Maybe it would have been better, easier, if he had never found her. He wouldn't have to deal with... with this. It did not matter if he accepted it or not. It didn't change things. There was nothing that could change things now. There could be no future for them, for Anatoliy and herself. Not anymore. Why did he bother? Why did he still care for her? Especially now. Now that she carried his children. Why would Anatoliy still want anything to do with her after she had pushed him out of her life at Keese's appearance, despite what her reasons might have been and now that she carried his children even it had been against her will? What man would willingly take on such a burden?
Hopeless and bitter thoughts fueled one another as she descended further into despair. She was afraid to hope, afraid to acknowledge the love that still remained between them. It wouldn't matter anyway. She had given up and a growing part of her wished that the Russo would simply do the same. That he would leave her and move on with his life. It was best, for him. Wouldn't he be happier that way? It seemed only logical from her contorted point of view. His words were slow to process through the thick haze of angry and bitter emotions. She was slow to recognize that moments ago he had called her love. And it hurt. It hurt like someone pulling open the curtains to let the light pour when when one had grown accustomed to the darkness. Bringing back more memories of better days. Days that seemed so far away anymore.
Slowly he was getting through to her. He was the light cutting through the darkness that consumed her. She mulled over his answers with growing confusion. Had she misunderstood? She looked at him, questions in her eyes along with mounting uncertainty. "You would accept them?" Disbelief prevalent in her tone. "You would claim them.. as your own?" Surely she had misunderstood. It was too much to ask for there was no way they were. The night they had spent together, the night before her world had fell to ruins, these children were not from then. They were not his and there was nothing else she was more certain of.
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