“You want the truth?” His forest-green eyes narrow. “Anton Lebedev is alive.”
My breath freezes.
“He’s running a rogue syndicate,” Damian continues, “trading digital blackmail, sabotage, and intelligence. He’s been a whisper for years. You digging into those archives? That was bait. It’s designed to flush out anyone still clawing at his old crimes.”
I step closer.
“Why hide the files at all? Why bury them under encryption that shouldn’t exist?”
He holds my stare, but his eyes flicker momentarily.
“Because some secrets kill families faster than bullets.”
It hits like a thin blade. My throat tightens with fury.
“You’re telling me to stop looking,” I say. “To stay in my lane.”
His jaw flexes.
“I’m telling you to survive.”
The air curdles with tension. The space between us shrinks, becomes charged the way storms are charged before lightning chooses its victim.
He steps toward me, just a half inch, but it feels like an intrusion straight into my chest.
“Harper,” he murmurs.
The way he says my name—low, threaded with something he won’t admit—sends a heat through me that I hate.
“I don’t need your protection,” I say. “I need the truth.”
“You won’t like it.”
“Try me.”
His eyes darken, a shadowed storm. “You think I enjoy holding pieces back? You think I don’t want to tell you everything? There are lines you cross and never come back from.”
I swallow hard. The truth in his voice is worse than intimidation. It’s intimate.
“Then why hide them?” I whisper. “Why hide anything from me?”
His breath shifts, nearly a plea. He’s too close now.
I can smell his wintry scent, all metal and the faint edge of exhaustion. The memory of his mouth, months old and still infuriatingly vivid, shadows the air between us.
For a heartbeat, the room feels too small. Too warm. Too dangerous.
His eyes drop to my mouth.
The ground under my feet tilts. Anger surges through me like a firewall rebooting.
“Don’t,” I breathe, heat curling in my chest. “Don’t look at me like that and then tell me to stay away.”
“You think I want distance?” His voice is rougher now, a rasp dragged over steel. “You think this is easy?”
“Nothing about you is easy.”
“Nothing about you is safe.”
