Forty-eight hours to find something for Patrick.
And Lev Volkov is watching my every move, touching me like he owns me, threatening to solve me like a puzzle.
I curl up on my bed, shaking from fear and arousal and disgust at myself.
Because the worst part—the absolutely horrifying part—is that when his hand was on my face, when he was hurting me and threatening me and looking at me like I was something to dissect, some twisted part of me wanted him to keep going.
Wanted to know what would happen if he stopped being curious and started being something else.
And that terrifies me more than anything Patrick could do.
Because I'm not supposed to feel heat when a monster touches me.
I'm supposed to feel fear.
But my body no longer seems to understand the difference.
Chapter four
Lev
Ican’t stop watching her.
I can’t stop thinking about her. What the fuck is wrong with me?
I watch her on the security feeds from my office, tracking her movements through the house. She cleans—adequately, nothing Sofia would complain about—but every chance she gets, she's cataloging. Memorizing camera positions. Testing locked doors when she thinks no one's watching. Lingering too long near keypads, eyes tracking the sequences when staff enter codes.
Really amateur. Any professional would know to be subtler.
But that's what makes it interesting. She's not trained. She's desperate. And desperation makes people ready to die rather than fail. And whoever sent her has fully weaponized her desperation.
A genius puppet master.
Last night at 2 AM, she tried my office door. Stood there for three minutes working up the courage, hand on the knob, before walking away when she heard Daniel doing his rounds. The hallway camera caught her face—pure terror mixed with determination.
What are you looking for, little mouse?
I pull up the rest of the week's footage. She's been asking questions. Casual ones that would seem innocent to anyone not looking for patterns. Asks Sofia about my schedule. Asks Daniel which cars I prefer. Asks Elena which rooms I use most often.
Classic reconnaissance. Building a profile. Gathering intelligence.
For who?
Mikhail's report sits on my desk. Phone records for both her devices. The smartphone shows nothing suspicious—calls to her mother, her friend Natasha Markov (Dmitri's daughter, interesting), and a few local numbers. Normal.
But the burner phone has one number. Just one. Called her three times in the past seventy-two hours. Incoming only. No outgoing calls. No texts.
The number's a dead end. Routed through multiple proxies, untraceable without resources I'd need to call in favors for. Which means whoever's running her has money and connections.
The Italians? Someone testing my defenses?
I should kill her. Clean, simple, problem solved.
But I don't.
Because she's also genuinely good with Mila.
I switch to yesterday's footage. Valerie in the sunroom, braiding my daughter's hair while Mila talks. Actually talks—more words in thirty minutes than I've heard from her in weeks. And Mila's smiling. Not the careful, guarded expression she gives everyone else. A real smile.
