Page 138 of Dark King Daddy

The meeting ended. Nikita gathered his tablet and the printed list and the key card and left for wherever Nikita went when he had work to do—probably the car, probably already dialing. Anton walked us to the door.

He stopped me on the threshold. Held my arm.

“Be careful with this, Ksyusha. These names mean something to us. Don’t let that make you blind.”

I nodded. He was right.

My phone buzzed as we left Orlov Marine.

Zoe. Three messages, sent at 8:41, 9:02, and 9:14, each one escalating.

“Coffee. This week. Non-negotiable.”

“I’m hearing nothing from you and I’m staging an intervention.”

“Ksenia Orlova if you are dead I’m going to be so annoyed.”

I read them standing on the Beard Street sidewalk, the harbor wind pulling at Daniil’s oversized coat, and I smiled. The first real smile since the phone had rung in the dark.

I typed back: “Alive. Coffee. One hour.”

“OH SHE LIVES. Where?”

“You pick. Somewhere quiet.”

“The Glasshouse. Rear room. I’m already here.”

I pocketed the phone. Ilya stood by the car, the rear door open. I climbed in and settled against the seat. The leather was cold. My body registered the exhaustion I had been overriding since dawn—the heaviness in my limbs, the ache behind my eyes, the particular fuzziness that came from running on soup and adrenaline and four hours of interrupted sleep.

“The Glasshouse,” I told Ilya. “Van Brunt Street.”

Ilya closed my door. He did not pull away from the curb. He stood outside my window, and when I lowered it, his expression carried the particular discomfort of a man delivering news he knew would not be received well.

“Mrs. Sokolova. I’m sorry. My instructions are to take you home. Directly.”

I looked at him.

“Daniil’s instructions.”

“Yes, ma’am. Given this morning.”

I pulled out my phone. I dialed Daniil. He picked up on the second ring.

“Ilya says I’m going straight home.”

“You are.” His voice was measured. Tired. “You’ve had four hours of sleep. We were at the yard until seven. The meeting with Anton ran two hours. You need rest, and after what happened at Maspeth, I want you somewhere I know is secure.”

I understood the concern. I felt it—the genuine, bone-deep worry of a man who had stood in front of a burned loading shed at dawn and understood how easily the body count could have been fourteen instead of zero. The concern was real. The concern was not the problem.

“You cannot arrange my day without speaking to me.”

Silence on the line. Not long. Three seconds.

“I was trying to—”

“I know what you were trying to do. You were trying to protect me. And I’m willing to take additional protection—a second car, a guard at the café, whatever Ilya thinks is appropriate. But I am going to have coffee with my friend. You don’t get to decide that by giving Ilya instructions behind my back.”

The silence again. Longer this time. I could hear the background noise on his end — engine noise, Arkady’s voice, the particular ambient sound of men working through a crisis.