I pushed off the wall. Started walking. My office was two floors down but I took the stairs instead of the elevator. Needed thephysical movement. Needed something to do with the energy crackling under my skin.
The office was dark when I entered. The financial reports still scattered across my desk where I'd left them. The monitors still showing security feeds. Everything exactly as it had been an hour ago.
Everything completely different.
I collapsed into my chair. Dropped my head into my hands. Tried to count to four. Couldn't focus long enough to reach two.
The weighted blanket. I'd given her the weighted blanket meant for me. Had used my own coping mechanism to help her without even thinking about it. Had seen her in distress and immediately known what she needed because I knew what I needed.
We were the same. That's what she'd said. We knew what it was like to need control because the world was chaos.
We saw each other. Really saw each other. The broken parts underneath the armor.
And I'd just rejected her for it.
My phone buzzed. I pulled it from my pocket. Security alert. Motion detected in the east wing third floor hallway.
I pulled up the feed on my phone. Black and white footage. Sophie's door opening. Her small figure emerging, wrapped in that grey sleep shirt and the weighted blanket draped over her shoulders like a cape.
She walked to the window at the end of the hallway. Stood there. Forehead against the glass. Just like she'd done in her room earlier.
I'd put her back in panic mode. I'd saved her from one nightmare just to deliver another with my own hands.
The right thing. I'd done the right thing.
So why did it feel like I'd just destroyed something precious before it had a chance to grow?
Chapter 8
Sophie
IarrivedatNikolai'sofficeat eight AM exactly, which was how we did things now.
Exact.
Careful.
Professional.
It had been a week of morning briefings where we discussed Belyaev communications and territorial disputes and supply chain logistics like I hadn't kissed him. Like he hadn't kissed me back before pulling away and making me feel like I'd done something wrong just by wanting him.
The routine was painfully polite. I'd knock. He'd tell me to enter. We'd review my work from the previous day. He'd assign new tasks. We'd have dinner at seven, conversation limited to safe topics—books, the weather, compound operations. Then I'd retreat to my room and he'd disappear to the war room or his office or wherever Pakhans went when they needed to avoid the women they'd rejected.
And every night I touched myself thinking about him.
My hand between my legs in the dark, the weighted blanket he'd given me pressing down on my body, imagining it was his weight instead. I'd picture his mouth on mine, his hands in my hair, what would have happened if he hadn't pulled away. The way he'd called me malyshka in Russian, little one, like I was something precious. I'd come thinking about being small and safe in his arms, about surrendering control to someone who actually knew what to do with it.
Then I'd feel ashamed. Because he'd rejected me. Because I should be stronger than this desperate wanting. Because good feminists didn't fantasize about mob bosses calling them little one while they got themselves off.
But I wasn't a good feminist. I was just lonely and scared and so tired of being the only one holding myself together.
I knocked on his door. Two sharp raps.
"Come in."
His office was smaller than I'd expected for a Pakhan. Masculine but not ostentatious—dark wood desk, leather chairs, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves filled with volumes in Russian and English. Three monitors on one wall showing security feeds. A chess board on the side table, mid-game, like he played against himself when he couldn't sleep.
Nikolai sat behind his desk wearing a navy button-down with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His dark hair was slightly damp like he'd showered recently. He looked up when I entered, and those grey eyes tracked over me in one quick assessment before he caught himself and looked away.
