His chin dipped. Maybe half an inch. So subtle that if I'd blinked I would have missed it.
But I didn't miss it. That tiny nod was everything. Was the "Good girl" he couldn't say out loud in this context, in this room, when I was Advisor Sophie presenting intelligence instead of Little Sophie coloring in her nursery. It was acknowledgment that I'd done well. That I'd earned my place at this table. That both versions of me—the analyst and the little girl—made him proud.
My chest did something complicated. Warm and tight and absolutely right.
"So we have three galleries." Maks's voice pulled me back to the presentation. His fingers were still moving across his tablet, probably already hacking into Galerie Rousseau's systems to verify everything I'd said. "Monaco, and where else?"
"Singapore and Cape Town." I pulled up the documentation for both. "Same pattern. Established within months of Anton taking power. Same shell company structure. Same impossible auction prices for mediocre art. The Singapore location moved forty-three million dollars in eighteen months."
Kostya let out a low whistle. "That's not money laundering. That's a fucking car wash."
"It gets better." I brought up the final image—the one that had made me actually gasp when I'd found it yesterday. "All threegalleries share the same art appraiser. A woman named Irina Sidorova."
The name landed like a grenade.
Nikolai's eyes sharpened. Kostya straightened from his casual lean against the wall. Maks's fingers froze mid-type.
"Sidorova," Nikolai said quietly, and his voice carried weight that meant this mattered. "Viktor Sidorov's daughter. The man who ran The Settling before Anton killed him during the attack."
I nodded, my heart kicking up speed because this was the part that had kept me awake last night cross-referencing dates and documentation. "Anton didn't just use her. He had her trapped in the same system that trapped me. She's been appraising his acquisitions for four years, signing off on valuations that let him move money freely. If she refused—"
"He would have killed her like he killed her father," Maks finished, his voice tight with anger that surprised me. Maks didn't usually show emotion beyond mild amusement or analytical interest. But this—this had struck something personal.
"We need to bring her in," Kostya said, already moving toward the door like he was going to personally extract her from whatever gallery she was currently trapped in. "Get her statement. Use her testimony to seize the galleries and freeze the accounts before Anton's remaining people can move the assets."
"Already working on location," Maks confirmed, his fingers flying again. "Give me twenty minutes."
Nikolai stood, his movement drawing every eye in the room. When he spoke, it was pure Pakhan—command that expected obedience and would accept nothing less.
"Sophie's intelligence is solid. We move on all three galleries simultaneously. Maks, coordinate with our contacts in Monaco and Cape Town. Kostya, you handle Singapore—you have people there. I want seizure orders filed by end of business today."
He paused, his eyes finding mine again across the table.
"Good work, printsessa."
The endearment in this context—professional, formal, with his brothers present—made my breath catch. He'd called me that during the presentation to the Council. Had used it when I was Big Sophie, Advisor Sophie, the woman who stood at war room tables and tracked money through criminal enterprises.
It wasn't just a Little name anymore. It was my name. The one that encompassed all of me.
Kostya and Maks were already moving, gathering tablets and phones, coordinating the next steps of the operation my intelligence had triggered. But Nikolai stayed still, watching me with an expression that made my professional composure wobble dangerously.
"You've come a long way," he said quietly, meant only for me even though we weren't alone. "From the frightened woman at the auction to this. To standing here commanding this room with your brilliance."
"I had a good teacher." My voice came out softer than I intended. "Someone who showed me I could be both. That being small and safe with you didn't mean I couldn't also be strong and capable here."
His eyes held mine, and in them I saw everything we'd survived. The auction. The Belyaev compound. The cathedral where he'd destroyed sacred protocols to save me. The three months since, where we'd rebuilt something better than what we'd lost.
Where I'd found my place. Both places. The little girl who needed raspberry jam and stories, and the analyst who could track criminal assets through offshore galleries.
Both versions mattered. Both versions were loved. Both versions had family.
"Meeting adjourned," Nikolai said, his Pakhan voice returning as Kostya and Maks headed for the door. "Sophie, stay. I need to discuss the Singapore timeline with you."
The door closed behind his brothers, and the war room transformed. Not physically—same mahogany table, same bulletproof windows, same chess board sitting unused in the corner. But the energy shifted. From formal to intimate. From professional to personal.
Nikolai crossed the distance between us in four long strides, and his hands found my face with the gentleness that never failed to make my chest tight.
"I'm so proud of you," he whispered, and his Pakhan mask cracked completely. "So fucking proud I can barely breathe around it."
