I paced outside the hospital room, my fists clenched at my sides, my body thrumming with restless energy. Every second that passed without news felt like a lifetime. I just needed to hear her cry. Just one sound, proof that my daughter was alive. Or for someone to step out and place her in my arms.
I had never cared about having a child before. The idea of it had once felt like a chain, another vulnerability to exploit. But that changed the moment I let myself imagine a future with Anna and our baby. A family. A reason to fight. If I couldn’t protect my own daughter, then I had already failed as a father.
And as a husband.
I exhaled sharply, my patience wearing thin. The doctor had said the surgery would take between thirty and sixty minutes. It had been nearly an hour.
Then I saw it.
A cluster of nurses rushed into the room with more medical supplies. My chest tightened. Something was wrong.
Minutes crawled by. No news. No sounds. No crying.
I couldn’t wait any longer. I shoved the door open.
Anna lay unconscious on the bed, her face pale, her breathing shallow. her eyelids fluttering like she was trapped in some nightmare.
“What did you give her?” I barked.
The doctor hesitated. “A mild sedative, to calm…”
“Liar.” I grabbed the IV bag, scanning the label. The dosage was too high. And why sedate a mother who just lost her child? No. They wanted her unconscious.
Her stomach had been stitched up, but something was missing.
No cries. No baby.
I turned to the nearest nurse, my voice like a gunshot. “Where is my child?”
The woman flinched. “Your wife had a panic attack during the surgery. We had to administer a mild sedative to keep her stable.”
A panic attack? That wasn’t an answer.
I took a step forward. “And my baby?”
Silence.
Then one of the nurses stepped forward, a small bundle in her arms. I reached for my daughter, my heart hammering, but something was wrong.
She wasn’t moving.
She wasn’t crying.
I felt it before I even looked down. Her tiny body was too still.
My breath caught in my throat. No.
“The umbilical cord was compromised,” the doctor said, voice carefully neutral. “We are so sorry, Mr. Romanov.”
Sorry?
“Try again,” I snapped. “Revive her.”
“Mr. Romanov…”
“Do it!” I roared, gripping my gun. But the doctor only looked away, as if she already knew it was useless. The room was too quiet. Too final.
I stared at my daughter’s lifeless form. A scream built in my chest, but I swallowed it down. My body locked up, refusing to break.
I turned to Anna. She was barely conscious, lost in drugged sleep. If I was already breaking, how the hell would she survive this?
They failed her.
They failed me.
The last time we had come here, they had told us the baby was perfectly healthy. And now? Now they handed me a corpse.
I couldn’t accept it.
My hand trembled as I placed my daughter beside Anna, pressing a soft kiss to my wife’s forehead. “I’m sorry, sweetheart,” I whispered. “I failed you. I failed her.”
But I wasn’t done failing yet.
I turned back to the nurses. My fingers curled around my gun, my voice ice-cold. “Who do you work for?”
Their eyes widened.
I pressed my gun against the doctor’s temple.
“Her lips trembled. “I… I swear, the baby…”
“Was alive.”
She flinched.
I tilted my head. “Which means you’re either incompetent or a liar. Pick one.”
I clicked off the safety. “Did you kill my daughter?”
“Sir, we followed standard protocol. You can check the CCTV footage. We did everything we could…”
“Lies.” My voice was dead, devoid of anything but fury. “You let my child die.”
The doctor tried again. “Please, put the gun down. We…”
I pulled the trigger.
The shot echoed through the room, and the doctor collapsed, blood splattering across the floor.
Screams erupted. The nurses fell to their knees, pleading, sobbing.
I didn’t hear them.
One by one, I silenced them.
By the time Boris arrived to clean up the bodies, I was already gone—my daughter’s small, cold form cradled in my arms.
I brought her home.
To the nursery Anna had designed with so much love.
She had moved in here for a time, furious at me, determined to claim something of her own. But after we reconciled, she had returned to our shared bedroom, leaving this space untouched.
Now, it was a mausoleum.
I laid my daughter down gently in the crib. Her crib. The one Anna had picked out. The one meant for a living, breathing child.
I sat beside her and waited. For what, I didn’t know. For Anna to wake up. For this to make sense. For my chest to stop aching.
But nothing changed.
Time passed, measured only by the slow, shuddering breaths I forced myself to take.
Then my phone rang.
I grabbed it, answering without checking the number. “Tell me you have news.”
A voice, thick with an Italian accent, spoke instead.
“Dove c’è vecchiaia, c’è saggezza.”
I froze.
The saying was familiar. Where there is old age, there is wisdom.
I didn’t recognize the voice, but I recognized the language. Italian.
I glanced at the screen. Unknown number.
My grip tightened. “Who the fuck are you?”
A chuckle. “Some call me Venom. Others call me Mr. Romano.” A pause. “But to you? I am your wife’s father.”
My blood ran cold.
This bastard. This ghost. I had never spoken to him, never needed to. My grandmother had always handled him.
Until now.
“Why the fuck are you calling me?”
“I won’t waste time with pleasantries. You want answers, yes?” His voice was calm. “Your wife delivered a bouncing baby boy. He is safe and healthy.”
My fingers twitched. “What?”
“Her job is done. To us, to you. She is no longer necessary. Soon, she will be eliminated.”
My heart stuttered.
His words didn’t make sense. A baby boy?
We had a girl.
“We knew which hospital you were using,” he continued smoothly. “We bought the doctors. The nurses. The first deception was the ultrasound. You were never having a girl.”
No. That couldn’t be…
I squeezed my eyes shut, my mind racing.
“And the second deception?” he mused. “Delivering you a stillborn child while your real son was smuggled out of the hospital.”
A rush of cold swept over me.
I had stood outside that room, waiting, trusting. And all the while…
“You’re lying,” I forced out.
“I never lie about business, ragazzo.”
My knees almost gave out. I had spent the last hour mourning a child who was never mine to grieve.
And now, he was out there. With the man who wanted my wife dead.
I swallowed hard. “Where is my son?”
A slow chuckle. “On a plane to Italy.”
Rage surged through me. “You stole my child.”
“And if you attempt to retrieve him, you will die,” he interrupted.
I gritted my teeth, every muscle in my body screaming for violence.
But he wasn’t done.
“Your grandmother and I planned this for a long time,” he said. “She played her role perfectly.”
My stomach dropped.
My grandmother.
I exhaled sharply. “My grandmother helped you steal my son?”
“She understands the importance of legacy,” he said simply. “Unlike you.”
Silence stretched between us.
Then, his voice dipped lower. “We’ve done it before, you know.”
A shiver ran down my spine. “What the hell does that mean?”
A dark laugh. “I explained it to your grandmother. Perhaps you should ask her.”
“You kidnapped and physically abused my sister for years, you crippled my wife for half a decade, and now you’ve stolen my son. No death could ever be cruel enough to match what you deserve.”
He chuckled darkly. “You won’t kill me, Gleb Romanov.”
“You sound sure of that.” My grip on the phone tightened.
“Ninety percent of the people working in our embassies and international airports are on our payroll. It’s not an empty threat when I say you’ll be shot on sight if you set foot in Italy. I know your grandmother set the same security in place for Russia. That’s why we wouldn’t dare step into your territory.”
His voice turned colder. “Enough has been said. You have my number now. If you want to negotiate, call me. But your son will grow up strong and healthy under my care. We’ll talk some other time.”
Then he hung up.
The silence that followed was deafening. My heartbeat pounded in my ears, a steady, brutal rhythm of failure. I had failed my wife.
I thought I had planned for everything. I had anticipated war, retaliation after the birth. I never imagined they’d strike before. I never thought they’d own the hospital from the very first moment Anna walked in for her check-ups.
And my grandmother…
She had kidnapped Anna once. I let it go.
She did it again. I let it go because she was family.
And now, she had taken our child.
A slow, creeping rage spread through my veins, thick and suffocating. I wanted to burn everything she had ever touched.
But first, I had to face Anna.
My son was alive.
But stolen.
Taken to a place where I was already marked for death.
Knowing Anna, she won’t care. She’ll go to Italy anyway. She’ll risk her life without a second thought.
And then her father will have an easy way to kill her.
Losing my daughter had already shattered me.
Losing her?
I wouldn’t survive it.
What do I tell her when she wakes? That our daughter is dead? Or that our son is alive, but stolen?
The moment she opens her eyes, I will have to choose between her knowing the truth… or keeping her alive.
Anna stirred.
Her lashes fluttered. Her lips parted.
And then… “Where’s my baby?”
Her voice was hoarse, fragile, full of sleep and unawareness. It shattered something inside me.
She didn’t even seem to notice that the room had changed. “Gleb, where’s my daughter?”
I moved closer, intertwining my fingers with hers. “Anna…”
She shook her head, “No… no! Tell me it’s not true… my daughter cannot die. She was healthy, I felt her move while I was in labor. There’s no way she would be dead.”
I watched as the panic set in, her chest rising and falling in short, erratic breaths.
“I’m sorry.”
A scream tore from her throat.
She yanked her hand from mine, clawing at her hair, pulling it wildly. Her sobs were gut-wrenching, shaking the entire room.
“They killed her… they did…” she gasped, her voice breaking. “You couldn’t even protect our daughter. You let them kill her!”
“Anna…”
“Don’t you dare say my name!” She dug her nails into her scalp, her eyes wide, frenzied.
“Is my daughter really gone? Forever?”
I couldn’t speak. My throat burned, my fists clenched at my sides. I had underestimated my grandmother’s cruelty, and now it had cost me everything.
She will die for this.
Anna shoved me away. “Get away from me!”
I reached for her. “Babe, you need me now more than ever.”
“No, I don’t.” Her eyes were red-rimmed, wild. “You could have protected her if you wanted to. But you didn’t.”
Her voice turned bitter. “Something wasn’t right. The labor had been too hard. The doctors kept saying I needed surgery, but I felt her moving. What if… what if they did something to me?”
“What if the nurses delivering me worked for your grandmother? You knew how much power your family holds in Russia. You knew. Yet you let them kill our daughter.”
The way she looked at me, like she was seeing me for the first time, sent a sharp pain through my chest.
She wasn’t the naive woman I had married.
She wasn’t blind to our world anymore.
“Don’t say that, babe.” My voice was raw. “I wanted her as much as you did. We prepared for her arrival together.”
Her face twisted with agony. “I imagined what it would feel like to breastfeed my baby. Now, I have swollen breasts filled with milk for a child who isn’t here to drink it. Because she was killed by your evil family.”
“I had men at the hospital. Trusted men. I made sure of it. Or at least, I thought I did. But I hadn’t accounted for how deep my grandmother’s control ran. She didn’t bribe the doctors, she owned them. She hadn’t just infiltrated my security, she had always been one step ahead.”
She wiped her face and spoke in a voice devoid of warmth. “Can you give me some space? Please. Don’t come back anytime soon.”
“Anna… please.”
“Just get out.”
I stepped out, but I didn’t leave. I leaned against the door, listening to the sound of her sobs, her pain carving deep, bloody wounds into my soul.
I was drowning in fury.
The next few hours, the next few days, would be a bloodbath.
For now, I just needed her to heal. Even just a little.
I stood there for a long time, lost in my own torment. The silence eventually settled, but when I cracked the door open, my stomach twisted into a knot.
Anna was lying on the floor, her eyes wide open, lifeless.
“Anna…”
She didn’t move. Didn’t blink.
Her sobs faded into silence. A long, empty silence. Then she laughed, soft, broken. A laugh with no joy left in it. When she finally looked up, her eyes were hollow. Dead. ‘I want a divorce, Gleb.’”
My heart stopped.
“No,” I whispered. “That’s not the answer.”
She laughed, a soft, broken sound. “I can’t stay here. Not with you. Not with your family. I’ll suffocate, Gleb. Every time I close my eyes, I’ll see her. I’ll hear her. I need to go.”
“But leaving me won’t heal you.”
“Not immediately,” she admitted. “But over time, it will.”
She wiped her face. “I need to get away from this life. I’m not cut out for it. My family is evil. Your family is worse. I won’t survive this.”
My chest was caving in. “Anna, I…”
She cut me off. “Bring me divorce papers tomorrow.”
“You can hate me. You can blame me. But I won’t let you leave. Not now. Not like this.”
Her cold, bitter smile cut me deeper than any knife. “You never really wanted her, Gleb.”
I flinched. “That’s not true.”
“Isn’t it? You weren’t prepared for this baby. You told me to get rid of her. You were afraid she’d be killed, and she was. You were right. And I was stupid.”
Her voice cracked. “I should have listened to you.”
“I swear to you, Anna, they will pay. Every last one of them. But you and I, we’re not over.”
I dropped to my knees in front of her. “Don’t shut me out, Anna. Please. I know I failed you, but let me make it right.”
She cupped my cheek, tears falling freely.
“You’re a good man, Gleb.” Her lips brushed mine, soft and lingering. A goodbye kiss.
“I should have told you before. I should have known before. I love you, Anna. And I won’t let this be the end.”
She laughed bitterly. “You do?”
“I do.”
Her expression turned icy. “I wish that were enough.”
“Do you still love me?” My voice was barely above a whisper.
She scoffed. “Nonsense. I will always love you, Gleb Romanov.” She paused. “And that’s exactly why I need to leave.”
Then she stood and picked up our daughter’s still body.
“Little girl,” she sobbed, cradling her against her chest. “We talked, didn’t we? You promised to stay strong. Why did you leave me?”
Her body trembled with silent sobs, “you should have fought to stay alive…” she squeezed her eyes so bad, tears trickling painfully out of her swollen eyes .
I had to look away. I couldn’t bear it.
I wanted to hold her. To stay. But I couldn’t. Not when the people who did this were still breathing.
I turned to leave. But before I did, I looked at her one last time. “I will fix this, Anna. Even if it kills me.”
I stormed out of the room, my rage burning through my veins, my path set.
Grandma would die for this.
I should have killed her the first time. I thought sparing her would keep the balance. That family meant something. But she had made her choice. Now, I’d make mine.
