RPOV
Over the two months since we arrived home Vika and Paul had come and gone for Easter break, Mom had called (multiple times, and always woke me up in the process), Dad frequently visited, and I was learning the ropes of being a Belikova 'housewife'.
Dimitri was still reluctant to let me out of his arms, and I never complained. I didn't really want to be let out after never being allowed in them until we'd fled.
I was still dealing with crappy morning sickness every morning, but Dimitri was always beside me, always a constant source of support. Karo was also around with kind words of support and amusing anecdotes about her experiences with Paul and Zoya. Even Sonya was surprisingly supportive given she was heavily pregnant, and hormonal, herself.
Mama would come up with some link between a meal she was teaching me how to cook and a memory of one of her kids. Dimitri came up more often than not and every time it resulted in a "don't listen to her, Roza. She's incorrigible," groaned softly into my ear. My response? Shutting him up with a kiss and a "she has every right to be. You know we'll be doing it with Bubby."
The biggest event, or moment, was when Dimitri proposed. He dropped to one knee at breakfast after Mom's first call. I accepted through tears. Stupid hormones! That and the man was still clueless about what effect he had on me.
My mother arrived exactly a month after her first call. And I hated she was disrupting the sanctuary that was the Belikova household. She walked right into one of the moments I was shutting my man up with a kiss which so wasn't G-Rated. How we weren't told off more by Mama I'll never know. "You are still clueless, fiancé," I whispered against his lips.
It only earned me a "speak for yourself, Mommy!" softly laughed against my lips. Any comeback was cutoff by another steamy kiss.
"Guys! G-Rated please!" Mama laughed. When we eventually pulled out of the kiss- but not the other's embrace- we saw Mom looking at us. Well. 'Scowling' is probably the more accurate adjective.
"Sorry Mama," Dimitri and I pouted at Olena.
"Forgiven. Dimka, I still don't get why ever thought a life without love was worth living." Mama sighed and shook her head while Dimitri carefully pulled me even closer to him.
"I don't get it either, Mama, I don't get it either." Dimitri was staring at me adoringly while answering Mama.
"Mmm. I love you, you know? Always have-" I got cut off again with a peck to my lips.
"I love you too, my love. You have no clue how much you've changed my life."
"Speak for yourself, Comrade!" Oh that did it.
The kiss I got out of that had my mother interrupting with a "get a room, Rosemarie! That's hurl worthy."
I shrank into Dimitri in shock at her loud voice and the unpleasant tone of her voice. "Hi Mom. Feeling the love," I mumbled out sarcastically after I'd swivelled in Dimitri's arms. Mom's expression when she saw my slightly bloated abdomen had me in hysterics. "I told you I was pregnant, Mom, so don't look so surprised."
"Rosemarie! It only just started sinking in," she retorted.
"I'm the eleven weeks pregnant one here, and I still can't wrap my head around it."
"You can talk, Roza!" Dimitri playfully teased, then proceeded to kiss my cheek.
"Sorry, Daddy," I melted, turned sheepish and blushed. Yes, the Dimitri Belikov can make the Rose Hathaway blush. "You really are still totally clueless, though. Do you really still have no idea what you do to me, man?" I sighed as I leaned back into his chest.
"Speak for yourself, my woman," he whispered into my ear. His tone and the sensation made me shiver.
"Does the world not exist?" Mom interrupted.
"It never does with those two, Janine. I really have to wonder how he trained her at all, they've been glued to each other like that from the day they arrived," Mama responded before we could.
"We're right here, Mama!" we butted in.
"You know it's true. You're inseparable!" Mama playfully retorted. "And seriously, Dimka, how did you ever keep your face straight long enough to train her?"
"You don't want to know, Mama. A lot of mental self chastising. Not even that worked."
"You knew all along I'd get you!" I teased. "You knew all along your control wasn't as strong as my stubbornness." I reached up and placed a kiss on his cheek.
"Roza!" he groaned dramatically. "Don't remind me, don't remind me you were always right."
"Ah well. Things happened as they should have," I sighed. "We've been through this. I had lessons to learn."
"Doesn't mean I had to hurt you in the process."
"Again, we've been through this. I had to learn I had to put you first, even if it meant handing you over to Tasha."
"Were you really ever happy with Mase or Adrian?"
"No. How on earth was I meant to be happy with someone who can't see into my soul, and doesn't force me open?"
"Because it's easier?"
"Not worth it. Promise. I prefer being scared shitless and having my sanity saved with one word."
"You're right. It's not worth it."
"So not worth it," I shook my head as I reached up so our noses were touching. I pulled us into a kiss after one more, "so not worth it," from both of us.
JPOV
Did my daughter even realise a world was watching? Clearly not by her response to Belikov's deepening the kiss. I seriously did not understand how those two were so totally lovesick.
"How?" I asked a returned-to-cooking Olena Belikova. "Are they always that oblivious?"
"Yes. Today's particularly bad," the middle-aged dhampir woman smiled fondly.
"Why would that be? Why is today worse? Could it be because I'm here?"
"No. Trust me, Janine, your arrival just happens to coincide with one of their 'I-might-as-well-lock-them-in-their-room-all-day-because-they're-that-useful' days," she softly laughed out.
"Unbelievable," I sighed.
"Give me a moment. Oh, and watch this," she turned to our children, "Dimka? Roza?"
"Yes Mama?" Their heads simultaneously whipped to face Olena and they sang in unison. Not freaky or adorable at all.
"Go to your room!" the homely woman laughed out the order. "You're as useful as a wet dishcloth, right now. You're not. So save us the sight-"
"Yes Mama!" The lovebirds giggled and Belikov pulled my daughter to their- ugh! that didn't sit comfortably- room.
"How'd you manage that?"
"Simple, I let them be when they get that lovesick. I actually did lock them in their room the first time it happened. They pull their weight, and contribute enough to the running of the house."
"How can you stand the sight of them?"
"I've never seen him so happy or at peace as he his when she's around. I never thought I'd ever see him this happy. I always hoped he'd find Her- the one who would challenge all he stands for. She is his Her, she challenges him, makes him happy and leaves him totally vulnerable. I still can't wrap my head around how they managed any pretence of professional."
"They didn't. Not really. In retrospect, it was blatantly obvious." I thought back through Christmas, the ski trip, Spokane and the rescue mission. It was right under everyone's noses. "It was so obvious it wasn't. Their reputations preceded them. It just wasn't a line anyone would begin to think either would cross. Let alone for each other."
"And yet, they've both abandoned duty for love and family."
"Does he feel guilty about that? We all know how duty driven he is."
"Not one bit. He doesn't regret it and he doesn't feel guilty over choosing her and their baby."
"You honestly believe it's theirs?" I'd chewed him out, but I still couldn't believe my daughter was carrying her, now ex, mentor's miracle mini-me.
"It can't not be. You forget- she's not supposed to be alive."
"I do constantly forget that. I tried to avoid building a connection with her to save her emotional pain if I died while she was still in training. Except, karma decided she would die first. If only momentarily. But still..."
"You're not the only one who forgot. He did. Up until the incident when they created their miracle. He learnt then to treasure her and life."
"It's why he refuses to regret choosing to run?"
"It's why they both refuse to regret running," she corrected.
"I never thought my daughter would throw her training away," I sighed. I didn't really know how to feel about the situation. It's not like she hadn't slaughtered more Strigoi in one night than most would in their lives. She'd been killing since seventeen, and it had taken it's toll.
"Janine," Olena sighed, "your little girl had more blood on her hands before her eighteenth birthday than most would have in their entire lives. She used her training before she'd finished it. She's traumatised enough. And the bond to the Princess did nothing but hurt her. This baby is the best thing her shadow kissed state has given her."
"She really is excited at being a teen mom to his child?"
"They're both ecstatic about having their own family. I suggest you don't bring her age into it. It's the sore point. She's finally a legal adult and that's all they care about. She's his woman."
"Have they? Has he?" I didn't know how to ask the next question, and I wasn't sure I wanted to know the answer. I could have sworn there was an engagement ring on her left ring finger.
"Are they engaged? Has he proposed? Yes. They are because he has. He should have done it much earlier, much much earlier."
"I don't know my daughter, do I?"
"Frankly Janine? No. You don't know her."
"How well does she fit in? Was she always meant to be a Belikova? Was she born a Hathaway-Mazur but destined to be his Belikova?"
"She's just like another piece of the furniture- fits in perfectly. And, as far as I can tell, yes- she was always destined to be his Belikova. She's his Roza Belikova."
"It suits her," I sadly sighed. "It's hard to accept, but it really does suit her. She's been his Roza Belikova from the moment they met, hasn't she?"
"Yes, she has, Janine. She's always been my Roza Belikova," Belikov commented as he walked into the kitchen. Empty handed.
"Where is she?"
"Asleep. Since you frequently interrupt her nights, she now naps at lunch. Her morning sickness usually starts about two or three hours after you call. And it's still lasting an average of three or four hours. Combine that with a delayed recovery from jetlag, switching to human schedule and normal pregnancy fatigue, she's completely exhausted. When she's at her peek she's nothing but glowing and radiating energy. Once it starts to hit her, well, the last thing she needs is a darkness battle." That's when I saw it, and heard it.
"You're just as exhausted?"
"I refuse to go to sleep until I know she's not just visiting Liss. Then I'm up in the time between your calls and when the morning sickness starts."
"Then why aren't you with her now?"
"Because she makes me pick up her slack. She makes me help out Mama." That caused Olena to laugh.
"I've told her repeatedly you both need the extra hours before your badass baby Belikov is born. I can live with it." The woman shook her head. Clearly amused by my daughter's antics and stubbornness.
"Can you blame her? After how we arrived? Can you blame her for trying to give you a hidden security detail?"
"God! She's too much like you sometimes!"
"What do you expect? The woman's my other half, so of course she's like me!"
"She still hasn't truly learnt to put her first. She's always putting Bubby, you, me, and the rest of the house first."
"In that order," Belikov sighed sadly. "Then Liss and the gang back at the Academy. She's tapering off, or so I'm led to believe, but she's still pulling too much darkness. She still can't just let it 'leak' into her. She's addicted to actively pulling."
"What are you going on about Belikov?" I interrupted because I was completely lost.
"The side effects of spirit magic use. Rose, thanks to the bond, can take them from Lissa before they become an issue for the Princess. But... The toll it takes on Rose is worse."
"Worse? How?"
"It, alongside Strigoi kills, strengthens her connection to the land of the dead. And she's not 'built' with a level of resistance to it." He took a deep breath before choking out, "I've seen her go insane once, it's not something I ever want her going through again."
"Dimka- go to her. Go have some sleep. You're no use when you're this sleep and Rose deprived."
"But I'm no use when she's in my arms."
"You need sleep. Don't make me-"
"Thanks Mama, really." He hugged Olena then beelined for the room his- gulp- fiancé was asleep in.
"What threat didn't you need to finish?"
"'Don't make me bring out the dishcloth'."
"Bad memories attached?"
"I've only ever used it once. After that, the threat worked well enough on its own. It still does- as you've seen."
I left the Belikova's with Abe that night, and was still trying to absorb everything I'd seen and heard. My daughter and Belikov was a sight, one which was hard to watch for longer than a minute, or two, without wanting to hurl at the sickly-sweetness. The two were lethal, but you'd never guess from the constant gooey-ness. And I had another fortnight of a visit of vomit avoidance to come.
By the end of my time there I'd come to realise she was safe enough in his care, in his arms. He'd made the right choice to bring her to Baia.
The commune was nothing like the stereotype, and the Belikova's even less so.
All my prejudices had been challenged, everything I assumed I knew of my daughter had been turned upside down, and I had seen the pair truly were ready for marriage and a family- despite her age.
I'd also seen that I measured my eighteen year old daughter against me at that age. And the two were nothing alike. Her life experience was immeasurable against mine at eighteen. She wasn't the typical teen- and Belikov had always known it, he'd always seen it, and he'd brought it to the forefront.
In her totally-melted state, I was given a rare glimpse of the mature, young woman hidden within. The one only Belikov could pull out. The one the Academy, myself, and society never got to see because we pressured her into keeping up her too-well-established reputation for being reckless, immature and lethal.
I came away from that trip with changed perspectives. I had been lucky enough to be given a print of an ultrasound image of my badass Belikov grand-baby, to come away with- and a wedding invite.