Caught Between Two Billionaire Brothers

Sasha's POV I announced the news with a bright smile the moment Ben walked through the door. "I'm pregnant." I had been waiting all day to say those words. I had confirmed it that morning and spent every hour after that watching the clock, waiting for him to come home faster so I could finally let it out. I had always wanted a child of my own, had wanted it so deeply and for so long that the wanting had become its own kind of headache. Ben stared at me like he had just heard the impossible. He was still holding his briefcase. He hadn't even set it down yet, hadn't loosened his tie like he always did when he came home. He just stood there and stared, and I watched the color drain out of his face. "Ben." I stepped toward him. "I just told you I'm pregnant. You should be happy." He forced a smile then. I saw the way he assembled it deliberately. "I am happy," he said. "I'm just shocked. I didn't think we would ever have kids, so I had already made plans." My eyes narrowed. "What do you mean you've already made plans?" Something flickered across his face. He froze for just a moment, and the scramble behind his eyes, the rapid calculation of a man who had said more than he intended. Then he pulled at his suit jacket and looked away. "I'm tired, Sasha. This isn't the right time." "I asked you a simple question." "And I'll answer it." He looked back at me and his expression was patient now, the particular patience that always made me feel slightly unreasonable for pushing. "Just not right now. I need to rest first, that's all." He touched my arm briefly as he passed, and went upstairs without another word. I called after him. He didn't respond. I stood in the sitting room and tried to make sense of what had just happened. Maybe it was work. Maybe he'd had a terrible day and the news had simply landed badly. Ben had moods, I knew that, and sometimes the wrong moment could flatten even good news. I pushed the thought aside and called Amara. "Is his food ready?" "Yes, ma." "Bring it. I'll take it up myself." It wasn't the pregnancy that made me do it. I had a request to make, and I understood my husband well enough to know the surest way to him. It wasn't manipulation exactly, it was just knowledge. No matter how dark his mood, cook his favorite and sit across from him while he eats, and he was yours. I found him at his study desk, both hands clamped over his head, elbows on the table, staring at nothing. "I brought your food." "I'm not hungry." "It's your favorite," I said, my voice smooth. He raised his head immediately, looked at the tray. And just like that, the resistance went out of him. "Drop it," he said. I set the tray down and waited. He pulled it toward him and started eating without ceremony, without another word, and I stood to the side and let him. I waited for the fourth bite before clearing my throat. "Ben." I kept my voice light. "I want the twenty billion dollars I invested in your father's company." His food stuck in his mouth. He stopped chewing entirely. Raised his head slowly and looked at me. "What for?" "What do you mean what for?" I kept my voice steady. "It was my money to begin with. I sold my entire inheritance and put it into that company to keep it from going under, and now it has made over three hundred billion in profit. I'm pregnant now, Ben. It's time for me to build something my child can be proud of." Ben covered the food. I raised an eyebrow. He had never done that. In seven years, he had never once covered his food mid-meal. I looked at the covered plate and then I looked at him and I understood, he was about to lie to me. "Before you say anything," I said, "your father mailed me three months ago. He told me he had already released the money to you so you could return it to me. So don't bother coming up with excuses." The fear that crossed his face didn't last long, it was swallowed almost immediately by something else. "Am I your husband?" he asked. I blinked. "Of course." "And that makes me the head of this house?" he asked. "What does that have to do with my money?" "Everything," he said. I shook my head. "I don't understand what you're saying to me." "I spent the money, Sasha," he announced coldly. The glass slipped from my hand. I didn't feel it leave, one moment it was there and then it was on the floor and I was staring at him with my ears ringing and my face burning. My eyebrows furrowed in a rage so deep it had no sound. "You did what?" My voice didn't sound like mine. "My whole inheritance. Twenty billion naira. Spent? That's impossible." "I can explain," he said. "I can tell you exactly how—" I looked at him and it was like invisible scales fell off my eyes. I saw him with a sudden, terrible clarity. "Take your explanation to your great-grandfather's grave." The words came from somewhere low and certain in me. "Give me my money. Then go and explain your stupidity to your ancestors." His mouth fell open. I hissed and turned for the door. Then his voice trailed behind me "I gave it to a girl." I stopped. My jaw locked so hard I felt it in my back teeth. "I gave it to the girl I intend to marry." His voice was steady, almost gentle. "I decided to marry again. Since you couldn't give me a child." Something moved through me from my feet upward, hot and electric, and I had to lock my knees to stay standing. And my eyes moved almost without my permission to the spot across the room where I keep my gun.