Ice flooded my veins. If Dorian saw us, everything would unravel.
“Keep your head down and keep walking,” I whispered, tightening my grip on Griffin’s arm. “Don’t look toward the corner table.”
“What is it?” he asked, keeping his voice low but thankfully he didn’t break stride and continued steering us toward our exit.
“Not now,” I hissed.
My heart pounded in my chest as we passed within meters of Dorian, the sound of his clipped voice drifting over the restaurant’s ambient noise.
“...understood. I’ll have the reports on your desk first thing.”
We made it through the kitchen without incident, Chef Niran beaming and pressing a small package of Thai sweets into my hands as we thanked him. But my hands were shaking as I took them.
“Who was it?” Griffin asked as we hurried toward the street.
“Dorian.”
“Fuck.” He ran a hand through his hair, quickening our pace toward where he’d parked the Aston. “Do you think he saw us?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. His back was to us, but...” I swallowed hard and checked my phone. No missed calls, no angry textsfrom my father. “If he’d seen us, my phone would already be ringing.”
Griffin opened the car door for me. Once we were both inside, he sat still for a moment, hands gripping the steering wheel.
“So we’re probably safe?” he asked.
“Probably,” I said, though my heart was still hammering. “Just a horrible coincidence.”
“Okay good.” He blew out a breath and started the car, the engine purring to life. This time.
We drove in tense silence, the magical evening shattered by reality creeping back in. I shouldn’t have agreed to go out. We never should have risked it.
If Griffin left Aedris, this would be easier. My father wouldn’t have leverage over him anymore which would solve so many of my problems.
But I couldn’t ask him to do that. If he upended his life because I was too much of a coward to stand up to Julian, I’d never forgive myself.
Griffin’s hand found mine across the console, warm and steady. “Don’t let him ruin this.”
I turned to look at him, this beautiful, reckless man who’d somehow crashed into my carefully ordered life. “Ruin what, exactly?”
His eyes met mine briefly before returning to the road. “Tonight. Us. Whatever this is.”
“And what is this, Griffin?”
He didn’t answer immediately, his thumb tracing circles on my palm. “Worth fighting for.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
GRIFFIN
“Easy, Princess.”
Violet’s knee knocked against mine for the third time in ten minutes. She jerked away each time like I’d electrocuted her, which was doing absolutely nothing to help my focus. We’d been airborne for two hours and she’d yet to relax.
“Sorry,” she muttered, shifting further into her seat.
I glanced up from my tablet where I’d been reviewing telemetry data from Singapore. She sat rigidly upright, fingers twisting her rings, gaze fixed on the window like the clouds held answers to whatever was making her so bloody twitchy.
“You’re wound tight enough to snap.”
