclusive billionaire and the daughter of prominent physicians. The perfect fodder for gossip.

I swirl my tea, buying time. “It’s business.”

“Is that what they call it now?” Her knowing smirk reminds me she was young once, too, and she hasn’t yet forgotten what it was like.

My hands move automatically, straightening the seasoning shakers that sit in the center of the island. They’re little Russian nesting dolls, the pepper container slightly smaller than the salt. There’s a whole set of them, each tinier than the next from cayenne down to coriander.

I don’t stop until they stand in a perfect row.

“Stop organizing my kitchen,” she scolds gently. “Your father did the exact same thing, you know. Especially when your mother confused him.”

I withdraw my hand as if burned.

I don’t need or want the reminders of the man who birthed me. My brilliant, principled father—destroyed by loving the wrong woman. A kind, weak man who couldn’t see the serpent sharing his bed until it was too late.

“I’m nothing like him,” I say coldly.

My grandmother’s eyes soften. “That’s what frightens me, darling.”

Before I can say anything—not that there’s anything to say; whatever version of me my grandmother wants died the day my father did—my phone vibrates.

I glance down, grateful for the distraction, until I see Mikayla’s name on my screen, along with a text message: Dr. Aster is here.

“Fuck.” I’m fifteen minutes late—it’ll be thirty by the time I get back to the office. “I have to go.”

“Of course you do,” she sighs. “Things were finally getting interesting. An old woman tries to get the tea over tea and⁠—”

“Who taught you about ‘tea?’” I start to stand, but her gnarled fingers catch mine. For all her fragility, there’s immovable strength in her grip.

“Sit. The world won’t end if you’re late to one meeting. Who’s it with, anyway?”

I plan to dodge the fuck out of that question, but my phone buzzes again. Saved by the bell for the second time in as many minutes.

This time, it’s Taras.

“What?” I answer.

“The security system at Elena’s house triggered while I was in the shower. Need me to check it out?” His concern is genuine. Taras might be a cold-blooded killer, but he has a soft spot for my grandmother.

“I’m already here. False alarm. She tried to microwave plastic.”

My grandmother reaches for the phone. “Is that Taras? Give me the phone.” She snatches it from my hand before I can protest. “Taras, darling! When will you come visit an old woman? You’re wasting your pretty face in Stefan’s dirty business. With those cheekbones, you should be in magazines!”

I watch her flirt shamelessly with my second-in-command, who’s half a century her junior. This is precisely why I started making these house calls myself. The last time I sent a young associate to check on her, she invited him to dinner and interrogated him about his “intentions” with her nonexistent granddaughters just to spend a few extra minutes with him.

Taras laughs, the sound tinny through the speaker. “Elena Safonova, you flatter me. Perhaps I’ll bring piroshki next week.”

I reclaim my phone. “That’s enough. She doesn’t need piroshki , and the only magazine you belong in is Corrective Plastic Surgery. ”

My grandmother is ready to argue when I hang up on my second.

“You get to have your fun, but I can’t?” She raises an eyebrow.

“There’s nothing fun about any of this, Babushka. I have work to get back to.”

“You mean Olivia?”

I freeze. “How did you⁠—”

“I didn’t, but looking at you— now , I know.” She pats my cheek, her eyes gleaming with triumph. “When will you learn that you can’t hide anything from me?”

“It’s business,” I growl again. It’s as useless on repetition as it was the first time around.

“A man like you needs someone strong,” she continues in utter disregard of my protesting. “It’s not right for a man to be alone. You need someone⁠—”

“I don’t need anyone,” I interrupt. “I’m not interested in being with someone. I like being alone.”

She arches a gray brow. “You like being safe. But not all women are dangerous. Most aren’t like your⁠—”

“Don’t.” My voice drops to a dangerous register that would make most men step back.

My grandmother merely rolls her eyes. “Not all women are vipers like your mother, Stefushka.”

I’m sure that’s what my father thought.

Then he got bit.

My phone pings. Mikayla. Olivia is still waiting.

I can see her tapping her toe in frustration, her jaw set in defiance. She’ll lay into me when I get back, accuse me of being unprofessional.

I’d love to show her exactly how unprofessional I can be.

I blink out of my thoughts and find my grandmother watching me like she knows exactly where my mind went. I quickly kiss her cheek and shuffle past her.

“I’m not willing to take that chance.”

I check the smoke detector one last time and toss the ruined microwave in the trash, despite my grandmother’s protests.

“That’s a good microwave! I’ll just clean out the soot and then⁠—”

“And then set off a fire that will take down the whole house?” I finish for her. “No thanks. I’ll get you a new one.”

“I can take care of myself! I lived on my own for over fifty years before you were born!”

“And I’d like you to live fifty more.” I kiss her forehead again, inhaling the familiar scent of lavender and black tea. “Lock the door behind me.”

She mutters something unflattering in Russian as I stride down the hall, but the words are softened by affection.

“You can’t hold everything in the palm of your hand!” she shouts from the porch as I’m ducking into my car. “Even you can’t hide from love.”

I close the door on her. Only then do I respond, though my voice stays so quiet that I can barely hear myself.

“I don’t need to hide from love. If it shows up, I’ll tie it up and chuck it in the basement of my soul, alongside everything else I keep there.”

By the time I make it back to Safonov Holdings, navigating a burst water main and a fender bender, it’s been a full half-hour since I left my grandmother’s, and whatever miniscule sliver of a good mood I might’ve had is dead, gone, and buried.

Mikayla must sense the dark cloud over my head. She approaches cautiously after I burst through the lobby door. “Dr. Aster waited thirty minutes.”

“And?”

“She’s gone now. Stormed out in a huff. But she left something for you. On your desk.”

I push into my office, slamming the door behind me. One breath and I know Olivia has been here. I smell her perfume in the air, a cloud of temptation I want to shove through the window and let waft out into the city for some other poor fuck to deal with instead of me.

Then I see it: a small plastic cup on my desk, sealed and labeled in a neat hand. A sterile specimen container, complete with printed instructions for optimal sample collection.

Wash hands.

Remove lid.

Provide sample.

Close lid.

Refrigerate.

So Olivia has made her decision without even seeing me. Without any discussion or negotiation. Just a fucking cup and printed instructions, like I’m some lab rat expected to produce on command.

I don’t know why I’m fucking disappointed. I never expected our transaction to be romantic. I’d call the entire thing off the second it got that way.

Who the fuck needs romance, after all? I can take over her business the old-fashioned way—with sheer might.

Still, I wouldn’t have minded taking her the old-fashioned way, too. This sterile, impersonal approach feels like a deliberate slight.

The message is clear: Olivia Aster may be agreeing to carry my child, but she wants nothing to do with me in the process.

I should be offended that she couldn’t even bother to wait half an hour to see the father of her future child face-to-face. But funny enough, I’m not offended. Not in the least.

On the contrary, my blood runs hot with something I haven’t felt in too long.

A challenge.

All day, I’ve been anticipating this meeting, imagining the flush on her cheeks when she finally admitted defeat, the reluctant respect in her eyes when she accepted my terms.

Instead, I got a hint of perfume and a plastic cup.

She’s making me work for it, forcing me to play by her rules—at least for the moment. And fuck if I don’t admire her just a tad bit more for it.

The beast inside me—the one I keep chained and muzzled in public—strains against its restraints, hungry for the chase she’s unwittingly started.

The cup feels like a dare. Like she’s taunting me to prove I’m exactly the monster she thinks I am.

And I never turn down a dare.

I loosen my tie and unzip my pants. Blood is already thrumming through my veins. I’m aching as I wrap my hand around myself, stroking a groan from deep in my chest.

I close my eyes and see her—defiant, brilliant, unbreakable. My careful doctor with her careful control.

But fuck that control. I wanted to see her hair mussed, her lipstick smeared. I wanted to wrap her hair around my fist, arch her back, and⁠—

“ Blyat’ .” I fumble for the fucking cup. I’m already on the edge. Have been since I got that text last night.

I want to see Olivia Aster bend for me. Break. I want to hold her in my hands and ruin her.

You can’t hold everything in the palm of your hand.

My grandmother had a point—but then again, if Olivia was in my grasp, it would feel a fuck ton like “everything” to me.

I stroke myself to the image of her kneeling in front of me. Her name sneaks out as a heated whisper on my lips. “Olivia…”

Then I swear I hear her gasp.