“Anywhere.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It is the answer.” She sets her cup down. “I don’t mean alone into some club or train station. I mean outside the estate. A shop. A café. A bookstore. I don’t care. I just need to leave the house.”
“No.” The word comes out before I soften it.
Her face closes.
I hate that.
I hate that I still don’t change my answer.
“No,” she repeats.
“Not yet.”
She laughs once, but there’s no humor in it. “There it is again.”
“Anya.”
“No, I know. Not yet. For now. Later. All these little phrases men use when they mean no but want to sound reasonable.”
I put my fork down.
She looks beautiful when she’s angry. That’s inconvenient. More inconvenient is that she’s not wrong.
“I’m not keeping you in this house because I enjoy it,” I say.
“Then why?”
“Because you walked into a gala last night and became the center of a war you don’t understand.”
Her mouth tightens. “I understood enough.”
“You understood what was in the room. You don’t yet understand what follows.”
She looks toward the window again, at the guards. “You mean them.”
“I mean my father. Dmitri. The men watching which side to choose. The ones who will think hurting you is an efficient way to reach me.”
That makes her go still.
Not afraid exactly. Listening.
I continue before she can turn it into another fight. “Until I know where the next hit comes from, you stay inside the estate.”
“Inside the estate.”
“Yes.”
“With guards.”
“Yes.”
“And if I refuse?”
My gaze holds hers. “You won’t.”
