Nine Months to Bear By Nicole Fox - 6

6

You could spike a head on those turrets.

That’s my first thought as I drive through the gates of Stefan Safonov’s estate.

Estate . That’s how it’s labeled on Google Maps. It’s like I’m in a Jane Austen novel, except my Mr. Darcy is a sociopathic billionaire with my fragile future clenched in his bloody, tattooed hands.

I slow down, practically hanging out my window to see all the way to the peaked roofline. This place is a gothic villain’s wet dream: ivy-choked limestone, gables refined to a razor’s edge, and a driveway lined with imported birch trees that Architecture Digest called “otherworldly.”

The birch branches reach like skeletal fingers toward the gray Boston sky. Each luxurious detail is a reminder of what I’m here for: money.

I need it like I need air, and Stefan Safonov has more than enough to go around.

The vulnerability makes my stomach clench as I ease my seven-year-old Prius into park between a Bentley and a Maserati. My car looks every bit as out of place as I feel in my too-tight blazer and the same heels I wore to the gala.

Nothing says desperate like an outfit repeater. My mother would be horrified. Then again, she already is, so what do I really have to lose?

A stone-faced guard in a dark suit approaches my car. I roll down the window with a smile he doesn’t return.

“Dr. Aster?”

It’s technically a question, but I get the idea he already knows exactly who I am. The number of cameras on me right now has to be astronomical. There’s probably an X-ray machine running over my car as we speak, scanning the contents of my purse to decide if my nearly-empty bottle of Tums is an explosive device.

I swallow back the anxiety crawling up my throat. “That’s me.”

“Turn off your car,” he orders. “Follow me.”

I scramble out of my car to follow the man, tugging my skirt down and straightening my already straight posture. I may not have lived up to all of my mother’s expectations, but I felt her knee in my back enough times to know never to slouch.

Each step into Safonov’s fortress feels like sinking deeper into quicksand. The foyer ceiling soars three stories high, a crystal chandelier that could double as a weapon hanging from the ceiling. Beautiful and lethal.

There’s a spiral staircase that wraps around the foyer, but I’m taken to a separate door and led down, not up.

Below the opulence.

Below the facade.

Down stairs that spiral into what can only be described as a billionaire’s murder basement.

My heels rap against the marble. Tick. Tick. Tick. It’s like a timer, but I don’t know what it’s counting down to and I really don’t want to find out.

A door booms open, and there he stands. Stefan Safonov is backlit against a bullet-riddled cement wall, assembling a handgun. His sleeves are rolled to expose forearms mapped with more tattoos I didn’t see at the gala. I have no business trying to decode them, but my eyes trace the black swirls anyway, helpless against curiosity.

He doesn’t turn as I enter. He doesn’t even turn when he speaks.

“You’re late.”

His deep voice is muffled this far below ground, like we’re in a tomb. A shiver snakes up my spine, but I never let it bend.

I pull my eyes from the wall of mounted firearms to my watch just as the second hand touches the twelve. “I’m right on time despite having to descend to the lowest circle of hell. What’s with the guns? Are we here to negotiate or audition for John Wick 5 ?”

The corner of his mouth twitches. Then Stefan turns and holds the pistol out, butt-first. “Let’s see what you can do.”

I back up like he’s handing me a venomous snake. Actually, I might respond better to the snake. “No thank you.”

“We can’t be in business together if you’re six feet under. You should know how to protect yourself. Boston is full of men who take rejection personally.” His ice-blue eyes—one with a distinctive brown segment that I should’ve clocked the night we met; Good God, how much would women pay to have a drop of this man’s genetics?—lock onto mine. “Who knows? I might even be one of them.”

I cross my arms. “I came here in good faith—for work . I’m not here to deal in weird, cryptic threats.”

“No?” His gaze drops to my outfit, lingering on the slit that exposes a sliver of thigh. “Then why wear that skirt?”

Heat blooms between my shoulder blades, and I have to fight the instinct to curl in on myself. To hide under the laser of his stare. Thirty seconds in front of Stefan and my body is already betraying me. I’m pitiful.

Of course, I knew that already. I knew it when I spent forty minutes this morning deciding what to wear, calculating the exact ratio of professional to desirable. One centimeter too much leg and I’m desperate. Too little and I’m forgettable.

But this moment confirms that I goofed it anyway.

“I have a business proposition,” I say firmly. “Not a death wish.”

“Then come here, Doctor.” He holds out the gun again. “You live in a dangerous city. Time you learned to protect yourself.”

“I have pepper spray.”

Well, now, I do. I didn’t have it on me the night of the gala. It was still in the console of my Prius, tucked away safely in the plastic wrapping.

Not sure how much good it’ll do me, though. I’m deep underground and Stefan Safonov has a gun. Frederick Carson was child’s play compared to this.

He waves the gun towards my hand and his cologne hits me. It wraps around me, seduces me into a hazy-headed daze.

“Fire one clip, Olivia,” he purrs. “You might even enjoy it.”

“I doubt that very much.” My body is humming as I reluctantly take the gun from his hand.

It’s heavier than it looks, cold and deadly against my palm. I step up to the stall. I’m hyper-aware of Stefan moving behind me. The air between us feels charged, like the moment before lightning strikes.

“If I shoot you, let it be known to all watching that it was an accident.” My heels are locked together, knees rigid as I lift my arms and aim the gun. “… Probably.”

Suddenly, his body heat envelops me from behind. I freeze. His thighs brush the backs of my legs. “Your stance is all wrong.”

His voice drops low, private. This is wrong. He’s too close, too hot.

He kicks my ankles apart and it’s impossible not to imagine this playing out at the end of his bed. God, it must be massive. Some double-wide California king cloaked in black satin, if I had to guess.

His thumb presses into a knot of tension at the base of my neck. I bite back a wildly inappropriate moan.

“Relax,” he purrs. “You’re too tight.”

I’m absolutely not thinking about other contexts for those words. I’m definitely not imagining those hands elsewhere.

I’m a professional. A doctor. A businesswoman here to save my clinic.

“I’m holding a deadly weapon,” I manage. “Tension seems appropriate.”

“If we’re going to work together, Olivia, I need you not to lie to me.” A low chuckle vibrates against my back as his words whisper against my neck. “The gun isn’t what’s making you tense.”

His calloused hands slide down my arms, adjusting my grip as he goes. The casual intimacy makes it hard to breathe. His fingers brush mine as they position my index finger over the trigger.

“Now, see those lines on top?” His breath stirs the hair at my temple. “Align them with your target.”

I’m staring straight ahead, but seeing nothing. My vision is red-tinged, pulsing to the beat of the drum between my legs. He’s so close I can feel his heartbeat against my spine.

It’s steady. Controlled. Everything mine is not.

“Breathe in.” His palm spreads across my hip, steady and warm. My skin burns through the thin fabric of my skirt. “Out…” His touch lifts, and I almost sway backward without the balance. “Now… kill him.”

The shot cracks like thunder. The recoil slams me back against Stefan’s chest and his arm instantly circles my waist to steady me.

My ears ring. My heart hammers. The paper target stands completely unharmed, but a section of the wall ten feet to the left is smoking. It’s a bad day to be a brick.

“Again,” he commands, not releasing me.

So I shoot again.

And again.

And again .

Each time, his body becomes more familiar against mine, his hands more confident in their corrections.

That being said, I continue to miss spectacularly. Stefan finds new ways to insult my aim with each horrible shot, but there’s an undercurrent of amusement in his voice that makes me determined to prove him wrong.

When I empty the clip, he hands me another. That one goes wanting, too. But on the third clip, finally, I pull the trigger—and praise Jesus, the bullet grazes the target’s shoulder. The very edge of the paper tears, but joy slams me straight in the chest.

“Good,” he murmurs as I whirl around, grinning triumphantly.

“Progress! I almost⁠—”

But then I realize he’s close. Much closer than I thought. And so, as I spin around, I come to a grinding halt with my lips half an inch from his.

Time slows, stills. His eyes drop to my mouth and my lungs forget how oxygen works.

“You’re a natural, Dr. Aster.”

My mouth opens and closes. I drop the gun to my side, stammering, “S-sorry.” I hate how breathless I sound. How pathetic I sound, apologizing for being close to him.

Especially when I can’t make myself pull away.

I need distance from his heat, his scent, the way his proximity scrambles my thoughts. What the hell is wrong with me? I came here to save my business, not drool over Boston’s most notorious billionaire.

My mother’s voice echoes in my head: Focus, Olivia. Excellence requires discipline.

The adrenaline from firing the gun courses through my veins, looking for an outlet I absolutely cannot afford. Which, I realize half an hour too late, was the plan. This is exactly what men like Stefan Safonov count on—the rush, the thrill, the momentary weakness that makes smart women do stupid things.

I take a deep breath, pull my shoulders back, and recalibrate. Finally, I take a step away from him. “Now that I’ve proven myself, can we discuss why I’m actually here?”

I sound steady and confident. It’s everything I’m not, but I’m praying to every god I know that Stefan can’t tell how much his little plan got to me.

He regards me for a long moment, his expression unreadable. Finally, he nods.

Without saying anything, he points to an adjacent stall. I peer over to see a single sheet of paper waiting there.

The header reads Surrogacy Agreement.

My brain is trying to decipher all the possible meanings when Stefan comes to stand next to me once again. “You wanted investors, but I have a better idea.”

As I read, my blood runs cold, then hot, then cold again. Each bullet point feels like another shot fired, but this time aimed directly at my professional integrity.

“But I… I help women… I need— I needed money,” I blurt. “But you need…” I read the document again. “You want a baby ?”