"I'm focusing on my career right now."
"Yes, I heard about your presentation today." His tone sharpened. "Richard Brown called me. Said it was adequate but that your attention to detail needs work."
The betrayal hit me like a physical blow. Mr. Brown had called my father. To report on my performance like I were a child whose parent-teacher conference hadn't gone well.
"I didn't know you and Mr. Brown were in touch," I managed.
"Richard and I have maintained a professional relationship despite my... setbacks. He's doing me a favor, keeping an eye on you. Making sure you don't embarrass the family name further."
Further.As if I'd been the one to commit securities fraud. As if I'd been the one to destroy everything.
"I have to go, Dad." My voice came out flat, dead. "I'll see you at the gala."
I ended the call before he could respond and stood on the dark sidewalk, shaking with rage and humiliation and something that felt terrifyingly close to grief.
He would never see me. Would never look at me and see a person instead of an extension of himself, a chess piece to be moved around his shrinking board. I could work myself to death at that firm, could single-handedly save their quarterly profits, and he'd still only see his disappointing daughter who needed to be managed.
The rain started—cold, fat drops that splattered against my coat and ran down my face. Or maybe those were tears. I couldn't tell anymore.
I walked the rest of the way home in the rain, not bothering to hurry. By the time I reached my building, I was soaked through and shivering.
My apartment felt emptier than usual. I peeled off my wet clothes, wrapped myself in a robe, and stood at the window with a cup of tea I didn't really want.
The street below was quiet. No black SUV. No watchers in the shadows. Just puddles reflecting streetlights and the occasional car swishing past on the wet asphalt.
I should have felt relieved. Instead, I felt foolish. Paranoid. Exactly as crazy as I'd accused myself of being.
But underneath the self-recrimination, something else lingered. A memory of green eyes in a coffee shop. A presence that had felt, for one electric moment, like being truly seen.
I pressed my forehead against the cold glass and watched the empty street, feeling more alone than I'd ever felt in my life.
Chapter 4 - Vasily
Sleep had become a foreign concept.
I stood at the penthouse windows as dawn broke over Manhattan, my third glass of vodka untouched on the table beside me. The city was waking up—delivery trucks rumbling down empty streets, early joggers cutting through Central Park, the first commuters emerging from subway stations like ants from a disturbed hill. From forty stories up, they all looked insignificant. Interchangeable. Lives that would unfold and end without ever touching mine.
But somewhere in the West Village, one woman was probably still sleeping. Or maybe she was already awake, standing at her own window, watching her own street with those wary dark eyes that had haunted me through the night.
I'd made a mistake yesterday. A serious one.
The coffee shop had been an indulgence I couldn't afford. I'd told myself I just wanted to see her up close, outside the sterile distance of surveillance photos and secondhand reports. I'd wanted to smell her perfume, hear her voice, confirm that the woman who'd invaded my every waking thought was real and not some fever dream conjured by too many sleepless nights.
But I hadn't anticipated the impact of standing beside her. Of feeling the warmth radiating from her body, close enough to touch. Of watching her turn toward me, her lips slightly parted, her eyes widening as our gazes locked.
She'd looked like she'd been crying. The realization had hit me like a blade between the ribs. Something had hurt her—I'd learned later from Kirill's morning report that her presentation had gone poorly, that her bastard of a boss had humiliated her in front of colleagues. The knowledge mademe want to find Richard Brown and teach him exactly what happened to men who made Gabrielle Blanchard cry.
Instead, I'd fled the coffee shop like a coward. Because if I'd stayed one second longer, I would have spoken to her. Would have introduced myself, inserted myself into her life in a way I couldn't undo. And despite my obsession—or perhaps because of it—I knew that was a line I shouldn't cross.
She was a civilian. She had no place in my world. The kindest thing I could do was worship her from a distance and never let her know I existed.
But God, those eyes. The startled recognition in them, as if some part of her had known me too.
My phone buzzed, shattering the reverie. A message from Vartan:Trophy Room. One hour. We have a problem.
I drained the vodka in one swallow, welcoming the burn. Whatever the problem was, it would give me something to focus on besides the woman I couldn't have.
***
