He needed an heir. I needed to bury my father's debts. The contract was simple.
It was not, on the matter, supposed to end like this.
I'm Lena Voronova. Bethnal Green translator. Twenty-six. Skint. Three months ago my father drank himself into the grave owing the Mikhailov bratva four hundred and eleven thousand pounds, and they came for me with a contract written by their family lawyer in a leather folio with a gold pen.
Two years. One baby. Their pakhan's heir. Two million pounds and a new identity when I hand her over.
I should have run. I read the contract instead. He'd already struck out the clause that gave him the right to terminate the pregnancy. He'd already struck out the clause that locked me in for the full two years if I changed my mind.
I signed.
Then I met him.
Maxim Mikhailov is thirty-eight, terrifying, Russian, and recently a widower. He buried his wife and his stillborn son eighteen months ago and hasn't slept properly since. He has his hand on the small of my back the second I cross the threshold of his house. He doesn't speak in front of his men unless he has to. He makes me wellingtons appear at the porch by seven in the morning when I mention I want to walk in the garden. He has the warmer grey eyes of a man who hasn't laughed in a year and a half.
I was not supposed to fall in love with him.
He was not supposed to fall in love with me.
His mother, his housekeeper, his cousin's wife, his family doctor, his lawyer's wife, his six-year-old niece in a yellow coat, and the eighty-year-old brigadier who carried his wedding ring out of the bedroom on the morning of the funeral were, on the matter, running an operation about us since the second of November.
We had a contract.
We didn't, on the matter, have a chance.
◆ ◆ ◆
Includes: dark Bratva romance, single dad widower, surrogate / heir contract that becomes real, age gap (38/26), forced proximity, marriage of convenience, found family, slow burn that ignites, terrifying Russian family with a soft centre, explicit content, healing from grief, guaranteed HEA. Standalone with series potential.
It was not, on the matter, supposed to end like this.
I'm Lena Voronova. Bethnal Green translator. Twenty-six. Skint. Three months ago my father drank himself into the grave owing the Mikhailov bratva four hundred and eleven thousand pounds, and they came for me with a contract written by their family lawyer in a leather folio with a gold pen.
Two years. One baby. Their pakhan's heir. Two million pounds and a new identity when I hand her over.
I should have run. I read the contract instead. He'd already struck out the clause that gave him the right to terminate the pregnancy. He'd already struck out the clause that locked me in for the full two years if I changed my mind.
I signed.
Then I met him.
Maxim Mikhailov is thirty-eight, terrifying, Russian, and recently a widower. He buried his wife and his stillborn son eighteen months ago and hasn't slept properly since. He has his hand on the small of my back the second I cross the threshold of his house. He doesn't speak in front of his men unless he has to. He makes me wellingtons appear at the porch by seven in the morning when I mention I want to walk in the garden. He has the warmer grey eyes of a man who hasn't laughed in a year and a half.
I was not supposed to fall in love with him.
He was not supposed to fall in love with me.
His mother, his housekeeper, his cousin's wife, his family doctor, his lawyer's wife, his six-year-old niece in a yellow coat, and the eighty-year-old brigadier who carried his wedding ring out of the bedroom on the morning of the funeral were, on the matter, running an operation about us since the second of November.
We had a contract.
We didn't, on the matter, have a chance.
◆ ◆ ◆
Includes: dark Bratva romance, single dad widower, surrogate / heir contract that becomes real, age gap (38/26), forced proximity, marriage of convenience, found family, slow burn that ignites, terrifying Russian family with a soft centre, explicit content, healing from grief, guaranteed HEA. Standalone with series potential.
Used availability for Cora J Riley's Heir of the Bratva