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Irina arrives a little before noon, wearing sunglasses indoors and carrying shopping bags from places that don’t put prices on tags.

“Are you ready?” she asks Anya.

Anya almost jumps out of her chair.

I give her a look. She slowly sits back down, as if this is all very casual and she is merely a child calmly awaiting kidnapping by birthday cake.

Irina turns to me. “I spoke to Mrs. Harrington. The party begins at four, but the children are arriving from three-thirty. It’s at their townhouse.”

Irina says it like she is giving a report at a board meeting, one hand resting on the back of Anya’s chair, her phone still open in the other.

Anya’s face lights up so quickly that I feel guilty before anything has even happened.

“She said I can come?” Anya asks.

“She said you are very welcome,” Irina says, smiling down at her. “She sounded surprised you might attend, actually.”

Because Nikolai said no. Because every reasonable adult in this house knows Nikolai said no. Because I’m apparently the only unreasonable adult currently available.

I fold my hands on the table and keep my voice calm. “And the house?”

“Townhouse,” Irina corrects. “Private entrance. No garden, but there is a small courtyard at the back. Mrs. Harrington said the children will mostly be in the drawing room and dining room.”

“That sounds manageable.”

“It is manageable,” Irina says, somewhat snottily, as if I have suggested she couldn't handle organizing a birthday party without causing an international incident.

Irina believes the plan is set.

She believes Nikolai knows enough. She believes that if there is a problem, it will be because the staff failed to execute properly, not because I am about to commit what may technically be child abduction inside a guarded mansion.

“Finish your reading first,” I tell Anya.

She stares at me. “Elle.”

“Reading,” I repeat. “If we are going to behave like normal people, we have to do normal people things first.”

Irina glances at the worksheet. “She can finish later.”

“No,” I say lightly. “If Nikolai asks what she did this morning, I would like to say something other than ‘vibrated with anticipation for five hours.’”

Anya presses her lips together.

Irina sighs, but she lets it go.

By noon, Anya has completed exactly enough work to satisfy my conscience and not one sentence more. She eats lunch in three bites and spends the rest of the meal pretending not to look at the clock.

At two-forty, I send Anya upstairs. “Blue dress,” I say quietly. “White cardigan. The gift. Wait near the side corridor until I call you.”

Her eyes are enormous. “What if Kirill sees me?”

“Then look innocent.”

“I’m bad at that.”

“I know. Try anyway.”

She nods solemnly and disappears. I sit alone for thirty seconds, staring at her abandoned pencil.