He's being careful with me.
I hate that I notice. I hate that it helps.
The bowl is half empty when something changes.
He goes still. Not the careful stillness from before—something else. His head turns toward the window, nostrils flaring. His whole body shifts, weight dropping, hands spreading at his sides.
"What—"
"Quiet." His hand comes up.Stay.
Every trace of the orc who laughed at my borrowed shirt is gone. What's left is something older. Something that makes the hair on my arms stand up.
He moves to the window. Something that big shouldn't move that quiet. He pulls the curtain back an inch. Peers into the darkness.
I've stopped breathing.
Then I see his face.
His lips have pulled back from his tusks. Not a snarl—something worse. Something hungry. His eyes have gone flat,pupils blown wide, and there's nothing human in them. Nothing thinking. Just the pure, cold calculation of something deciding whether to kill.
The fork slips from my fingers. Clatters against the bowl.
His head snaps toward me.
For one heartbeat, he looks at me the way he looked at whatever's outside. Like I'm prey. Like I'm meat.
Then it's gone.
He blinks. His face shifts back to something I recognize—guarded, gruff, controlled. But I saw what was underneath. I saw what lives behind his eyes when he stops holding it back.
He sees me seeing it.
My chair scrapes back. I don't remember standing.
Every instinct I have saysrun. Get to the bedroom. Lock the door. Find something heavy. But my legs won't move because the thing between me and the door is the thing I'd be running from.
I'm trapped.
For three seconds, I am genuinely afraid he's going to kill me.
Something shutters in his expression. He turns back to the window. When he speaks, his voice is flat. Dead.
"Deer. Heard it in the brush."
I don't answer. Can't.
He lets the curtain fall. Doesn't look at me again.
"You should know the rules," he says, and crosses to the counter. Puts the whole kitchen between us.
The distance is deliberate. He's not giving me space.
He's giving himself a cage.
My heart is still pounding. "Nova already—"
"Nova gave you the overview. I'm giving you the details." He leans against the counter, arms crossed. "No one comes to this cottage. No one. I've arranged for my bike to be moved, so there's nothing outside to signal someone's here. As far asanyone knows, I'm in New York on club business. And no one visits me out here anyway, so we're covered."
