Dominion Hall.
I’d been here before—dozens of times now—for wedding planning meetings with the Dane brothers, with the brides. But this wasn’t one of the common areas. It wasn’t the east wing, where the security briefings happened, or the courtyard where Hallie Mae insisted the string quartet would play her entrance.
This was somewhere else.
Somewhere off-limits.
Then I saw him.
Slumped in a chair in the corner, chin dipped to his chest, legs splayed out, one hand resting on his thigh—and the other curled around the grip of a pistol. His head turned slightly in sleep, and the movement exposed a cut just beneath his jaw, a faint smear of blood already crusted.
Silas.
Asleep.
Worn.
Beautiful in the way bombs are beautiful—right before they detonate.
I didn’t move. Not right away.
Because it was like seeing a bear sleeping in your room. Dangerous. Unreal. And far too close.
But then my heart started working again, and the questions came fast.
How did I get here? What happened? Why does my chest feel like it’s been carved out and replaced with smoke?
I turned away from him, carefully pushing the blanket aside. My body hurt in odd places—knees, ribs, the back of my neck—but nothing sharp. No bruises I could see in the shadows. Still, the ache was deep, like something had tried to drag me under and failed.
I slid from the bed in silence.
The floor was cool stone under my feet. Slate, maybe. Or polished concrete, stained the color of ash. The whole room was darker than it should’ve been—walls painted a gunmetal gray, the tall windows hidden behind blackout curtains.
This wasn’t just a bedroom.
It was a bunker. A fortress built for one man. And that man was asleep ten feet away from me, weapon still in hand.
I crossed to the nearest wall slowly, passing a sideboard lined with photographs. Not the kind you'd expect from a man like Silas—there were no smiling snapshots, no blurry childhood memories.
These were surveillance images.
One showed a man with a hawkish nose and a cigarette hanging from his lips, boarding a private jet in Prague.
Another—chillingly—was of me.
Taken from above. I recognized the outfit, the posture. It had been the day of the engagement brunch. I’d been standing on the patio outside Verandelle, phone to my ear, waiting for a call from a supplier who’d dropped the ball on floral delivery.
He’d been watching me even then.
I didn’t want to look at the next one.
But I did.
It was Monte.
Sitting alone in the Dominion courtyard, eyes half-closed, like he knew he was being watched but didn’t care. Like he welcomed it.
I backed away, breath catching.
